Driver who Killed Nick Adenhart Gets 51 Years to Life

[HiAndTight]

He can join them, as far as I'm concerned. Irresponsible behavior, be it drinking and driving, or randomly shooting a gun into a crowded shopping center, will garner no sympathy from me. He made the decision, and he can bear the consequences.

There's a real problem here with twisting around words. Nobody said he deserved anyone's sympathy. Just that pure evil and eternal hell for a 24 year old selfish moron who killed 3 people by driving drunk might be a little over the top.

 

 

That's all I'm going to say on it though. I'm not going to put myself in the position of defending the guy who ended 3 young lives and ruined a 4th, just think a touch of context is needed here. So again lets not pretend that I'm asking you to "garner sympathy" in order to show how tough you are on such topics. I'm in agreement. He deserves none. There's also the matter of putting things in context however.

[GAME05]

i think that making first-offense DUIs into severely-punished crimes goes too far and like it that they only involve heavy fines, a criminal record and alcohol counseling. as it is, to have a DUI on your permanent record has a way of severely harming a career as employers will hesitate at hiring someone with any kind of record. not a justification, but .08 is pretty easy to get to, and a level which you barely notice if you have a decent tolerance. i think that for 90% of the population, getting a DUI is a pretty big wakeup call and they won't get in that position again. repeat offenses are frightening, however, as they show a trend of doing it again and again until the eventuality of causing an accident.

 

maybe there could be different DUI penalties based on the BAC you blow. like, blowing a .09 gets you fines and mandatory classes for a first offense, but blowing .25 is much much harsher. i think there's a difference of being moderately impaired and unable to drive versus being so drunk you can barely get your keys in the lock yet choosing to drive, regardless.

 

the guy deserves the sentence he got, but i can find some sympathy for him. guy's obviously an alcoholic and doesn't have the decision-making abilities most of us do when it comes to alcohol, not like he's getting in his car saying "I don't care what happens." i don't picture him laughing in the courtroom about it. i knew a kid who drank and drove and ended up killing his best friend while he walked away unharmed. part of his sentence was to do community service for us, and the kid's eyes looked like his heart had been ripped out of his body. kid is going to have nightmares about that for the rest of his life. and from the solitude of his cell, this guy is probably going to, as well. so as i imagine this guy is already being tortured in his head, it's hard for me to stand and point a finger yelling 'monster monster monster.'

[LouisEly]

I'm wondering if there are statistics out there that show what % of DUI fatalities involve mild intoxication (.06-.10%), moderate intoxication (.11-.16%), or severe intoxication (>.16%). Maybe it's just press bias and you only hear of cases like this in the media, but it seems like whenever you hear about a DUI fatality it almost always involves someone at least twice the legal limit or more. I have always wondered the same thing about different tiers of penalties based on what the offender blows. It seems to make sense that the more drunk you are, the harsher the penalties should be.

[mothershipconnection]

Now that we've gotten into evil and eternal hell, I'm guessing it will be best to lock 'er down and move this discussion to the politics board if anyone would like.