[Blessings2You]

I'm so angry and upset, I've been in tears. Last night in Burlington, a woman was killed by a drunk driver with FIVE PRIOR drunk driving convictions and a VALID driver's license. She died instantly.

Five prior convictions? When is a repeat drunk driver going to be treated as the menace to society that he/she is, and taken off the streets? I don't mean take a way the license...that's a joke when it comes to "hard core" drunks. I mean jail. For a long time.

I realize that a first-time drunk driver can just as easily kill someone. But repeat offending says something about that person: he or she either can't or won't stop, and WE have to stop that person from driving ever again.

[Dejibo]

When I used to drive with my first husband I would simply be in prayer the whole time. Prayer to arrive home alive. Prayer that a cop would be waiting. Prayer that he wouldnt kill us or someone else on the way home. I would beg to drive and it would reach the level of violence before he would demand that I get in the dang car.

If their license is taken away, they drive anyway. If they are fined, they refuse to pay, and somehow they never chase them for contempt of court. They play pity stories upon the court about needing to support their families, and permission to drive to and from work.

Remember the woman on the highway a couple of years back that slammed into wrong way traffic and killed all but one child in her own car? Her family claims they had no idea she had been drinking at that picnic. BS!

When I worked in prison and as a medic I would ask why we were not taking this drunk to jail, instead of the hospital and would be told all about how Alcoholics are sick, and need hospital and medical care, not punishment. That used to anger me to my core!

Drive drunk once and you lose your license, do it twice and lose your freedom. Kill or injure someone while out there, and not only do you lose your freedom, but your family should be hauled into court to explain why they didnt report you. Its so important for loved ones to stand up and say NO! I wont get in the car with you, and NO! I wont stand here in silence. If you leave this spot, I am calling the cops with your license plate number and direction. My ex never had a single accident while blasted, but it was not for his skill, it was blind luck.

[Kitty]

I hate alcohol. I just don't see the purpose of it. Nothing good comes of it. People who drink and then get behind the wheel of a car are lower than low in my opinion. The laws are not near strict enough. IMHO.....too many lawyers and not enough laws. Punishment should be swift and severe.

[SallyC]

Oh no, that's just awful. They won't let us with MS drive because of the POSSIBLE problem, but the give the drunk carte blanche..

I think it's because lawyers and judges are all closet drunks, themselves, so they let them down easy.

Saying a prayer for poor dear woman!!

[Erin524]

I have a special hatred for drunk drivers.

My mother was nearly killed when she was 17 by a drunk driver. She lived, otherwise I wouldnt be here, but she didnt come out of it without some damage.

She was unconscious for five weeks. This was back in 1957 when they really couldnt do much for people in a comatose state. One day she just woke up. Took her a couple of years to recover. She had to wear special prisms in her glasses because she had some strange diplopia, and because of that head injury she's always had a bit of a temper...as she's gotten older, it's gotten more difficult for her to keep control of her temper, and she's also had problems with her memory at times. The memory problems werent too bad, but they've gotten worse as she's gotten older. People in her family typically havent had alzheimerish problems...so it's weird for people on her side of the family to deal with her. They dont have the experience for it.

My mom also has some problems with her back and legs and knees from the accident. She didnt have any broken bones (surprising) but she's had a lot of problems with back pain that they said could be traced back to that accident.

Guy that hit her was in an old pickup...my mom was in a car that was on the side of the road. It was a friend of her's car, they were having some car problems and my mom stayed in the car while her friend went to talk to some other friends that had stopped to help them with the car. Drunk came over the hill, (think) he crossed the center line and slammed into the car my mom was in on the side of the road. She got thrown out of the car and across the road. Had a contra-coup concussion. (basically means that her brain got hit twice...or more)

I really hate drunk drivers.

My hometown (Omaha, NE) has been having a big problem with drunk drivers killing people lately. Recently a guy from Omaha got drunk and was driving on the interstate in Iowa and hit FOUR motorcyclists (two from Omaha) and killed all four of them.

Another drunk putz hit a car this summer being driven by a local doctor (co-worker of my dad) and killed him and injured his two sons that were in the car with him. That accident happened at EIGHT AM! The doctor that died, was driving one of his kids to school for his first day of school. The drunk guy said he'd had a "couple of drinks" the night before, but that he wasnt drunk when the accident happened. (his blood alcohol was off the charts)

That drunk was in the hospital for awhile and I know some of the people who work at that hospital in the kitchen. They told me that when they'd deliver his food, he was constantly ordering pie and acting as if his stay in the hospital was a vacation. Said he was mad that they wouldnt let him go home, and he has no money, so the state was paying for his medical care because he was arrested and under guard...so he was going to take advantage of the government paying for his medical care. Ordered pie like it was going out of style. He gained a ton of weight while he was in the hospital. I hope that jerk dies of a heart attack or that he develops diabetes and loses a kidney or two.

People like that, with no apparent remorse for what they've done. Makes you wish the drunk died in the accident and that the people he/she/they killed had lived.

There have been so many drunk driver accidents in Omaha lately, most of them resulting in the death of some innocent victim. I'm half afraid to go out on the road anymore.

I think drunks should go directly to jail if they cause an injury or death. Life imprisonment especially if they caused a death...with hard labor.

[NeuroNixed Craig]

As a Police Officer arresting as many DWI's as possible, I had a certain knack for it or maybe I just attracted them, not sure. When going to court their attorney would always come up and want to plea bargain down to improper driving of something even more stupid.

My stance was very solid, presented with a very cold stare and the sincerity of certain death. I would simply say, "In my opinion there is no negotiation for what I believe should be a first offense "FELONY!" The attorney would then excuse himself and ironically, when the case was called, there was no attorney representing the defendant. Geee! I wonder why?

Let's not discount the fact that someone "enabled" this person to get to this state unless they were drinking in a locked closet.

[Erin524]

That guy I mentioned that killed the four motorcyclists in Iowa earlier this year...pretty sure they have video of this moron stopping at a gas station, stumbling in and going to the cooler where he grabbed a bottle of some sort of alcohol (beer? maybe?) and then he went up and paid for the alcohol and the MORON CASHIER SOLD IT TO HIM! (hope he gets jail too...)

Witnesses who followed him back out onto the interstate said it was obvious when he came into the gas station that he was plastered. A couple of them were desperately trying to call the IA state police/hwy patrol and trying to get him stopped when he barreled head-on into the motorcycles. (crossed the center line in the middle of a construction zone)

I had to look it up, he had a blood alcohol of .373, which according to the article I read was enough alcohol to kill a non-drinker.

The guy that killed the doctor (which happened 2 days after the 4 motorcyclists were killed) had a BAC of .308

Another drunk driver who killed a woman and injured her new husband (think they were only married 5 weeks) a few months ago had a BAC of .137. That guy had a previous drunk driving conviction, and so did the guy who killed the motorcyclists. Guy who killed the newlywed woman also had been arrested 6 weeks before that for drunk driving.

Most of these people who drink and drive do it more than once. They're given a pansy slap on the wrist and told to not do it again and "go get treatment". If they would change the law so that anyone who is convicted of drunk driving resulting in an injury/death to another person gets sent to jail for life with no parole, maybe then the number of people being killed/injured by drunks would go down.

Like I said, I have a special hatred for drunk drivers. I had a close call once with a drunk driver. My mom and I had just left a McD's here in town. We were sitting in a turn lane, waiting for the light to change when a black car came speeding down the street towards us. He hit the cement median in the middle of the street and went airborne and was coming towards us. Came down directly BEHIND my mom's car. (I think I was about 16yrs old at the time). Literally just missed us.

He was plastered...and killed. Thank goodness he didnt kill me and my mom. My dad was freaked for months after that. It had been tradition for my mom to take me out on saturday nights to go buy an early sunday paper and take me to McD's. That ended that weekend. My dad would not let us out of his sight for months. My mom would still go get her early sunday paper, but would come straight home after getting it.

I really did not realize how close we came to being victims until my dad reminded me that we witnessed that accident. Now I can remember how freaked out I was when that car launched into the air and was coming towards us. I can remember getting out of the car and running across the street into the McD's to tell them to call the police. I didnt need to tell them...the manager (a friend of my mom's) saw the whole thing and thought that he was about to see us get killed. He thought that the car had hit the back of ours when it came back down, but it didnt touch us that I can remember.

So, yes, serious hatred here of drunk drivers. When a drunk hits another car or runs down a pedestrian, it's not an "accident". An accident implies that something went terribly wrong and the person(s) hurt were in the wrong place at the wrong time.

When a drunk causes an accident. I think it's murder...first degree. The drunk intentionally got plastered, and then intentionally got into a car and drove. Yes, their judgment was affected by the alcohol, but if they hadnt made the decision to drink till their brain was mush, they wouldnt have killed someone in the first place. They made the decision to get drunk, so they should accept the consequences and go to jail.

Judges need to stop giving these people second and 10th chances at "turning themselves around". If I were ever allowed to be a judge, drunk drivers would be getting sent to jail left and right. For as long as they could be sent to jail.

[Kitty]

Originally Posted by NeuroNixed Craig

As a Police Officer arresting as many DWI's as possible, I had a certain knack for it or maybe I just attracted them, not sure. When going to court their attorney would always come up and want to plea bargain down to improper driving of something even more stupid.

My stance was very solid, presented with a very cold stare and the sincerity of certain death. I would simply say, "In my opinion there is no negotiation for what I believe should be a first offense "FELONY!" The attorney would then excuse himself and ironically, when the case was called, there was no attorney representing the defendant. Geee! I wonder why?

Let's not discount the fact that someone "enabled" this person to get to this state unless they were drinking in a locked closet.

Craig, when my son was a patrol officer he'd have to appear in court numerous times for drunk drivers he arrested. It was amazing to me how many times court dates were postponed or canceled. By the time the case was heard it was sometimes more than a year since the incident! Plus, many lawyers hoped the police officer won't show up. I think my son would have come to court even if he had been on vacation! He really had a dislike for the chemically impaired drivers.

[Blessings2You]

My opinion is that a stiff sentence for a drunk that kills somebody is the right thing to do because it will stop THAT drunk from ever hurting anybody again.

It also might make the social drinker get more serious about making sure he/she has a designated driver.

For the true "drunk", the potential repeat offender, I don't think the thought of a possible life sentence or any OTHER thought goes through a drunk's mind when he's drunk. That's why they get behind the wheel again, license or no license. I have known drunks that don't even REMEMBER they don't have licenses once they've had a few.

Driving after drinking is no different than driving by a McDonald's and firing random rifle shots through the windows. It needs to be treated as the violent crime it is.

[Dejibo]

When my ex would demand to drive the car he had no idea just how drunk he was. He didnt care about the law, he didnt care about killing someone, he didnt care about killing me. He only cared about getting his way and proving to me that he had not lost control. At that moment it wouldnt have mattered what the law says or how many got a life sentence. He didnt believe himself to be compromised. He believed me to be controlling, manipulative and picking on him.

In a sober moment he would say things like "why didnt you stop me?!" or OMG I cant believe I got home safe. I would burst into tears and explain to him just how out of control he was and he would say "you are making too much out of this. I got us home, didnt I?" Alcohol is a disease of denial. They are good at it. "I can quit drinking anytime I choose" or "its only beer!" or "why are you picking on me?! I dont drink as much as (fill in any name) so back off me!" They are simply not capable of controlling their behavior and have no clue how bad it is, because they cant see themselves when drunk. I wish I had a cell phone camera back then.

It will only work when our courts stop coddling them. Drive drunk, do community service, AND go to rehab! do it twice, loose your freedom. its jail time! more than a weekend. I cant tell you how many drunk drivers would check in my jail for a weekend sentence. A six month sentence to be served on weekends so they could continue to go to work all week. Ok, so they got to keep their job, their family and ability to make money, AND on the weekend got to escape their chores, family obligations, and got free medical care, free education, dental...whats the down side? Too many lawyers say "been there, done that, whats the big deal?"

Makes me sick!