5 years for drunk driver

[Velvet]

Okay.

[SaggyBalls]

I forgot to separate intent from premeditation.

In the heat of a moment someone can intend to inflict serious harm, but to think about it befgorehand and plan it out makes the difference.

Velvet, I think PT has explained his position as both are potential deadly weapons...although there has to be more to it than that.

And, PT - I'm not saying that we should pin it on all of us that this bullshit killing happens, but seeing that it's the 21st century and it's a world of enormous riches (and we're part of the G8) that there must be a way to do more to solve the problem than merely hand out fines and demoralize people because of the poor choices they are unable to make clearly.

Educating people about the risks and outcomes aren't giving people other options in the heat of the moment. There's nobody stopping drunks from driving.

The options are available, but turning our backs just because we can only to turn around again and wag a finger obviously doesn't work.

I'm not expecting anyone here to implement a strategy to prevent more drunk drivers from getting in their cars, but at least I recognize that it takes more than shock ads and deaths for people to smarten up about it.

Anybody else?

Perhaps some of our enormous sin taxes on alcohol could go toward anti drunk driving initiatives around the country...like an operation red nose all year long?

Perhaps it takes breathalyser machines in every car that lower our insurance rates to almost nothing?

Perhaps tax breaks or payback incentives on cab rides home?

Whatever it's going to take it will be entirely costly and a headache to implement. Perhaps that's part of the reason so many are quick to turn their backs in disgust.

One thing I do know is that in most communities people mostly drive to the bar or restaurant where they consume alcohol. Many people feel safe driving their car/truck home but nobody checks to see their BAC before they're allowed to drive. I wonder how often people drive drunk over the legal limit. I presume it's quite often.

Should there be RIDE programs most nights in the summer?

Should RIDE programs have mandatory breathalysers?

Do you hope they don't implement that?

[badams]

All I know is that if I am ever hit and killed by a drunk driver I would appreciate that the individual spend the rest of their life in prison.

[mattm]

Same, and same if they kill my little guy and any little guy/gal that might come in the future. And to whoever asked if I believe in the death penalty, it all depends. There are some people that I firmly believe have forfeited the right to live and quite frankly I don't like paying for them to stay in jail but the circumstances need to be pretty dire which I'm not getting into and I don't want to change the topic of this.

For this guy, he was a repeat offender and he isn't going to change or he would have, it's too late now but it's not too late to punish the living shit out of him and make one hell of an example out of him in doing it. Basically, with a verdict like this the law has basically said that you can murder someone if you like, all you have to do is to drink a whole tonne and then go out and hit them with your car and you'll only get a slap on the wrist so if you need to off someone, don't go the way of the gun, go the way of the drunk.

Edited June 16, 2008 by Guest

[Hal Johnson]

I dunno, I watched a ton of Matlock when i was a kid. If you wanted to kill someone in particular and got drunk so as to avoid a huge sentence, you'd probably end up being proven guilty of 1st degree anway. Most murders are committed by someone close to the victim. So they'd probably find a motive and what have you.

If you just felt like taking some random person out and decided drunk driving would get you the lesser of a sentance, well, hopefully the courts would find you certifiably insane.

[StoneMtn]

and yes, the legal industry condones drunk driving. look at the joke sentences.

What is the "legal industry"? It is the Court that imposes sentence. They are certainly not involved in any "industry".

I think you are confused.

[phishtaper]

from dictionary.com: industry: 7. the aggregate of work, scholarship, and ancillary activity in a particular field, often named after its principal subject: the Mozart industry.

im just using the term loosely to include everyone involved in developing, administering, interpreting and refining the laws involved here. this would include elected politicians, civil servants, law enforcement, lawyers, judges, and participants.

i suppose I could just as easily have used the terms "legal system", "courts" or even "society".

Edited June 16, 2008 by Guest

[SaggyBalls]

Perhaps the issue of sentencing is regarded by judges as how likely a person is to be of detriment to themselves and those around them.

A cold blooded murderer may feel less remorse than a drunk driver and may be more likely to commit many different crimes to either fulfil some sociopathic intent or to reinstatutionalize him/herself while a drunk driver may eventually repeat his/her crime, it is unlikely s/he will kill again while doing so. Perhaps the shock of jail will make him/her think twice about not arranging a ride home after a trip to the bar.

So if sentencing is paying for an action rather than paying for its outcome then that would explain the point of view of the judges' 'joke' sentences.

I don't really think there's truly a way for someone to pay for the life of another, even in death, So 5 years seems short to me. Thinking about paying for killing someone else while the action was not to kill that person but was the outcome. I don't expect to ever be a judge as it is difficult to separate reason from emotion in cases like this.

Perhaps people don't appreciate me not coming down hard on drunk drivers as the rest of society would in a thread like this, but what kind of discussion would there be if everyone just had the same thing to say?

And of coming down a bit firm on the emotional responses everyone has after reading about a case as this might seem opportunistic and heartless to some, but there are a lot of social misjustices that are happening on all sides of issues. While I don't intend to change peoples' points of view, it is necessary for someone to voice that change is needed.

Maybe I'm not the best person to do it but nobody else seems to voice that there's something wrong, instead people assert that the courts and offenders are the only ones that are wrong.

That formula isn't solving anything.

Luckily, a joystick isn't as apt to offend a person's sensibilities as much as any number of other things. Cause after all's said and done you can always have a game of asteroids.

[bouche]

anyone know of a good breakfast place in ottawa?

[SaggyBalls]

Nate's breakfast is $2.50 until eleven.

Rideau street by the Loblaws.

Good? elgin street? Some Pho in chinatown?

[Ms Zimmy]

I've been reading this thread, coming from a small town in northern ontario, drinking and driving is common and every year young kids die.

I've known people who died or who suffered brain damage, people who have killed people (most of the time, friends of theirs in their cars) and a cousin who was hit and died. Every year I knew someone who was involved in a drinking and driving accident.

I was just talking to my sister and she told me that an older (30 +) was at a grad party (field parties), she left drunk and hit two kids, one is dead, the other will lose her arm.

I think that if you kill someone driving drunk, you lose your right to drive for the rest of your life. If someone is driving drunk and gets caught, mandatory jail time. The laws need to be harsh.

Man, it's so sad and frustrating.

[Velvet]

I think that if you kill someone driving drunk, you lose your right to drive for the rest of your life. If someone is driving drunk and gets caught, mandatory jail time.

Agreed.