{"article":{"id":5690,"heading":"JESSICA WILLIAMS 120YEARS FOR TRACE AMOUNTS OF THC","author":"ALEX CAMPBELL","created":"2001-03-17 21:16:18","modified":"2005-08-15 00:31:45","last_modified":"Mon, 15 Aug 2005 07:31:45","article":"

Six teen-agers cleaning up roadside trash as restitution for minor crimes were killed March\/2000 on a busy interstate highway when a white mini van drifted into the median after the driver twenty year old Jessica Williams fell asleep.

Silver State pays the county to pick up trash that blows off its garbage trucks as they head to the landfill near Apex, a few miles north of the accident site.

\"I always just assumed that they went to parks, I didn't know they were off on the side of the road.\" Said Lorene Boggs the mother of a child on a work crew.

Doug Gould can't understand why it was necessary to have his boy, Scott Garner Jr., 14, picking up trash in the middle of the busiest interstate in Nevada.

\"What were they even doing out there?\" Gould asked. \"It makes no sense. It's Sunday afternoon, everyone is in the process of leaving Las Vegas, and the county has these kids out in the middle of a super-expressway ... you would think they would have had some safeguards.\"

Garner, of Henderson, was doing community service to clear a burglary charge from his juvenile record and was one of six teens killed near the Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Also killed were Las Vegans Anthony T. Smith, 14, Alberto Puig, 16, Rebeccah Glicken, 15,Malina Stoltzfus, 15, and Jennifer Booth, 16. The attorney elicited evidence that no signs, pylons or flagmen were present to warn drivers that children were working in the area.

\"These young folks were extremely close to the freeway,\" Watkins said.





















































































































<\/p>\n","contact":"SUNYDAY23@GO.COM","link":"","address":"PBX 243 LITTLEFIELD AZ","phone":"5203475171","parent_id":0,"mime_type":"text\/plain","summary":"BRIEF HISTORY AND HOW TO HELP","numcomment":1,"fileurl":"\/uploads\/2001\/03\/jessica_wi.txt","filesize":"9.5 kibibytes","article_url":"\/news\/2001\/03\/5690.php"},"attachments":[],"comments":[{"id":5716,"heading":"Drivers License Should NOT be License to Kill","article":"Jessica Williams was rightly found culpable in the\r\ndeaths of the pedestrians, but for the wrong reasons.\r\nThe medical technicians and other specialists believe\r\nthat Jessica drove while asleep at the wheel, not while\r\nintoxicated. Thus, she is guilty of reckless driving\r\nresulting in the deaths or grievous injuries of several\r\npeople. She should be subject to the same standards of\r\nliability that apply to the operator of any heavy and\r\ndangerous equipment who, by their reckless conduct, cause\r\nthe deaths of numerous people. The appropriate penalty\r\nmay not be life in prison, but it is, at a minimum, some\r\nprison time, and an absolute lifetime ban on ever sitting\r\nbehind the wheel of a motor vehicle.\r\n\r\nRight now, we have a double standard in this country, one\r\nwhich is responsible for untold suffering and destruction\r\nof innocent lives. And that double standard is: kill with\r\na car while sober, no matter how reckless, and, so long as\r\nintent is not proven, you'll face at worst a point or two\r\non your driving record. But drive while intoxicated even\r\nwithout killing, and you may go to jail. Of course, such\r\na policy as this has nothing to do with public safety. It\r\nis simply a reflection of two things: the irrational and\r\nfanatical war on drugs, and the car culture that posits the\r\nabsolute supremacy of the motor vehicle over our landscape.\r\n\r\nBelow is a letter from Simon Baddeley and colleagues to\r\nauthorities in England regarding the issue of traffic\r\nsafety in that country, a letter whose contents are highly\r\nrelevant to this discussion. Though the context is England,\r\nalmost every observation below applies equally to this\r\ncountry and the case in hand concerning Jessica Williams.\r\nIf we take to heart the considerations and observations in\r\nthis letter, we can't fail to conclude that Ms. Williams\r\ncase calls for severe penalties, but for different reasons\r\nthan invoked by her prosecutors.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Date: Tue, 20 Mar 2001 15:07:29 -0000 From: \"Simon\r\n Baddeley\" \r\nSubject: RESPONSE TO THE ROAD TRAFFIC OFFENCES PENALTIES\r\nREVIEW\r\n\r\n6 March 2001\r\n\r\nJisha Salim, Sentencing and Offences Unit, Home\r\nOffice, 50 Queen Anne's Gate, LONDON, SW1H 9AT; fax\r\n020 7273 4345; e-mail jisha.salim@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk\r\nhttp:\/\/www.homeoffice.gov.uk\/cpd\/sou\/rtpcons.pdf\r\n\r\n\r\nDear Jisha Salim,\r\n\r\nRESPONSE TO THE ROAD TRAFFIC OFFENCES PENALTIES REVIEW The\r\nfirst part of this response focuses on the 4 co-signers of\r\nthis letter. It aims to convey the knowledge, experience\r\nand values that might lead you to regard our views as\r\nhelpful to your timely review of road traffic offence\r\npenalties. It is prepared in some haste but with a sincere\r\nwish to make a positive response to the invitation to\r\nconsult on a most welcome policy development.\r\n\r\nThe response is not assembled as a point-by-point response\r\nto specific items as requested. We apologise for this and\r\nhope that the Home Office may still glean some helpful\r\nadvice from what follows.\r\n\r\nThe Road Traffic Offences Penalties Review can mark a shift\r\nin attitude to driving in the UK. These changes must affect\r\nall of us. We believe that they will benefit the majority\r\n- drivers and non-car-drivers alike - but political will\r\nis required to resist a vocal minority of interests who\r\nwill claim this review infringes their rights, but in the\r\nmatter of road traffic offences the government can win\r\nhearts and minds by strengthening the law.\r\n\r\nWe are four citizens who, though interested in\r\nand affected by transport issues, do not represent\r\nanyone but ourselves. Three of us work together.\r\nProfessor John Raine, Director of the Institute of Local\r\nGovernment Studies, Birmingham University, has spent many\r\nyears researching the Magistracy on behalf of the Home\r\nOffice. He is a Green party Councillor for Malvern District\r\nCouncil. Ray Puffitt is Senior Lecturer at Birmingham\r\nUniversity with wide experience of regulatory processes in\r\nLocal Government. Simon Baddeley lectures as an associate\r\nof the same department. He commutes and travels across\r\nthe UK by bicycle, walking and public transport and has\r\nan interest in the role played by transport in urban\r\nregeneration.\r\n\r\nOur decision to write a joint response arose in connection\r\nwith the death, in a road crash, of Ray Puffitt's only\r\ndaughter, Jane, on 25 March last year. Jane's death\r\naffected all who worked with Ray and convinced us of the\r\nneed for a shift of direction in sentencing policy and its\r\ncontext as this relates to driving behaviour. We welcome\r\nthis Review.\r\n\r\nTo ensure our views would not look like an attempt to\r\ncreate law based on a specific tragedy or bias policy\r\ntowards punishing a particular individual we enlisted\r\nour fourth respondent Martin Ward. Martin is a family\r\nfriend of Simon Baddeley. More than the rest of us,\r\nMartin relies on driving cars for work and leisure. His\r\nbusiness is reliant on road transport by car and van.\r\nIn 29 years, at his conservative estimate, Martin has\r\ncovered over a million miles in 57 cars and at least 20\r\nmotorcycles. At 18 he had a minor motorcycle accident which\r\nmade him determined to pay \"ultimate attention at all times\r\nwhilst in charge of a motor vehicle\". He has had no form\r\nof road traffic accident since. A successful businessman,\r\nMartin recently qualified as a member of the Institute of\r\nAdvanced Motorists (IAM) and has successfully encouraged\r\nhis employees to seek IAM certification.\r\n\r\nWe believe that your review should take forward the\r\nprinciple that driving a car (or other motor vehicle) is\r\na privilege and not a right. To earn and keep the right\r\nto drive, a citizen must demonstrate on-going competence\r\nthroughout their life in the form of driving skill and\r\ncare for others. We use, as an analogy, the written\r\nand unwritten laws of the sea about care for self and\r\nothers in a hazardous environment. The same is taken for\r\ngranted among train drivers, airline pilots and, though\r\nstill far from widely accepted, among a growing minority\r\nof motorists.\r\n\r\nAs well as the contempt that should attach to bad driving,\r\nthe law should provide sanctions against those unwilling to\r\ndemonstrate competence and care when driving. This should\r\nbe a sanction that would regard exceeding a speed limit\r\nof 20 or 30 mph as being as serious as a faster breach\r\nof the law. Thus, manoeuvring at relatively slow but\r\ninappropriate speed within an enclosed space can be quite\r\nas serious in its consequences for others as disobeying\r\nhigher speed restrictions.\r\n\r\nIt is difficult to get to the controls of a train, bus,\r\nplane or ship if one is of an inappropriate age for the\r\nrequirements of the job, sleepy, ill or intoxicated and\r\nhave not passed regular tests of one's fitness for that\r\nresponsibility. It remains extraordinarily easy for someone\r\nin any of these conditions to get behind the wheel of a\r\nmotor vehicle - as temptingly easy now as it was when\r\nA.A.Milne described Toad's miscreant car theft in the\r\n1920s. It is equally easy to do the same thing even though\r\nunqualified, uninsured and legally banned from driving by\r\na court.\r\n\r\nWhile driving a car, actions that would be prohibited or\r\nlooked upon with extreme disapproval if done by anyone in\r\ncharge of a plane, ship, train or bus, such as non-journey\r\nrelated chats with passengers, changing a tape or disk,\r\ntuning a radio into an entertainment station, listening\r\nto it, speaking on a mobile phone, lighting a cigarette,\r\nlooking at a map, wiping a window or adjusting a seat\r\nwhile moving, are not only legal but in many cases\r\nwidely considered acceptable when in charge of a motor\r\nvehicle. Yet the road is an environment as hazardous as\r\nair, sea or railway.\r\n\r\nChanging current road traffic behaviour requires a shift in\r\nvalues which extends to the Home Office itself - certainly\r\nto the writer of the introduction to the review. While\r\nthe government is arguing elsewhere that the \"sheer\r\nnumber of road traffic offences is staggering\" [footnote:\r\n\"In England and Wales alone in 1997, 2.2 million motoring\r\noffences went to court, and a further 1.6 million offences\r\nwere dealt with by official police action or fixed penalty\r\nnotices, excluding parking and obstructions offences. More\r\ngo undetected, some of them serious. A great many, though\r\nnot all, affect road safety directly. Para 10.5 Department\r\nof the Environment, Transport and the Regions Tomorrow's\r\nroads: safer for everyone The Government's road safety\r\nstrategy and casualty reduction targets for 2010] the Home\r\nOffice consultation suggests, with limited evidence, that\r\nthe review should, by and large limit itself to eliminating\r\nthe behaviour of a marginal group of \"recklessly bad\r\ndrivers\" (Para. 8.2). The review seems - and forgive us if\r\nthis is a misreading - to seek special consideration for\r\n\"the overwhelming majority of traffic offences\" because\r\nthey are committed by \"decent, responsible and basically\r\nlaw abiding people, in circumstances where tiredness,\r\nimpatience, a moment's carelessness or haste can have\r\nserious consequences for the safety of themselves\r\nand others.\" This paragraph reveals like the driving\r\nbehaviour that needs re-examining, a misperception of the\r\npervasiveness of the problem.\r\n\r\nThe view that most offenders are \"law-abiding\" is\r\na mitigation that steers the courts away from the\r\nneed to use the law to influence and modify driving\r\nbehaviour throughout the population of present and future\r\ndrivers. Placing your main focus on \"bad\" drivers, though\r\nwe are all for recognising the fact of repeat offenders\r\nand do not gainsay their miscreance, can be compared to\r\nthe attempts by some reformers to mitigate the injustice\r\nof slavery by eliminating \"bad\" slave owners rather than\r\nthe institution.\r\n\r\nDriving, despite being much more widespread and accessible\r\nthan piloting a plane, handling a ship or driving a\r\ntrain, needs to acquire the same esteem, responsibilities\r\nand liabilities that attend control over those forms\r\nof transport. Given the statistics of road related\r\ndeaths, relative to deaths linked to these other forms of\r\ntransport, it will seem astonishing to future generations\r\nthat the apparatus for public protection that surrounds\r\nrail, air and sea travel is not linked to road movement.\r\n\r\nIf you consider liability on these terms the issue\r\nof the crash, and attendant injury and\/or death that\r\nresults is as much the responsibility of the \"good\"\r\nmotorist who makes a \"pilot error\" as the \"bad motorist\"\r\non whom your review seems to be focusing. The officer\r\nin charge of a lost or damaged naval vessel is allowed\r\nand required to face an automatic court martial.\r\nInfinitesimally few marine officers, airline pilots\r\nor train drivers intentionally cause disasters, but\r\nthere is a sophisticated legislative and investigative\r\napparatus in place to establish innocence, liability,\r\nnegligence and degrees of criminality where there has\r\nbeen damage, injury or death. These procedures are taken\r\nfor granted. They are seen as protecting the standards of\r\nthe relevant professions, serving the interests of victims\r\nand a wider public interest. The same must be applied to\r\nbeing in charge of a motor vehicle.\r\n\r\nShifting the scope of liability for driving offences\r\npromises to benefit non-drivers and drivers alike\r\nand present drivers who would like, in line with\r\ngovernment policy, to use cars less. They know about\r\nexhaust pollution. They experience more and more road\r\ncongestion. They realise alternatives won't work unless\r\npeople switch in large numbers to other ways of getting\r\naround. But the public space needed to take to the\r\nstreets to walk or cycle and take trains and buses is\r\nnot available.\r\n\r\nThe apparent reduction in reported road traffic casualties\r\nduring 1999 (DETR) is misleading, not so much because\r\nof statistical anomalies but because the figures do not\r\nshow how road safety education, by its effectiveness\r\nat spreading the word from the earliest age about the\r\ndangers of road traffic, has helped reduce casualties by\r\nremoving potential victims - voluntarily and compulsorily -\r\nfrom public space. Many citizens have come rightly to see\r\npublic space as hazardous for themselves, and perilous\r\nfor their children. They are reluctant to enter it except\r\nto take a few paces between their car - if they have one -\r\nhome, school and shopping centre. It is not surprising that\r\nlack of exercise, sometimes leading to problems of obesity\r\nwill surface in early middle age [Footnote: Di Guiseppi,\r\nCarolyn, Li, Leah and Roberts, Ian (1998): 'Influence of\r\nTravel Patterns on Mortality from Injury among Teenagers\r\nin England and Wales 1985-95: trend analysis' British\r\nMedical Journal. Volume 316 pp.904-905 \"Reduced walking and\r\ncycling have undoubtedly contributed to declines in overall\r\nphysical activity, a cause of increasing obesity in British\r\nchildren. The curtailment of independent mobility may\r\nalso have important adverse effects on children's mental,\r\nphysical and emotional development.\" LTP predictions of\r\nroad traffic growth suggests these trends are increasing.]\r\n\r\nFar too much public space has been taken out of circulation\r\nfor all but cars by dangerous road traffic. The law can\r\nreclaim this space. We are pleased to see many agencies\r\nbeing required by government to exercise \"joined-up\"\r\nthinking about what makes city life attractive and\r\ncivilised. As a result, official bodies pressed by\r\nvoluntary campaigning groups and charities are responding\r\nin a concerted way to concerns which for years have been\r\nviewed as eccentric. These changes in attitude to the\r\nunconditional benefits of car travel are seen by some as\r\nassaults on common sense, but common sense is altering\r\nunder the weight of accumulating private realisations\r\nabout what makes a city liveable and local economies more\r\nsustainable. The Road Traffic Offence Penalties Review\r\ncan help ensure these experiences are built into urban\r\nregeneration.\r\n\r\nLast year the Home Secretary's \"Crime and Disorder\" Bill\r\nincluded traffic behaviour that \"local people perceive\r\nto be unsafe\". This marked a pivotal moment in changing\r\nentrenched attitudes to road traffic - long seen as a\r\npositive influence on local economies. The Home Secretary\r\nboth through the present review and his earlier guidelines\r\nfor Statutory Crime and Disorder Partnerships is defining\r\ntraffic behaviour as a dimension of community safety and\r\nurban regeneration. This bold \"appreciative judgement\"\r\ncan is complemented by road traffic penalties aimed\r\nat removing driving behaviour that, as surely as street\r\nrobbery, blights local economies. Simon Baddeley, Chair of\r\nhis local residents' association, and a \"Neighbourhood\r\nWatch\" co-ordinator sees cars, vans, motorbikes and\r\neven mini-buses driving through his own and surrounding\r\nresidential streets at speeds far in excess of speed limits\r\nturning communal space into \"an unofficial factory floor.\"\r\n\r\nWe all agree that driving a motor vehicle - despite claims\r\nto the contrary - is actually becoming more dangerous\r\ndespite improved technology and roads. This danger is\r\nmasked by the steps people have been forced to take to\r\navoid it. The explanations are varied and debatable but\r\nwe agree the main reason is that society has changed and\r\nwith it, attitudes to the car. We are not denying the car\r\nits convenience. The problem is that the car has become\r\ntoo widely elevated from a useful form of transport, to a\r\nstatus symbol and than a weapon in which too many of our\r\nfellow citizens are liable to live out their personal\r\nproblems. Car advertising encourages this, promoting\r\nthe car as a means of expression that has nothing to\r\nwith using it to get conveniently from A to B. We have\r\ncreated a \"car-culture\" analogous to the \"gun-culture\"\r\nso robustly undermined after Dunblane. Like \"gun\r\nculture\", \"car-culture\" is not sustained by a minority of\r\npsychopaths, but by an enormous number of self-proclaimed\r\nlaw abiding citizens. The difference between gun and car\r\ncultures is that \"car culture\" is more dangerous.\r\n\r\nThe \"mis\"-use of the motorcar by \"decent law-abiding\r\npeople\" must be tackled. It requires political will. We\r\nfully support the government's reiterated point that\r\nthe measures contemplated are not \"anti-car\". Ministers\r\ndefending their stringency must not be diverted by claims\r\nthat these measure restrict freedom. These measures can\r\nmake cars safer for those inside and outside them. They are\r\nliberating. Measures to restrict the use of cars in cities\r\nand to introduce car parking charges and congestion charges\r\nare designed for the convenience of drivers and non-drivers\r\nalike and promise to recover choices that have been taken\r\naway by the growth of an over-dependency on cars. This\r\ndependency congests roads and lessens the freedom of all\r\ntravellers - drivers and non-drivers alike - forcing onto\r\ninto cars many people who would use alternative transport\r\nif it were available.\r\n\r\nThe car is not our target. Government action must change\r\ndriving standards. This must be achieved by education\r\nincluding advertising and legislation. Driving a car,\r\nfor work or pleasure, should be seen - with pride - as\r\ninvolving the responsibilities that attend ship handling,\r\nflying and train driving. Being a responsible, aware,\r\ncapable driver must be elevated to being \"trendy\" at the\r\npoint where the young person gets access to a car.\r\n\r\nWe propose the current driving test be elevated to the\r\nlevel required by the IAM. We suggest a rich combination\r\nof stick and carrot be used to make this retrospective\r\nfor all drivers. The difficult thing about passing such\r\na test is less technical than attitudinal. The new test\r\nshould be phased in over 3-5 years and done by age groups\r\nstarting with the youngest.\r\n\r\nWe would make the new photocard licences mandatory and\r\nvalid for 3 years. Renewal, as with a pilot's licence,\r\nwould be subject to a sight test, reaction time test and a\r\ndriving simulator so that GPs can assess an individual's\r\nphysical ability to drive. For over 65s, this renewal\r\nshould be an annual event where it would offer the\r\ncollateral benefit of health checks in line with local\r\nHealth Improvement Plans (HIMPs).\r\n\r\nWe are uncomfortable with penalties that entail clamping\r\nand forfeiture of vehicles on the grounds that is a legal\r\nminefield which would allow too much evasion via insurance\r\nand which would miss out on offences committed in cars\r\nhired or taken without permission. On the other hand,\r\nwe approve these measures for unfit vehicles and suggest\r\nthat driving and\/or owning such vehicles be included\r\nwithin the penalties tariff as occasion for forfeiture.\r\nThus we would ask the government to ban the welding of\r\nused cars and take out of circulation cars that have had\r\nthis kind of \"repair\". Apart from helping the environment,\r\nthis would remove, from hazard to themselves and others,\r\ncars which have failed or will fail their next MOT, are\r\ntherefore uninsured and untaxed and being driven with bald\r\ntyres and bad brakes.\r\n\r\nWe conclude on the role of imprisonment. This February the\r\nyoung man who while intoxicated, unlicensed and uninsured,\r\nwas driving the car - not is own - in which Ray and Anne\r\nPuffitt's daughter, Jane, and Stacey Parry, the only\r\ndaughter of another couple, were killed, pleaded guilty to\r\ndangerous driving and was sent to prison for 6 years. Ray\r\nand Anne expressed the view (and who more qualified?) after\r\nthe sentence that they were uncertain that this penalty\r\nstruck the right balance between retribution, redemption\r\nand deterrence. They, and we, share their view that in a\r\nsituation like this a sentence of this length may do little\r\ngood. What would have been more relevant and preferable\r\nwould have been a \"sharp\" custodial sentence of, say, 12\r\nmonths and a lifetime's driving ban. As it is the driver\r\nhas received a driving ban of 7 years concurrent with his\r\nprison sentence with a requirement to take an extended test\r\nafter that period. We believe in sentences which reflect\r\ncircumstances in which an individual has forfeited the\r\nprivilege of driving for the rest of their life.\r\n\r\nLong prison sentences should be confined to that category\r\nof criminal who having been disqualified from driving gets\r\nback into a car. Someone caught driving when disqualified\r\nshould, even if no other offence has occurred, be liable\r\nto a sentence of 5 years. If a disqualified driver kills\r\nor injures another person a life sentence should be\r\navailable to the courts. We realise that the imposition\r\nof tougher sentences will rest on changing attitudes in\r\nthe population at large and that these views will come to\r\nbe reflected in sentences - if they are available. They\r\nshouldn't be mandatory.\r\n\r\nWe realise that to some a lifetime ban might after, say 10\r\nyears, seem unreasonable. It is nothing to the sentence\r\nimposed on those bereaved by the behaviour that led to\r\nthe sentence. While recognising its intended strictness -\r\nespecially within what we have referred to as the mind-set\r\nof \"car-culture\" - we know that there are other ways of\r\ngetting about (with prospects of these improving in the\r\nfuture) and that living a good life without driving a\r\nmotor vehicle is feasible. We believe that for certain\r\ncases, such as that of the young man whose driving led\r\nto the death of Jane Puffitt, a life time driving ban\r\nrepresents a reasonable loss of privilege. It would be\r\na sentence with which juries would be happier and which,\r\nin the circumstances we have described, could play a more\r\neffective part in changing popular attitudes than long\r\nprison sentences.\r\n\r\nCourts which might balk at the long prison sentences we\r\nwant for driving while disqualified, could impose a life\r\ntime's driving ban and in so doing send a message from\r\nsociety that driving a car is a privilege that in certain\r\ntragic circumstances - such as those that prompted this\r\nletter - can be forfeit forever.\r\n\r\nYours sincerely\r\n\r\n\r\nDr John Raine, 33 West Malvern Road Malvern WR14 4NG 01684\r\n5650521 Simon Baddeley, 34 Beaudesert Road Handsworth\r\nBirmingham B20 3TG 0121 554 9794 Ray Puffitt, Rockend, 23b\r\nCecil Road Weston-super-Mare BS23 2NG 01934 633710 Martin\r\nWard, 2 Lahn Drive Droitwich Spa WR9 8TQ 01905 772278\r\n\r\n\r\n","author":"Guy Berliner","parent_id":5690,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2001-03-23 18:12:47","modified":"2001-03-23 21:49:08","fileurl":""}]}