According to a recent report from the Idaho Press-Tribune, which recently interviewed Rep. John McGee about his DUI arrest, McGee’s arrest came after his erratic driving caused him to jackknife an SUV and its cargo trailer.

After McGee was arrest, police discovered that his blood alcohol level was almost twice the legal limit, although the politician still contends that he remembers nothing from that night. McGee said he remembers having a few “celebratory drinks” after winning a golf tournament, but that the rest of the night was a blur.

For his actions, McGee pleaded guilty to the charge of a DUI, but police later dropped their charge that he was driving the car without the owner’s consent.

After his guilty plea, McGee spent 36 hours in jail (which was a far cry from the possible 180 days he could have spent behind bars), and performed 24 hours of community service. He was also fined $1,000 and, because it was his first offense, under Idaho DUI law, the arrest may be removed from his record if he follows the terms of his probation.

Of course, while his criminal record may eventually be clear, his record in the court of public opinion may have suffered long-term damage.

This week, the senator will learn whether he will retain his position as the Republican Senate Caucus chairman, or if his party will remove him from the position for fear of a public outcry.

Too be fair, McGee certainly isn’t the first politician who has recovered his position after a DUI accident, but the Idaho public remains skeptical about his ability to serve as a senator.

Nevertheless, McGee continues to fight for his position in the senate, and pictures he showed the Idaho Press-Tribune seem to support his claim that the injuries he suffered in the accident have fogged his memory of the events that led up to the crash.

Sources indicate that these photos reveal discoloration and a wide scab on the top of his head, as well bruises and deep abrasions on his waist, left knee, and torso.

And, despite McGee’s poor decision—which he readily admits was wrong—he may offer a good example of an otherwise responsible person who made one terrible decision.

Many DUI arrests, in fact, involve responsible members of the community who don’t know their own limits. In order to avoid making a similar mistake, other drivers should remember that getting behind the wheel after a few drinks is never worth the risk to one’s reputation.

One such DUI arrest occurred last week in California when a man suspected of driving under the influence of alcohol ran his car directly into the front of a police cruiser.

According to a report in the Riverside County Press-Enterprise, 50-year-old Deepmohinder Singh Kapur was arrested for a suspected felony DUI after he slammed his car into the front of a police vehicle.

Sources indicate that the police car belonged to a member of the Riverside County Gang Task Force. The officer in the car was transporting two men to jail when the accident occurred. Fortunately, though, no one was seriously hurt in the collision.

The absence of injuries was particularly fortunate given the nature of the wreck. Apparently, immediately before the accident, both cars were head in opposite directions on an interstate highway in the early afternoon.

The police officer saw Kapur’s Volvo sedan crossing the center dividing lane, but he did not have enough time to maneuver his vehicle out of the way. All he could do was slow down.

The accident cause severe damage to the front of both the Volvo and the police cruiser, and the impact of the collision set off the drivers’ airbags in both cars.

The police officer suffered some cuts to his arm during the collision. In addition, the detainees in the back of the car, who were wearing handcuffs, suffered some facial injuries and one may have injured his wrist.

The detainees had been arrested in connection with a gang-related stabbing incident and were being transported to a detention center at the time of the accident.

Both the police officer and the detainees were taken to the hospital for their non-life-threatening injuries, which will delay the arrestee’s inevitable trip to the detention center.

As for Kapur, only time will tell what punishment a local court will eventually level against him, but he may be facing serious fines, jail time, or a suspended license, especially because this is not his first DUI offense.

In addition to standard DUI charges, Kapur may also face possible punishment for reckless driving, endangering the life of others, and whatever else a local prosecutor wishes to throw at him.

Of course, when police are usually tasked with discovering drunk drivers, they have to pull over suspects and administer a range of blood alcohol tests to determine their level of inebriation.

Here, Kapur saved the police officer a significant amount of legwork, albeit in a dangerous fashion. Usually, drunk drivers do not readily offer themselves to police in the form of a head-on collision.

Common tactics include driving too slow or too fast, masking swerving by simply swerving really slow, or blaming red eyes and slow reflexes on a lack of sleep, or prescription pills.

The most infamous DUI offenders, though, are the people who cause car accidents, and then flee the scene out of fear of being caught driving under the influence of alcohol.

A man in Louisville recently learned just how difficult escaping the scene of a DUI accident can be.

According to WDRB News, which is based in Louisville, Kentucky, 37-year-old Jesse Gaines was arrested last week after police tracked his car by following the path of leaky fluids from Gaines’ wounded vehicle.

Before his arrest, Gaines had allegedly been involved in a three-car accident in downtown Louisville. The police report from the accident indicates that Gaines swerved into oncoming traffic and struck two cars before speeding back into the road and then striking a pole.

After the accident, Gaines fled the scene, which led to phone calls to Louisville about a drunk driver on the loose.

Officers did not have a hard time locating Gaines, as they simply followed the path of a leaking fluid that had started dripping from Gaines’ car at the scene of the accident.

When Gaines was finally arrested by the police, he admitted that he had just left a strip club where he had consumed two “large liquor drinks.”

The police report also claims that Gaines smelled of alcohol, had red eyes, and was unable to stand without falling down. When the police administered a breathalyzer test, Gaines blew a remarkable .26, which is far above the legal limit of .08.

After his less-than-sterling performance on the blood alcohol test, Gaines was promptly arrested and charged with operating a motor vehicle under the influence of alcohol.

To add insult to injury, Gaines was also charged with a failure to maintain insurance. This, of course, will be disappointing news to the other drivers whose cars were struck by Gaines during his ill-fated drive.

While Gaines faces a world of legal trouble, it’s worth noting that DUI arrests can be serious crimes even in the absence of an actual accident.

A DUI arrest often leads to jail time, a suspended license, and hefty fines. Because of the potentially severe impact of DUI charges, many people who are arrested seek legal information from a local DUI lawyer.

Courts take DUI arrests very seriously, but with the proper legal information, people who are arrested are able to deal with the charges with minimal damages to their finances and their reputation.

This harsh reality happened once again after a recent fatal car accident in Northfield, Vermont, that was allegedly caused by drunk driving.

According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, 18-year-old Renee Robbins died after a car containing eight Norwich University students crashed in a single car accident.

The car was being driven by 22-year-old Derek Saber, who was arrested by local police under suspicion of a DUI shortly after the accident.

In addition to Robbins’ death, three other people in the car suffered “critical” injuries during the accident. Four other students required hospitalization after the crash.

Before the accident, the eight occupants of the car had been at an off-campus party early Sunday morning. The passengers were all freshmen students at Norwich, and they lived in the same dormitory on campus.

The incident had a severe impact on the campus’s collective psyche, and many members of the campus community are grappling for answers.

According to Norwich President Richard Schneider, the incident was “an unfathomable tragedy,” and “the entire Norwich family is grieving over this.”

While the families of the accident victims face their own pains, the driver of the car and the leader of the party the students left before the accident are facing legal troubles of their own.

The driver, Derek Saber, allegedly had a blood alcohol level of .16, which doubled the legal limit of .08. He was arrested and held on $100,000 bail in a county jail in Vermont.

In addition to Saber’s legal troubles, 20-year-old Logan O’Neill, who hosted the party, was charged with various counts including possession of alcohol, enabling consumption of alcohol with a minor, and violating the terms of his release, stemming from a prior DUI charge of his own.

At the time of the party, O’Neill was under strict orders to avoid consuming alcohol due to the conditions established by a court after his second drunk driving arrest earlier this year.

Drunk driving accidents are one of the most common causes of teenage deaths in the United States. This statistic is particularly troubling in light of the fact that drunk driving accidents are completely preventable.

Later the same night, one of the officers, Derick Kuilan, took the bachelorette for a joyride on a department-owned ATV, crashing into and seriously injuring two innocent beachgoers.

The picture was released Tuesday by Miami-Dade prosecutors as they charged Kuilan with two felony counts of reckless driving with serious bodily injury and two counts of DUI with serious bodily injury. The second officer, Rolando Gutierrez, does not face criminal charges.

“It is mind-boggling that they felt comfortable enough to do something like that,” Miami Beach Police Chief Carlos Noriega told the Miami Herald.

Both officers have been fired from the department since the time of the incident.

Details of what allegedly happened are outlined in a warrant prepared by prosecutor David I. Gilbert and Miami Beach detective Robert Silvagni:

Derick Kuilan was assigned to ATV patrol, midnight shift, on July 3 and Officer Rolando Gutierrez was assigned to patrol mid-Beach.

That night, the pair of officers walked into the Clevelander hotel bar, a known attraction for tourists, around 5 a.m.

A group of young women from Pennsylvania were celebrating a bachelorette party when the officers arrived. After posing for a picture with the group, Kuilan and Gutierrez began dancing and drinking.

Kuilan then invited the bachelorette, Adalee Martin, to take a ride with him on the ATV he had parked nearby, to which Martin agreed.

The two drove south along the beach at alternating speeds, turning the headlights on and off as they neared approaching pedestrians. When they arrived at the end of the beach and turned around, they drove back north with the vehicle’s lights turned off.

On the drive back, the ATV crashed into Kitzie Nicanor and Luis Almonte, who were on the beach dipping their feet in the water. Bystanders claimed that the ATV whizzed by and that “they could barely see it, because it had no lights on and it was traveling fast,” according to the warrant.

Almonte suffered a broken femur, requiring surgery, while Nicanor had to have her spleen removed and remains hospitalized in serious condition.

Kuilan surrendered to the Miami-Dade County Jail after being charged Tuesday and has already posted $30,000 bail. His arraignment is scheduled for Aug. 25.

The conviction came after Conner’s defense team attempted to shift some of the blame for the child’s death to a police officer. The jury decided, after hours of deliberation in the Will County courtroom, that Conner alone was responsible for the tragic outcome of the May 10 DUI crash.

Conner crashed into a tree, drove through a fence, and hit another tree in the accident that killed young Michael Langford, Jr., before being charged with drunk driving, according to an article in the Herald-News.

Part of Conner’s unsuccessful DUI defense was the claim that police had some part to play in his drunk driving and subsequent accident. He argued that police arrested his girlfriend, his designated driver, on a suspended license during a previous traffic stop, then ordered him to drive home. Conner claimed that they threatened to arrest him if he didn’t drive away.

Conner was drunk, and family members have criticized law enforcement for, according to their story, ignoring the fact that he was an impaired driver when they ordered him to drive home.

The prosecution in the case successfully argued that Conner alone was responsible for the decision to drive drunk and endanger the child.

Per Illinois DUI law, Conner could face up to 14 years behind bars. He’ll be sentenced in May.

Conner admitted to being drunk following a house party. His girlfriend, Kathie LaFond, was driving, but was arrested on the way home. Conner took the wheel, and police said that neither Conner nor LaFond informed the police that he had been drinking that night. Prosecution were also skeptical that police ordered Conner to drive home.

Conner, however, continued to drive drunk, even after he called a friend for help. The friend told him to stop the car, but Conner drove on, reaching 66 miles per hour at points, before he drove over several lawns, through trees, catapulting his car to the point that it uprooted a tree.

Young Langford did not survive the poor decision.

The jury deliberated for nine hours before reaching its guilty verdict on two aggravated drunk driving charges.

David P. Baker had been driving a city-issued green Ford Explorer in Arlington County when he caused roughly $900 in damage to either vehicle. His blood alcohol level was reported to be 0.19—twice the legal limit in the state of Virginia.

Baker, 58, submitted his resignation on Monday, July 27. Prior to his resignation, Baker’s attorney James Clark insisted that his client had no intention of resigning.

City Manager James K. Hartmann initially ordered an investigation of the incident and told the Washington Post he would “wait for the findings of the internal review” before making a decision on how to proceed. In the mean time, Baker had been put on administrative leave.

Hartmann stated, “It is very disappointing when one of our colleagues makes a bad decision.”

If convicted, Baker will face a minimum of five days in jail due to his blood alcohol  level more than doubly exceeding the legal limit, according to the police report.

Baker will leave his post officially on Friday and will temporarily be replaced by Deputy Police Chief Earl Cook who will serve as acting chief.

Source: Washington Post

In April 2000, Hawkeye Kinkaid was drinking at the Bellingham Moose Lodge, where is girlfriend, Alexis Chapman, was serving him as a bartender. The forensic consultant found that Kinkaid probably drank the equivalent 21 12-ounce beers or 30 ounces 80-proof alcohol.

His blood alcohol level was believed to be .32 at the time of the collision.

While he was driving home, Kinkaid crossed the center line in Ferndale, Wash. and struck Bianca Faust’s car. Fraust, from New York City, was driving with her two children and grandchild. Everyone in Faust’s car was injured and Kinkaid was killed. The accident left Faust’s 7-year-old son, Christopher, a paraplegic.

Faust sued the lodge and Chapman and was awarded $14 million in Whatcom County Superior Court. The state Court of Appeals later overturned the case because Faust needed to present “specific point-in-time evidence” that Kinkaid appeared drunk when Chapman was serving him.

Washington DUI law holds bartenders liable for damages to potential victims if they serve visibly intoxicated customers. The court said that Chapman told others that Kinkaid was too “tipsy” to be driving. At one point in the night she refused to serve him.

Source: The Associate Press

The 200 page report is the first to give the details about what happened on April 9th, when Andrew Gallo crashed into a car, killing three people.

The transcript reveals that Gallo remembers having two drinks at a restaurant and three at a bikini bar, intermixed with sake shots.

While his stepbrother, Raymond Rivera, tells the court about half pitcher “Boombah” beers, 1880-brand Tequila shots and drinks of Arrogant Bastard, a “very strong” ale.

The details about what the two men drank was fuzzy. Neither could recall exactly what they drank and how much. Both men describe “bleaking out” before crashing their minivan into an Eclipse carrying Adenhart and three friends.

Courtney Steward, 20, and Henry Pearson, 25 died on the scene. Adenhart, 22, died during surgery a few hours later.

The men remember coming to 90 minutes later, with not much recollection of the night.

Last month Gallo was indicted on three counts of second-degree murder, fleeing the scene with a death or injury, driving under the influence causing injury and driving with a .08% blood alcohol level causing injury.  He has plead not guilty and remains in jail with a $2 million bail set.

Source: The Press-Enterprise, ESPN

The plea deal, which was just accepted by Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Dennis Murphy, orders Stallworth to spend 30 days in jail for the death of Mario Reyes.

In the plea agreement, Stallworth was sentenced to eights years of reporting probation, two years of community control and a lifetime driver’s license suspension. During probation, he will have many drug and alcohol tests.

The Reyes family agreed to the plea bargain, pushing for a quick agreement so the case could be resolved.

“We’ve been in intense discussions with the victims who, as far as we’re concerned, are the primary force in what is a just resolution of this case,” Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernández Rundle told the press Monday night.

Stallworth, who had a clean driving record before the DUI offense,  showed remorse over Reyes’ death and cooperated with authorities, helping to make a quick plea deal.

On March 14,  Stallworth hit and killed Reyes, a 59-year-old crane operator, who had just finished a night shift on Terminal Island. At the time, Stallworth had a blood alcohol level of .126%.