Our lame duck Governor Pawlenty that has this mysterious power to cloud GOP minds has now decided to solve drunk driving all by himself, proposing stiffer penalties and lower thresholds. This is obviously part of his national ambitions. It sounds good at first. Some of it I support. But requiring breath-testing ignition interlocks is going too far, particularly for first time offenders.
Our DWI laws are too harsh as it is for first time offenders who otherwise don't cause an accident or worse, i.e., pulled over by police. I've not had the experience, but I know many who have, and it's humiliating, too much so in my opinion, knowing these "perps" as I do. The current laws assume you're a habitual drunk on the first offense. I think that's both wrong and counterproductive, making those charged too angry to show any remorse. To impose further public humiliation exacts too high a price in lost respect for the law. It also "sentences" all drivers of the car, not just the offender.
I'm not belittling the 180 alcohol related deaths of last year in Minnesota, but let the punishment fit the crime. I think you should lose your license immediately for 30 to 180 days depending on the circumstances, plus pay a fine, towing if necessary. But then after carefully explaining what will happen next time, accident or no, let it go at that. I believe our roads will be safer if we focus our limited resources on those who truly do have a problem.
How odd. I see it exactly the opposite. I have long favored the Swedish system: First offense you lose your license AND your car, and you never drive again. If you do, we switch to the Albanian system: Bang! There are no third offenses.
The purpose of DWI laws should not be to punish, but to effectively and as near completely as practicable to eliminate the crime. Make the penalty high enough so that people will consider how they will get home BEFORE they leave for the bar. There are many options; they do NOT need to be driving impaired and endangering others.
Posted by: J. Ewing | Wednesday, January 20, 2010 at 08:47 AM
You might as well close all the bars, then.
Posted by: Speed Gibson | Wednesday, January 20, 2010 at 01:10 PM
I agree with the first comment.
It's not a hard sell with to strengthen drunk driving penalties. Let's see, the common consequence on drunk driving is death. An innocent person dies or some drunk loses their license and is forced to have a breath-testing ignition interlocks. Hmm, wow, I can't see how voters fall on that one. Obviously Pawlenty wants to leave office on a high note.
Posted by: Brent M | Wednesday, January 20, 2010 at 10:17 PM
Second offense I'm with you. First event and you hit somebody, I'm with you. But otherwise, I don't like false accusations and other tactics that I've heard about too many times.
Posted by: Speed Gibson | Wednesday, January 20, 2010 at 11:02 PM
There is an alternative to harsh penalties. The only reason those are necessary is because we can only enforce those penalties on a very limited subset of those engaging in DWI behavior. People think they can escape the penalty so we make the potential penalty very high in hopes of reversing behavior. But suppose we change enforcement? How about we allow law enforcement to park outside random bars and observe patrons going to their vehicles? Anybody getting into their car alone would be subject to a "stop" before they got started. And if you don't like that "intrusion," an ignition interlock is a great technical alternative.
Here's the test of what we ought to be considering: Do most DWI-related deaths involve first offenders or repeat offenders? The answer is the behavior that has to be stopped. You don't have to close all the bars; you don't even have to station police outside every bar every day. You just have to put a definite stop to premeditated murder.
Posted by: J. Ewing | Wednesday, January 20, 2010 at 11:40 PM
I don't see taking away the privilege of driving is any sort of punishment at all. It's both in the interest of the offender and in the rest of us.
Posted by: Hiram | Thursday, January 21, 2010 at 06:30 AM
I think the answer to JE's question has been found to be the repeat offenders, many times. TV stations have run features showing 9 time offenders, their licenses revoked years ago, driving to their court appearance for #10.
That's what really angers me. Seems like the third time should be hard time, but we keep reading about 13'ers out and about on our roads.
Posted by: Speed Gibson | Thursday, January 21, 2010 at 07:48 AM
One reason we have repeat offenders is that driver licenses are not taken away after first offenses.
A mere drunken driving conviction is in fact a lucky break, and the loss of driving privileges is in the interest of everyone. The outcome could have been so much worse.
Posted by: Hiram | Thursday, January 21, 2010 at 08:13 AM
From the article: "According to Minnesota Department of Public Safety (DPS) data, drivers with just one previous DWI offense account for nearly 20 percent of all alcohol-related deaths every year. Of those first-time offenderes, 40 percent are likely to reoffend."
The multiple offenders who end up finally killing someone make the news because it is such an outrage and, apparently, still an exception. I am assuming (the article isn't clear) that the bulk of largely-unnoted (on the statewide news, at least) DWI-related carnage occurs among what are likely to be the bulk of DWI offenders, the first-timers. Most people, one would believe, would change their behaviors after one DWI conviction, and certainly after one crash-related DWI. Therefore the governor's solution makes good sense, but still seems to namby-pamby to suit me. If you get a second DWI, you have an ignition interlock for life, MINIMUM. And that does absolutely nothing to solve the 80% of deaths caused by first-time offenders who aren't caught until they crash into something or somebody.
I would still favor much harsher penalties AND increased enforcement to cut down on this completely avoidable crime. Where I disagree is the notion that "Our DWI laws are too harsh as it is for first time offenders..." How many "chances" has the first time offender had to kill somebody before finally getting caught? If you told me that everybody who got into a car with a .15 BAC was given harsh fines and required to have an ignition interlock, I would agree readily. Tell me the way to make sure nobody drives a car with a .15 BAC, and I'll be happy to set the penalty as low as you like.
Posted by: J. Ewing | Thursday, January 21, 2010 at 11:07 AM
When you get down to it, I am not all that interested in penalizing drunken drivers. I think they need help and am all in favor of their getting it. They just shouldn't be allowed to drive again, and that really is in their interest.
Posted by: Hiram | Thursday, January 21, 2010 at 12:03 PM
The ones who kill are the habitual drinker/drivers. If we spend our resources tagging and punishing everyone who has a second glass of wine with their dinner, we've missed the danger. The danger in this issue is it's too easy to condemn drunk driving. It's like condemning child molestation. We can write laws making having a beer harder to do than own a gun, if we like, but it won't fix the problem. The larger question is how to keep the habitual drunks from even being on the road at all. As it is, a casual drinker with a .08 is treated the same as a habitual drinker with a .17.
Posted by: The Big Stink | Thursday, January 21, 2010 at 12:19 PM
Stink has it right. I should have thought a third time. It's that yes, the guy just over at 0.08, which used to be legal in fact, is treated the same as 0.18 or 0.28. That's the true injustice I was ineffectively complaining about.
Posted by: Speed Gibson | Thursday, January 21, 2010 at 04:55 PM
Now that would be correct. It isn't the drinking, or even the amount consumed. It is the degree to which you are impaired when you get behind the wheel. At that point, I want the law to kick in and PREVENT that car from being started, either by the driver's knowing of terrible penalties that await, by knowing he is about to kill someone, by an ignition interlock, or by a cop who noticed him staggering out of a bar and getting into his car alone. Any or all of them, your pick, so long as the job gets done. If you want to set some more appropriate measure than 0.08 for being "impaired," feel free. It's an arbitrary number. I might even take into account the fact that the guy lives only three blocks down the street and there's nobody else on the road-- so long as he never gets caught again.
Posted by: J. Ewing | Thursday, January 21, 2010 at 05:09 PM
You might as well close all the bars, then.
You don't have to close all the bars. You just have to not drive after you go to a bar. There are plenty of alternatives. For example you could take public transportation or you could have a designated driver.
To say that you either have to let people drive drunk or not allow people to drink at all is a pretty shallow argument.
Posted by: Brent M | Thursday, January 21, 2010 at 05:19 PM