Old Out-of-State DUIs Blocking a Washington License

Attorney Answer

After nineteen years, the two Montana convictions by themselves are almost certainly not what is stopping you. Something attached to them was never closed out — and until you get the exact reason off your record, nobody can fix it.

Why Montana convictions ever reached your Washington license. Washington's enactment of the Driver License Compact is chapter 46.21 RCW, with the compact text at RCW 46.21.010. Under Article IV, the licensing authority in the home state must, for purposes of suspension, revocation, or limitation of the license to operate a motor vehicle, give the same effect to reported out-of-state conduct as it would if that conduct had occurred in the home state — for enumerated violations including driving a motor vehicle while under the influence of intoxicating liquor or a narcotic drug. That is the pipeline that carried the Montana convictions onto your Washington record.

Why their age matters. RCW 46.65.020 defines a habitual traffic offender by reference to a five-year window: three or more convictions within five years for enumerated serious offenses — vehicular homicide, vehicular assault, DUI, driving while license suspended or revoked, hit and run, reckless driving, physical control while under the influence, or attempting to elude police — or twenty or more convictions within five years for separate and distinct traffic offenses, with at least three of those in the 365 days immediately preceding the last conviction. Two DUI convictions do not reach the three-conviction threshold, and a five-year window that opened nineteen years ago closed long ago.

So on the arithmetic alone, those two convictions should not be generating a fresh bar today. The likelier explanations are administrative: a revocation that was entered and never formally terminated, reinstatement requirements that were never completed, or a hold still sitting on the Montana side that Washington will not work around. Do not blend clocks, either — the lookback periods used for criminal DUI sentencing are a different rule from the administrative provisions above and do not decide what the licensing agency will do.

What you can do 1. Order your complete Washington driving record from the Department of Licensing — not the abstract an employer buys, the full record. It shows the action taken, the date, and the basis. 2. Order your Montana driving record too. If Montana still shows an open suspension or revocation, Washington is unlikely to issue while that stands. 3. Ask the Department of Licensing, in writing, for the specific statutory basis of the current denial and what it requires you to do. Keep the written answer. 4. Clear the Montana side first if the records show anything unresolved there — finishing what Montana still requires is usually the unlock. 5. Complete every Washington reinstatement condition on the list — fees, any required proof of financial responsibility, any reexamination, any evaluation or treatment requirement. Do them in the order given and keep receipts. 6. If you receive a formal denial, read the letter for its own review route and deadline and act inside it — that letter, not the old convictions, becomes the thing you are contesting. 7. Take both records to a lawyer who handles licensing matters if the stated reason does not make sense. With the records in hand this is often a short conversation.