A drunk driver took another life in Seattle last weekend, in South Park, as the P-I reports today. With the cases of Susan West and Mary Jane Rivas fresh in mind, tolerance for intoxicated drivers is wearing awfully thin. And now, it turns out the Alki DUI deaths last Sunday are even spookier than reported in Seattle dailies so far. We already know that Roy Espiritu, 17, killed himself and another passenger when at 5 a.m. - and after police say he just had alcohol - he drove into Puget Sound at a speed of up to 100 mph. But dailies in Tacoma and Bellingham and Longview carry an AP report he had an online paean to booze at MySpace. Why no coverage of that yet in Seattle dailies? The Times report yesterday plays up the Native-American ties of the other victim. Fair enough. But not enough. AP reports:
In his page on MySpace.com, Espiritu listed his interests as alcohol, beer, booze, hard liquor, spirits and wine and wrote, "Don't drink-n-drive -- Drive-n-Drink."
Parents: know your children, and their lives.
Posted by Matt Rosenberg at September 27, 2006 11:09 AM | Email ThisWhat we need is a greater culture of personal responsibility that encourages people, and especially young and inexperienced people to make good choices. I think that to a certain degree, the more we legislate safety nets the more we distract from the root problem of a culture that no longer encourages or expects people to make good choices.
I agree that parents should know their children and their lives, but I don't think this is anything new, it's mostly just a sensational story for a news media that feeds off of such vivid imagery.
Posted by: Jeff B. on September 27, 2006 11:12 AMHere is an article from the December 20, 2005 King County Journal about how Frank LaSalata, as a substitute judge, threw out the 0.132 and 0.122 breath test results for Seattle SuperSonics forward Rashard Lewis at arraignment:
http://www.kingcountyjournal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051220/ARC/512200314&SearchID=73258140637827
Without this crucial bit of evidence to use at trial, the King County Prosecuting Attorney was forced to plea bargain the charges down to reckless driving. LaSalata also presided over Lewis' plea bargain and sentencing a few months later.
The procedure in the Lewis case was unusual, and very unfair to the prosecution. Normally, motions to exclude evidence are set on a special calendar, with at least one week notice to the prosecution as required by court rules. But LaSalata allowed Lewis' attorneys to bring the motion to arraignment (where lots of ORDINARY defendants were patiently waiting for LaSalata to hopefully explain their rights to an attorney, the right to a jury trial, and other important rights) without advance notice to the prosecution. As you can see from the King County Journal article, the deputy prosecutor was quite upset at the procedure used by LaSalata.
LaSalata is now running for a regular elected seat as district court judge. LaSalata is presently 22 votes ahead of incumbent Mary Ann Ottinger for second place in this race. Depending on how the last few hundred ballots and the inevitable manual recount go, LaSalata could be facing me in the general election in November.
LaSalata was asked about the most important cases he had ever handled as a lawyer or judge. In response to the KCBA questionnaire, LaSalata listed five drunk driving cases he presided over as a substitute judge, and how he had thrown out the DUI breath test results for a variety of reasons.
Coincidentally, the majority of LaSalata's campaign contributions (other than the money coming out of his own pocket) appear to be coming from attorneys who specialize in DUI defense or other criminal defense.
As The Olympian editorial points out, only 43% of DUI charges result in convictions. 27% are pleaded to lesser charges and 17% dismissed entirely. Probably only a very small percentage of these DUI dismissals result from having a jury trial where the judge has allowed the BAC breath test results to be presented in evidence to the jury.
Posted by: Richard Pope on September 27, 2006 11:28 AMFor any driver under 21. Any DUI, reckless, or negligent citation results in the loss of the license until age 21. The 3rd traffic infraction would also invoke this punishment. The car is also confiscated, no matter if owned by the parents or not. If its the parents car they needed extend more control over the driver. Any vehicle driven by a suspended driver under 21 is simply gone.
Make driving while stupid hurt and hurt badly, the learning curve for driving is pretty steep, the loss of a license is car is damn cheap compared to cost of the Alki crash, 2 dead and a totaled car.
In general my idea for DUI is simple direct and designed to get the offenders undivided attention.
1st offense -- loss of license for 1 year and loss of the car. Caught driving in that year the loss of license becomes permanent and the car is lost. I am willing to give them one and only one chance to learn the lesson.
2nd offense -- permanent loss of the drivers license, and loss of the car. Caught driving after that drunk or not counts as an DUI offense.
3rd offense -- 5 years and loss of the car.
4th offense -- 25 years and loss of the car.
5th time -- life.
Until we get serious about DUI and make the offense have serious long lasting consequences on the life and life style of the offender nothing will change.
I learned my lesson 2 months after my 16th birthday. I joined the volunteer FD as soon as I had my license, we could join at 16 back then. 2 months later I was putting a DUI with virtually every bone broken in a body bag.
Posted by: JCM on September 27, 2006 11:45 AMI see a lot of really dangerous and reckless driving that goes unpunished, and in most cases, I think it people who are not DUI, but simply driving reckless. Just last week my brother was involved in a hit and run during the morning commute. Police, and our legal system seem to be hyper focused on DUI instead of on bad driving and / or dangerous and distracted driving as a whole. I see this as a big problem because police focus less on bad driving and more on looking for DUI drivers, however slight their level of intoxication because they are easier to catch and easier to book on probable cause. DUI drivers thus become the poster children for a much larger problem of bad driving.
I think we see the same thing in the medical world with AIDS. AIDS is not anywhere near the killer of other diseases, but it has an attached "cause" and a crusade and lobbyists, and hollywood adoration, etc. so it often eclipses diseases that are much greater problems.
I'm not apologizing for drunk driving, but frankly, I'd much rather see the asshole that violently cuts me off on the freeway while weaving in and out of traffic busted, because that happens far more often than drunk driving and yet is equally dangerous in potential outcome.
Posted by: Jeff B. on September 27, 2006 11:58 AMWhile it may not be much of a deterrent, at least we would eliminate a worthless segment of our society that insists on endangering all of us.
NO, I'm not joking in the slightest....
Drunk driving is given a complete pass in our society because there is so much money to made off of "treating" it. Instead of incarcerating drunk drivers, or even making it a painful experience, all we do is fine them, make them go to worthless AA meetings, and raise their insurance rates. All of this means absolutely nothing to the majority of habitual DUI violators out there - it's time we took the problem seriously and did something other than talk loudly while doing nothing.
Posted by: H Moul on September 27, 2006 12:09 PMI don't know the stats on reck and neg driving as opposed to DUI. But I would be comfortable lumping them into the same penalty scheme.
Part of the problem is the drivers ed programs. They are geared to teaching someone point their car down the road, and to pass a 25 question test. Real driving skills are not taught, defensive driving is mentioned but not taught as a skill or attitude, accident avoidance skills.
On the enforcement side, the local PD's are understaffed and traffic enforcement takes a back seat to other crime. The State Patrol is too paper driven, troopers spend far too much on documentation.
Finally we as a society accept 20,000 a year dead at the hands of DUI drivers. Witness the last leg sessions "tough" on DUI bill.
We need to dump the idea that driving is right or for that matter travel. The right to travel is not in the Constitution, but has been accepted in case law. Denying a person a drivers license merely precludes one method of travel not the ability to travel.
Driving is a privilege with heavy responsibilities. Drunk drivers however deprive 20,000 citizens a year the right to life. DUI, neg and reckless driving demonstrates a serious disregard for the responsibility of driving and callous indifference to the rights of others. As such those actions should be heavily sanctioned.
Posted by: JCM on September 27, 2006 12:51 PMI'm in agreement tough sanctions, but it should be even tougher to get a license in the first place. I see no reason why we give out as many licenses as we do. I'd make the driving test really tough, with a very tough road test. Granted it would cost more, but we could get a return on that investment through lowered insurance premiums and an overall lowering of the societal cost of driving.
Posted by: Jeff B. on September 27, 2006 01:12 PMThen last session the Democrats had the opportunity to make life tougher for repeat offenders, and they totally passed on it. They decided the cost was too high to send those who are truly a danger to society to prison.
My proposal:
First time offenders: depends on whether they were recklessly driving. If so, license suspension and heavy fine and 1 year interlock. If not, up to the judge.
Second time offenders: mandatory interlock device on any car they drive, for the rest of their life. These people are going to drive, whether they have a license or not. If they are caught driving a car without an interlock device, the car is confiscated by the state, regardless of who owns it.
Third offense: felony charge and one year in jail, no early release for good behavior.
Fourth offense: life in jail.
But I'd raise the alcohol level to .10. Otherwise it catches too many who are not a threat to public safety, and promotes the whole lawyer/court industry.
Posted by: Janet S on September 27, 2006 02:03 PM"Every year this country experiences a national tragedy that is as preventable as it is devastating," said Secretary Mineta. "We have the tools to prevent this tragedy � every car has a safety belt, every motorcycle rider should have a helmet and everyone should have enough sense to never drive while impaired".
NHTSA�s report projects a fatality rate of 1.46 deaths per 100 million vehicle miles traveled (VMT), up from the record low of 1.44 in 2004. NHTSA also found safety belt use is at 82 percent nationwide.
The report also projects the eighth straight increase in motorcycle fatalities. In 2005, 4,315 motorcyclists died, a 7.7 percent increase. In 2004, there were 4,008 motorcycle fatalities, the report said.""""""
An average of over 118 deaths per day just from auto/motorcycle wrecks. 55% of those unbelted or unhelmeted is a national disgrace.
Posted by: Pagar on September 27, 2006 02:08 PMhey--stupid act gets payoff. what about choked police officer's alleged killer gets off (no charges) in North End; what about illegal immigrant girl tossing live baby into dumpster--light or no charges.
sorry--stupidity at any age will not jerk my tears anymore. highway memorials notwithstanding. enough already with dumb perps getting the big tear. at any age.
where are the stories about good, decent kids doing great things?
Posted by: jimmie-howya-doin on September 27, 2006 02:41 PMI like your proposal, and especially raising the level to .10. I think that is reasonable and it will catch the more serious offenders. I think most people think that blowing .08 means that one is extremely drunk, when it actuality it takes very little alcohol to reach .08. Many studies have shown that one is more impaired while talking on a cell phone as compared with having a couple drinks with dinner and driving home. Yet no doubt cell phone related accidents are rapidly if not already a greater source of driver impairment and accident than alcohol. Again, not defending drunk driving, but the laws on the books now are too focused on alcohol and don't give nearly the same weight to reckless or inattentive driving sans alcohol.
Posted by: Jeff B. on September 27, 2006 03:13 PMI favor much more severe penalties for DUI, although it's somewhat arbitrary to make loss of the car a big part of the penalty -- it will just incent people to drive an old car when they want to drive drunk, and penalize poor drunk drivers more than rich ones. I have no problem penalizing poor drunk drivers, but I want to penalize rich ones too. I think even the first DUI should involve jail time and an ignition interlock (assuming they're effective -- are they?) as well as some fines, education, and loss of privileges. And I agree that the second offense should be punished much more severely.
Posted by: Bruce on September 27, 2006 04:10 PMIf we did, the Republican Party would have renounced Mike McGavick and would have found a last minute candidate to run in his place (or against him if he had refused to step down).
So, I guess this is no big deal. Just another "Mainstream" Republican hypocrisy.
Posted by: Steve on September 27, 2006 06:08 PMMisty, Ted Kennedy is not in "my" party, and anyway, I've never voted for him. What he did was inexcusable, far worse than what McGavick did. And I've said before that the DUI is the least of McGavick's flaws.
Posted by: Bruce on September 27, 2006 07:31 PMForced rehab does not work. Just suspending the license does not work. We need to have statewide enforcement of the impoundment of vehicles of drivers with suspended licenses because these drunks will drive with or without a license.
H Moul at post 5: AA meetings are worthless when a bleeding heart court gives the accused a choice of attending AA meetings or jail time. Guess which they will choose? Duh. The true purpose of AA is a very good one and the organization does not proclaim to solve the world's problems or insist on more lenient treatment of drunk drivers. What AA does advocate is a system for people who have finally realized the booze has impacted their lives and it is time to seek help and accept responsibility. It's too bad wussy judges use AA as a dumping ground for people who have no desire to sober up.
http://news.com.com/2061-10801_3-6090342.html
Using a driving simulator under four different conditions: with no distractions, using a handheld cell phone, talking on a hands-free cell phone, and while intoxicated to the 0.08 percent blood-alcohol level, 40 participants followed a simulated pace car that braked intermittently.
Researchers found that the drivers on cell phones drove more slowly, braked more slowly and were more likely to crash. In fact, the three participants who collided into the pace car were chatting away. None of the drunken drivers crashed.
"This study does not mean people should start driving drunk," said co-author Frank Drews. "It means that driving while talking on a cell phone is as bad as or maybe worse than driving drunk, which is completely unacceptable and cannot be tolerated by society."
Posted by: guest on September 27, 2006 08:46 PMWe have a law for inattentive driving which covers cell phones to lattes to baby in back.
I don't have a problem for stiff penalties for a distrated driver who are a hazard.
The big difference is the DUI driver is a hazard from the moment the key goes in the ignition, the cell phone is a hazard during the period of distraction.
Posted by: JCM on September 27, 2006 09:01 PMWe desperately need the state legislature to step up and make 3 DUI's a felony. The arguement agsinst it that seems to prevail in Olympia is that it is too costly and we already have too many people in jail.
So my question to all of you, are you willing to pay for new jails?
Posted by: Chris on September 28, 2006 11:58 AM