Drunk Driving

A Dallas native, Sean was a business major at Midwestern State University in Wichita Falls. He loved sports and girls, a good combination for a guy who was an athlete and who already had modeling agents in Dallas and New York City. Sean still can’t remember that Saturday night. Like many times before, he had been out drinking. When he was ready to call it a night, he simply got a ride with a friend. Unfortunately, his friend had been drinking too. After they’d been drinking for several hours, Ryan was driving Sean home when his truck hydroplaned and crashed into a tree. He pleaded guilty to a charge of intoxication assault and was placed on probation for 10 years. His goal to be a football coach vanished. When Ryan was again arrested for drinking and driving, his probation violation landed him in prison and county jails for 26 months. Released in 2011, he now works in his family’s fishing business. Sean’s brain injury left him unharmed mentally but physically no longer able to talk or walk. He couldn’t swallow his own saliva, causing him to drool. He couldn’t dress or feed himself. Or go to the bathroom alone. At night he found himself trapped under the covers in his bed, unable to move when he was too hot or cold. Once fiercely independent, he was forced to rely on his mother for everything. Since the crash, Sean and Jenny have embraced their new mission in life – to tell everyone they can about choices, consequences, and the preventable dangers of drinking and driving.

Penalties for drunk driving continue to become tougher over the years as the cost of this dangerous behavior rises. Reckless alcohol consumption among young people has also risen to extreme numbers, and it has been met with high intolerance. There are often lower legal limits for minor drivers and longer driver’s license suspensions. Drunk driving, driving while intoxicated (DWI), or driving under the influence (DUI), is typically determined by the alcohol content found in the driver’s blood. Blood alcohol content (BAC) may be determined in two ways: through breath analysis or urinalysis. All states have now lowered the legal limit of blood alcohol content from 0.10 to 0.08 percent. Penalties for drunk driving are severe in most states. Virtually every state suspends the driver’s license on a first offense, and the length of suspension increases sharply with each successive offense. There is, however, a great deal of variation in the lengths of suspension of driving privileges among the states. Several states include revocation on the third or fourth offense. Every day, 29 people in the United States die in motor vehicle crashes that involve an alcohol-impaired driver. This is one death every 50 minutes.