Party Plates

In some states drunk drivers who are able to get driving priviledges some times are required to purchase what are euphemistically called "party plates."

Sometimes, some of these people never learn.

This is from the police blotter of a small town in northeast Ohio. 

"While making a traffic stop at 9:02 p.m. June 1 at the North Royalton Speedway station, a cop observed a man walk past his patrol car carrying a six-pack. The man got into the driver’s side of a white Mercury displaying yellow OVI tags. The driver, who is under suspension with limited privileges, stated he was on his way home from an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting and stopped to get gas, and apparently some beer. The man was issued a citation for driving under an OVI suspension and will appear in court."
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Usually when we encounter the repeat offender it is in the context of ghastly tragedies. 

Dallas Lawrence Is a Serious Alcoholic

The Oregonian's great court's reporter, Aimee Green, has this tale of the "serious alcoholic."

"Dallas Lazar Lawrence fell off his bar stool and drove away from Duke's Country Bar & Grill even though others reportedly told him not to.

He made it about a half-mile before he veered off the street and struck two 21-year-old women who were walking on the sidewalk near Southeast 158th and Division Street. They were on their way to catch a cab because they also had been drinking that night.

Share Monday, Lawrence was sentenced in Multnomah County Circuit Court to nearly six years in prison -- and another 2 1/2 years hangs over his head if he doesn't cooperate by testifying in a civil case against the bar that served him.
Both women have hired attorneys, but no lawsuit has been filed against Lawrence or the bar. The pedestrians' medical bills are estimated to be hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Lawsuits against bars for overserving are relatively rare in Oregon, often because it's difficult to prove in court that bar employees served a visibly intoxicated person.

But investigators say that Lawrence, now 25, was stumbling drunk as he downed drinks with friends that night. His blood alcohol content was about three times the legal limit when he plowed into the women at 12:30 a.m. Feb. 20.   Lawrence pleaded guilty last month to driving under the influence of intoxicants and two counts of second-degree assault.

Chuck Sparks, the deputy district attorney who prosecuted the case, described Lawrence's actions that night as 'stupidity.' Under Measure 11, Lawrence will have to serve all 70 months of his sentence, with no possibility of early release.  'Thank goodness for Measure 11, frankly,' Sparks said.

Marie Ann Drennan and Rachel Nichole Barber suffered broken bones and ruptured arteries, among other injuries.  Drennan was still using a wheelchair at Lawrence's plea hearing nearly six months later.  The impact sent Barber 60 feet and into a parked car. Monday, she spoke about how she has suffered since the crash. She said she spent two months in the hospital, and during that time her 3-year-old son 'thought I'd abandoned him.' Her daughter, who wasn't yet a year old, didn't recognize her voice when she came home.

'I used to be very confident in myself and now because of his choices, my body is covered in scars,'  Barber said. '... I can't breathe normally anymore. I have to use an inhaler at times, just doing normal things like making my bed because my lungs get exhausted.'

Lawrence, now 25, offered an apology: 'I'm so sorry I did this to you guys.'   Lawrence's attorney, Scott Raivio, said his client has admitted he's a serious alcoholic, which shows he's working on his problem."
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As an attorney, I've handled a number of cases on behalf of clients injured by drunk drivers who were killed in situations not dissimilar to this story. 

The depositions that I took of the OurCounty coroner and toxicologists in those cases should have sufficed to have kept me and any rational person from behind the wheel of a car after drinking.  Nah, it didn't stop me.   Alcohol in my experience is one of those substances that has the cunning, and baffling power to convince your neurons that: "You're Ok to drive"  when in fact you are a menance to all other living things within range of your automobile. 

Don't drink and drive.

Young, Drunk, Driving--Part Two

The Charlotte Observer is also reporting on a youngster who critically injured others in her second undeage DWI, reporters Ely Portillo and Steve Lyttle write:


"Police say a 19-year-old woman accused of driving drunk Sunday never hit the brakes as she struck three pedestrians and drove nearly 100 feet with one of them on her car before crashing into a tree. The driver accused in the wreck, on East Seventh Street in Charlotte's Elizabeth neighborhood, was already facing a DWI charge from May and had her license revoked.

Kirstie Pienta (pic), of Charlotte, remained in critical condition late Monday at Carolinas Medical Center. One of the pedestrians, Danielle Moore, 27, of West Chester, Ohio, also was hospitalized at CMC and was expected to recover. The other two victims were treated and released from Presbyterian Hospital on Sunday, at least one of them with a broken leg.

On Monday, one of the victims, with a cast on his right leg, said he hopes Pienta recovers. 'I want her to be OK, and learn from this and get some serious help,' Michael Hayes told Observer news partner WCNC-TV. 'She's got to learn her lesson.'

Police said witnesses reported that Pienta was driving over the 35 mph speed limit about 2 a.m. Sunday when she hit the pedestrians, who had just left Jackalope Jack's, an East Seventh Street restaurant and bar.

They were not in a crosswalk, police said, but had crossed two of the three lanes when they were hit. The police report shows no indication that the investigating officer believed the pedestrians were impaired. It also shows they were not tested for alcohol.  Pienta was driving her father's 2002 Mercedes inbound on Seventh Street, police said. Court records show her apartment is two blocks from the scene of the wreck.

Charlotte-Mecklenburg police Officer J.S. Cerdan said Pienta was driving at what 'several witnesses believed to be in excess of 45 mph.'

Two pedestrians - Hayes, 24, and Damion Jenkins, 26, both of Charlotte - were knocked down by the car. Moore was 'hit squarely'  by the front of the Mercedes and carried 99 feet before the car swerved left and hit a sign and then crashed into a tree, according to Cerdan's report. Moore slid off the car before it hit the tree. The police report said the wreck happened 'without signs of braking.'

Meredith Jones, 32, was at the Philosopher's Stone tavern nearby shooting pictures of a friend's band Sunday. She walked out and heard the car hit the tree. She saw two men sitting on the road, and a woman unconscious and bleeding from injuries to her legs. People were helping them, so she ran to the wrecked car, where she saw the driver slumped across the front seats and bleeding.

'Her legs were in the driver's side, and her body was (toward) the passenger door,' Jones said.  Jones was shocked to realize she knew the driver - an ex-boyfriend's neighbor - and told paramedics, 'That's Kirstie!'

Steven Pienta, her father and the car's registered owner, could not be reached Monday. Moore, reached at her hospital room Monday, declined to talk about the wreck. Jenkins couldn't be reached. Records show Pienta was charged May 31 with driving while impaired, after she was pulled for speeding and tailgating on Interstate 77 near Wilkinson Boulevard. She was also charged with driving after consuming alcohol while underage, and speeding 80 in a 55 mph zone.

She was driving a 2005 Kia sedan, records show.  Pienta blew a .15 alcohol concentration about an hour later, records show, nearly twice the legal limit of .08. She was charged and released on a $1,500 secured bond.

She failed to appear July 21 in traffic court for the speeding charge and was scheduled to be tried Aug. 30 for the alcohol consumption and DWI charges.  Now Pienta faces new charges of DWI, reckless driving, driving after consuming alcohol under the age of 21, and driving with a revoked license."

Young, Drunk, Driver, and Killer

The St. Louis Post Dispatch reports this searing account of the sentencing of the St. Peters woman, 24, who killed her passenger, another young woman, and seriously injured a young male passenger in a drunk driving accident last year.  This is reporter Shane Anthony's story:

"St. Peters woman was ordered Monday into a four-month prison treatment program for a drunken-driving crash that killed her 24-year-old passenger.

Ashley P. Matthews, 24, of the 1100 block of Spencer Road, pleaded guilty in April of involuntary manslaughter and felony assault. She was driving a car on Highway 94 near Defiance on May 17, 2009, when she veered off the road, overcorrected and collided with an oncoming vehicle driven by David R. Mann of Augusta. Ashley Walker, 24, of St. Charles County, was thrown from the vehicle and died. Mann and Matthews both were injured.

Matthews refused a blood alcohol breath test. Investigators obtained a warrant to take her blood for tests, which revealed a blood-alcohol level of 0.182 percent about an hour after the crash. Drivers are presumed drunk at 0.08 percent in Missouri.

St. Charles County Circuit Judge Nancy Schneider sentenced Matthews to a 120-day prison treatment program. If she completes the program, she could be placed on probation, if not, she could be sentenced to five years in prison.

Walker's family members spoke of their suffering since the crash.  'My heart is broken and has an emptiness that I imagine will never be filled again,' said Walker's mother, Debbie.

She asked Schneider to impose the maximum sentence, seven years in prison on each count and $10,000 in fines. Anything less would be an insult to her family and a slap on the wrist, Debbie Walker said. Ashley Walker's family members and friends filled one side of the courtroom gallery. Matthews' supporters filled the other. About a dozen people stood in the center aisle after all the seats were taken. There were few dry eyes.

Defense attorney Paul D'Agrosa said Matthews has been one of the most remorseful clients he has represented. She often cried in his office, he said, but not for selfish reasons. 'She cries for the friend that she killed and for the gentleman she injured in this accident,' he said. D'Agrosa said Matthews has received treatment for substance abuse. He also said Ashley Walker's blood-alcohol level was 0.212 percent. The roles could have been reversed, he said.

Assistant prosecutor John Bauer said the court should stop Matthews' pattern of behavior as evidenced by a minor-in-possession of alcohol charge from 2006 and a DWI arrest in 2009. Neither resulted in a conviction.

Matthews, who spoke briefly before she was sentenced, said she has wanted to apologize to Ashley Walker's family. 'I just want them to know that I am so sorry,' she said.

Schneider, who just began her 20th year on the bench, said she knew people on both sides of the courtroom would be upset no matter what she did. 'What I see here is an example of an all too common situation where young, irresponsible people engage in behavior that is so devastating to themselves and the community at large and certainly the families.'

Schneider said Matthews has a loving family and friends to support her, and she could still lead a positive, productive life."
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I go to an AA meeting at 5:30 six days a week.  During a comment a fellow AA said that on the first of every month he writes a check to the widow of the man he killed in a DWI accident.   These stories may be old for you, but for me they are a constant reminder that alcoholism is cunning, baffling, and powerful. Don't look away.  This may not be you, but it could be someone you love.

[The photo is not from the accidents discussed with in the post.]

Louisiana Supreme Court--30 Years for DWI, Yeah That's About Right!

The Lousiana Supreme Court ruled that a 30 year sentence handed down to Marilyn LeBlanc in the 2007 DWI vehicular homicide of Geneive Hardy, a Lafayette-area  resident--was appropriate.  Gwen Filosa's NOLA.com account should be a cautionary tale to the likes of Lindsay Lohan and anyone else still using and still driving:

Thirty years in prison is not an excessive punishment for a Breaux Bridge woman who, during a days-long cocaine binge in 2007, plowed her Jeep Cherokee into a family of four, the Louisiana Supreme Court ruled this week.
Marilyn LeBlanc eventually pleaded guilty to vehicular homicide for the collision on Highway 274 that killed Genevieve Hardy, who was riding in the backseat with her 22-year-old daughter that evening on the way to a family reunion in Lafayette Parish.
Share Michael Hardy, 55, Kyle Hardy, 25, and Christi Hardy, 22, survived the crash. Kyle and Michael later testified that a witness said that LeBlanc was smiling after she hit their Toyota Camry and took off, 'smiling like it was a game.'

The plea bargain, however, didn't include a sentence and the local judge gave her the maximum term of 30 years, saying that the self-professed drug addict posed an extreme risk of getting behind the wheel again while impaired.  

LeBlanc, 37 at the time, kept driving after the crash, even after striking a parked car at a store at the intersection and vaulting across Highway 90 into a ditch before leading police on a chase.

At first, the glossy red-eyed mother of two told police that an unknown black man had kidnapped her at a local store, beat her up and forced her to drive while he grabbed the steering wheel, causing her to crash several times.  But by trial time, LeBlanc said that her reckless driving was due to being upset at having just had a fight with her cocaine dealer. LeBlanc tested positive for eight drugs, which included prescription pills for pain, anxiety and depression, along with marijuana and cocaine - both of which were found inside her Jeep.  LeBlanc also said that she was married to a drug addict and that her own addiction began in 2000 after she suffered injuries in a car accident.

The Louisiana 3rd Circuit Court of Appeal last year rejected the 30-year sentence handed down by District Judge Durwood Conque as excessive for LeBlanc, a first-time offender, but didn't offer an alternative number of years.

On Wednesday, a unanimous state Supreme Court reversed the lower court's ruling, saying that LeBlanc has an opportunity for release after serving ten years, or one-third, of her prison term. She also remains eligible for early release on 'good time' credits after 15 years.  LeBlanc's sentence, the justices said, 'will require her to serve a substantial term of imprisonment at hard labor commensurate with the seriousness of her crime which resulted in the death of another human being.'

The trial judge refused to consider LeBlanc's drug addiction as mitigation for a lesser prison term, and his decision was legally sound, the justices said.  'Her long-standing abuse of legal and illegal drugs had been punctuated by only a few, half-hearted attempted to receive treatment,' the state Supreme Court said. LeBlanc went to treatment twice, but always resumed drug use after detox, the court said. Prison will allow LeBlanc an opportunity for rehabilitation, the Supreme Court ruled, just as Judge Conque did in 2008.

Vehicular homicide carries five to 30 years in prison upon conviction. Louisiana has steadily increased punishment for the crime over the years, raising the maximum sentence to 15 years in 1989 and then up to 20 a decade later. In 2006, the Legislature upped the mandatory prison term from two to five years, two years after raising the maximum term to 30 years.

'The changes reflect the growing awareness in this state and elsewhere of the carnage caused by intoxicated driver on the open road,' the justices wrote."
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This last week a regular member of the Alcoholic Anonymous fellowship where I attend meetings climbed a ladder and placed his neck in a perfectly calibrated noose and hanged himself.  As I write I have just attended services for him.  Addiction is about a physical compulsion and mental obsession. For the recovering alcoholic and drug addict it is truly about life and death.  With this decision the Justices of the Louisiana Supreme Court may have just saved a life or two--very harsh, but in my opinion very appropriate.

"Painter of Light"--Drunk Driver

Thomas Kinkade the self-described "painter of light" got busted for DWI near his Carmel, California home last week according to the Sacramento Bee.

Kinkade appears to be doing his artiste thing backwards--so to speak.  First Kinkade has enormous financial success with his "art," now he's doing the suffering and starving artist phase with commercial collapse, spectacular fraud charges, and bankruptcy.  The following comes from Hudson Sangree's report:

"[Tom Kinkade's] company owes millions of dollars to art gallery owners who successfully pressed fraud claims.   Earlier this month the firm filed for bankruptcy protection from those gallery owners and hundreds of other creditors.

And on Friday, the 52-year-old Kinkade, who calls himself 'the painter of light,' was arrested on a DUI charge outside Carmel, where he owns a home. Kinkade could not be reached for comment Monday. But a company spokesman insisted all was well in the artist's empire. 'Tom is still painting and the business is still strong,' said Dave Satterfield.   He said Kinkade would not comment on the DUI arrest on the advice of his lawyer. Officials at Kinkade's corporate offices were still reviewing the allegations, Satterfield said."
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You know, you rarely hear of art theft cases involving Kinkades, I wonder why that is?

Probably the same reason you don't see the Bad Lawyer plagiarized, all kidding aside, I do relate to Mr. Kinkade's suffering, though.  In my case, I am the cause of my misery, perhaps Mr. Kinkade will find that he is the cause of his.