DWI Deaths: Is It Murder?

Recently, I watched a clip from an episode of 60 Minutes on CBS titled DWI Deaths: Is It Murder? While extremely sad this video really hit home with me, and I really thought that it properly addressed the ideas that I was trying to address in my project. This video was really powerful and I think that it would be great for everyone who visits my display at the Marketplace of Ideas to watch it, so I am going to have it up on a laptop. The story is about the Flynn family. The Flynns were at a wedding and in order to remain safe and be able to dance and party all night, they hired a limo to take them home from the wedding. While they made an appropriate, safe decision in order to keep themselves safe, Martin Heidgen, a drunk, 24-year old insurance salesman, unfortunately was not as smart. Despite his friends warning him not to drive, with a BAC of over three times the legal driving limit, Heidgen got in his pickup truck and was driving the wrong way down the interstate that the Flynns were on. He slammed into their limo, instantly killing the limo driver, decapitating the Flynn’s beautiful 7-year-old daughter, and causing life threatening injuries to the remaining passengers in the limo. Although it is extremely rare in America, Heidgen was charged with murder by depraved indifference, a much more serious charge than the standard manslaughter charge that is usually given in these cases. Manslaughter comes with a sentence of probation to 15 years, while murder comes with a mandatory penalty of 15 years to life. Kathleen Rice, the district attorney who prosecuted the case, has become a forefront in the fight against drunk drivers. She understands the horrible ways in which a poor decision can change the lives of an innocent family, and she has been working day in and day out in order to change the way in which our nation views and punishes drunk driving. Rice has made it her passion to go against drunk drivers and prosecute them to the fullest. Driving drunk is “as inevitable as taking a gun and firing it at an individual who’s standing five feet away from you,” she says. It is something that can easily be avoided, and for that reason, it is unacceptable that people can get away with murdering someone else and blaming their actions on the effects of the alcohol.

Should Your Car Test if You’ve Been Drinking?

This article, from CBS News, talks about the ROADS SAFE Act and both sides of the argument about whether or not it is a good idea. The first thing that this article mentioned, that I had yet to understand, was that this technology would be an optional tool to put into cars. The ROADS SAFE Act is just for the funding to research the technology. After the technology is designed, it would be up to the government to decide if this would be something required for every car or an optional feature. While there are many people who are for this type of technology, there are definitely people who are against it, especially because they feel as if it will be something required in cars and that it will become very intrusive and that it could cause people who were not drunk from being unable to drive their cars. While the legal limit is .08, some people feel as if this technology would be set so that the cars detected alcohol at .03 or .04. The reason for this is because alcohol needs time to work its way through the body. Someone could have a bunch of quick drinks and then get into their car, but their blood alcohol level would still be below .08 because they hadn’t given the alcohol time to absorb into their bloodstream. Setting the limit on these devices to a lower blood alcohol level would help prevent these types of situations because the system would detect the alcohol even before it increased the blood alcohol level, but it also poses a problem for the person that goes and has one drink at dinner and is still capable of driving home. As stated before, this technology could potentially save 9,000 lives by eliminating the possibility of drunk driving, lives that are invaluable.

Representative Jerry F. Costello

I read a letter that Representative Jerry F. Costello, who is a Democrat from Illinois, wrote regarding the ROADS SAFE Act and his opposition. I thought that it would be very interesting to read an opinion of someone who was opposed to the act in order to get the other perspective. Costello raised some very good points on why the ROADS SAFE Act is not a good idea, and I think that there are definitely things that would need to be thought of before this t4echnology was created. The first thing that he mentioned was false positives. There are many medications, mouthwashes, and toothpastes that contain a large amount of alcohol in them. If the system were to detect this alcohol, the car would not start, even though the driver wasn’t drunk. Next, the idea of a device malfunction was introduced. Like any other electronic equipment, it is very likely that the technology would fail. What would happen in a life or death situation when the car couldn’t be started due to an error? Or what if the car was already started and then it malfunctioned and turned the car off? This could create potential dangers that could result in major accidents or fatalities. The last thing that I thought was definitely something that would be important to consider is the price. Currently, our economy is suffering and prices of cars are increasing, but would this technology cause an even greater increase? All of these things would need to be addressed and resolved before these devices could go into production.

Udall, Corker Introduce ROADS SAFE Act

This article that I read goes into more detail about the ROADS SAFE Act and explains what its purpose is. The ROADS SAFE Act was introduced by New Mexico Senator Tom Udall and Tennessee Senator Bob Corker.  The entire legislation was designed to reduce the amount of drunk driving crashes and fatalities by developing new technologies that prevent drunk drivers from starting their vehicles. The funding from this program would go to NHTSA and DADSS who would use this money to explore a variety of emerging technologies such as devices that determine a driver’s blood alcohol level by touching the steering wheel or engine start button. In addition, technology is being researched that would have sensors in a car that would passively monitor a driver’s breath or eye movements in order to determine their sobriety (or lack thereof). The entire purpose of this legislation is to eliminate drunk driving fatalities and save lives because just one drunk driving death should be unacceptable throughout our society.

The ROADS SAFE Act

I read a bill that was introduced to Congress that directly pertains to my topic for this project. This bill that has been introduced to congress is called the Research of Alcohol Detection Systems for Stopping Alcohol-related Fatalities Everywhere Act of 2011, or the ROADS SAFE Act of 2011. This bill was designed as a way to prevent drunk driving injuries and fatalities across the country. Currently, 1/3 of all highway fatalities in the United States are due to alcohol-impaired accidents. If alcohol detection technologies were more widely used throughout the United States to help prevent alcohol-impaired drivers from driving a vehicle, it is estimated that 9,000 road traffic deaths would be prevented. This act asks that $12,000,000 be given to the government for the next 5 years to help develop such technology to help eliminate alcohol-related fatalities.

Drunk Driving: Is the Blood Alcohol Limit Too Liberal?

This article, by TIME magazine, highlighted the differences between the laws in the United States and other countries around the world. In Sweden, the legal BAC limit for drivers is .02, while it is .08 in the U.S. Only 15 other countries throughout the world, besides the U.S., have a limit of .08. Many of the countries in Europe have laws of .05 or lower for BAC levels. As I stated in one of my earlier blog posts, .08 is way too high for the BAC limit. According to the University of Oklahoma Police Department, a 180 pound male would blow a .08 BAC level after consuming six 12 oz beers or five gin-and-tonics over just two hours. This is an extremely large amount of alcohol to be consuming, and the thought of it being a legal amount to drive with is very frightening. Having people on the road after drinking six beers is not safe at all because anybody would be slightly altered after consuming that much alcohol.

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 11,773 people died in drug driving related accidents in the United States in 2008. If the United States had a lower limit, this number would definitely be a lot lower. During 2007 in the U.S., 31.7% of traffic fatalities were alcohol related while only 16% of road fatalities in Sweden were related to alcohol. This drastic difference can be attributed to the fact that Sweden changed their BAC threshold from .05 to .02. Similarly, after Switzerland and France both lowered their limits to .05, the amount of alcohol related fatalities almost instantly declined in both cases. It is very obvious that .08 is way too large of a number, and the United States needs to follow in the footsteps of other countries throughout the world and change the laws in order to keep our citizens safe on the roads.