By Larry G on Sep 11, 2008

Im now less concerned about making my point and more about the fact that Ive even momentarily entertained discussing any topic of even relative importance with a such group of fringe individuals.
The more you post the scarier you become.
I actually lended some credit to this site when taken at face value, however once having an opportunity to exchange comments with james young,tracker and sequilicas? Im now convinced this site is a joke or simply a venue for like minded fringe anti-le anti-government types to vent.
Its also clear that as quickly as I post a comment the same fw folks quickly launch a rant that is hardly what I would consider concrete thought, or with any merit,basis,truth or process.
Its funny that for weeks and months this particular blog had no posts…then as quickly as I challenged the garbage posted the blog came alive.
Thanks but no thanks folks…I’ll make it easy and take my fathers advice and not argue with fools for fear of becoming one.
If these views are truly your own I feel very sorry for you as do the folks I knoe who have previewed the site the past few days.

good luck

Good Luck

By sesquiculus on Sep 10, 2008

1) Juries once convicted people of witchcraft. Still would, except science discredited the concept.

2) Around here at least, the path to a judgeship tends to go thru the DA’s office.

3) The DA’s, not the LEO’s, perpetuate the abuses. In Houston, the head of the ME’s DNA lab got fired because she would not cooperate in faking evidence– She proved it in court, BTW.

This sent a message to everyone else in a Houston crime lab that you better give the DA’s what they needed or lose your job.

3) As you note, this situation is common.

4) My favorite example of “canned testimony” is a local LEO who swore to observing positional nystagmus in a DUI defendent.

On cross, the defense attorney asked him if nystagmus was present in both eyes. “of course”, replied the cop, under oath. At which point, the defendent took the stand and popped out his glass eye. Case dismissed.

5) Canned testimony is why I think the videotapes got lost/erased in the case I describe above.

Expecting the defendent to plead out, the DUI squad wrote a generic arrest report. When my friend spoiled the game by demanding a trial, they realized the videotapes did not correspond to the claims in the arrest report.

So the videotapes had to disappear. Destruction of material evidence is called “obstruction of justice”. But when did you ever hear of an LEO or DA prosecuted for this.

By James Young on Sep 10, 2008

Larry G writes: {Your opinions are laughable at best and thank god most americans dont share your at best fringe views…..but no matter…I appreciate those that serve and protect me.}

As do I but modern law enforcement certainly does not qualify for that description. Anybody or any institution that is always trying to stick their hand in my wallet without common benefit is not serving or protecting but is merely abusing authority to collect. I stand by my assertions above.

Who you reference is unclear; therefore, I will assume that you mean all of us collectively. The views expressed in these fora are hardly fringe views because many Americans, certainly more every day, are becoming disenchanted with the pronouncements of public agencies and that is because the people have been lied to so many times. The whole NMSL was a lie and those who perpetuated it or enabled it are equally culpable of lying. Clarification of the term “lie:” voicing a known false assertion with the intent to deceive. That fits NMSL perfectly.

{Your angry responses directed at my comments are filled with venom and im quite sure anyone reading this blog will see the forest for the trees.}

Yet you fail to see why we should be angry and, in the absence of effective alternatives, why we direct “venom” toward you and your brethren. As for what readers see, I hope they see the forest and the trees. Remember, it is not the public that is keeping their activities secret, obscuring official reports, refusing to disclose where and how many stops are made, citations issued, for what offenses, how much fines and fees are collected, and where the money goes. Texas DPS refused to disclosed this basic information, gather by a public agency with public employees at public expense, because they said it was “
proprietary.” They just didn’t want the public to know what they were doing.

{Finally DUI convictions have ben held up in every court in the land…}

So? Courts have accepted judicial notice for unqualified instruments and theory in many cases. Just because a court says it does not make it true. Asserting otherwise just smacks of arrogance.

Sidebar about crime labs and forensics: Houston is hardly unique in providing forensic results that are less than honest. We have also seen similar malfeasance in Oklahoma State crime labs; Boulder, CO; Los Angeles; Utah, and Dade County, FL.

{I will continue to relentlessy pursue those who choose to drive drunk . . .I wish you the bst in your endeavors….some day I hope you come to your senses}

Nobody here is suggesting that you should not pursue those who are too impaired to be driving. That is not an issue with us. What we condemn is the mindless focus on conviction without regard to evidence, the unqualified collection and handling of evidence, the willingness to cheat in scientific tests, the willingness to fit one’s own testimony around model testimony, and the unwillingness to examine alternative explanations. We do not want impaired drivers on the roads with us and that includes the sleep-deprived, the cell-phone user, the Nyquil addict, the distracted soccer-mom, and a host of others. Yet, you ignore all of those to concentrate on the low-hanging fruit of speeders and occasionally come up with somebody with an alleged BAC of 0.08 and believe you have struck gold.

We suggest that you use real science and reason. Do those things that will have the greatest positive impact on key safety measures such as fatally rates and crash rates first. But you, your brethren and the prosecutors see convictions as the end product, failing to see that the real goal is lower fatality and crash rates and even more egregiously missing the larger picture that convictions have no effect on fatality or crash rates.
{MADD is one my of most respected organizations . . .}

That used to be the case. They have morphed into nothing more than a corporate whore, selling their name as a marketing gimmick, trying to find a parade and then jumping in front of it. Even Candy Lightner has disavowed the very organization she founded.

By sesquiculus on Sep 10, 2008

Naturally, we all appreciate the efforts of our friends in law -enforcement. But there is a reason tyrranical gummits are called “Police States”.

True, my opinions are colored by over 20 years of observing shenanegans here in Houston. In fact, things got so bad that, after decades of abuse, the state finally stepped in and closed down the Houston Police Department DNA and toxicology labs.

BTW, I had been pointing out the frank fakery on the wittness stand for years. Even had a judge threaten me with contempt for mentioning it in front of a jury. Imagine her surprise when the State came in and shut the labs down.

It was easy to see if you had any technical knowledge, which juries do not. It was a pretty open secret for years.

BTW, technical matters do not depend on majority opinion. We are a constitutional republic and not a democracy per se.

The case of the terminal cancer patient with chemobrain is illustrative. First, the HPD toxicology lab was closed for fakery. So the samples were sent to the Dallas county tox lab.

Though the diagnosis of chemobrain would have been obvious to any real toxicologist, the DAs were certain that the guy was under the influence of something. So they kept pushing for more tests.

Moreover, with the connivance of the judge (judges here tend to be ex-DA’s) they refused to provide his attorney with the negative results. They also claimed falsely that the results were positive for the pain medication that he occasionally took. This was in an effort to get him to plead out.

I personally called the toxicologists concerned and got the facts. Turns out the local DAs were doing something that they had specifically-agreed not to do in a consent agreement. I.e., as soon as public attention was diverted, they picked up their old tricks. The county spend several million in a cosmetic attempt to show something was being done. Completely wasted.

In the old days, before the tox lab was shut down by the state, they would have just ordered the lab to produce the results they needed. So there was some progress.

What really makes me mad is that had a citizen done some of the stuff they were doing, he would have almost certainly served jail time.

By Larry G on Sep 10, 2008

GOOOOOOOOO

MADD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

To volunteer your time to this wonderful organization please visit

http://www.madd.org/Volunteer.aspx

By Larry G on Sep 10, 2008

Your opinions are laughable at best and thank god most americans dont share your at best fringe views…..but no matter…I appreciate those that serve and protect me.
Your angry responses directed at my comments are filled with venom and im quite sure anyone reading this blog will see the forest for the trees.
Finally DUI convictions have ben held up in every court in the land….you psycho’s on here that preach your anti -law enforcement anti-government message are fools and cowards.

I will continue to relentlessy pursue those who choose to drive drunk and me,my family,friends and co workers will continue to rejoice in there convictions and be safer for it.
I wish you the bst in your endeavors….some day I hope you come to your senses…

P.S. MADD is one my of most respected organizations and Ill take this opportunity to use your site and its bandwith to promote them by mentioning them at every oppotunity.

By sesquiculus on Sep 9, 2008

I sometimes testify in DUI cases. So I guarantee you that these are toxicological matters. But it sure opened this middle-aged white doctors eyes to how things really operate.

What really concerns me are cases in which a person who has a medical disease is picked up and run thru the DUI mill, even though they were not doing anything that could resonably be interpreted as intoxication. Rather, they just looked “wierd” or “confused” to an LEO.

The first case I describe above. This was a person with clinically-defined epilepsy secondary to a head injury in a mugging. He was finally forced to plead out to DUI as a result of undue pressure from the judge. Meanwhile 1-3 videotapes of the incident disappeared, the arrest report indicated the incident happened a half-mile from where the wrecker picked up my firends car, etc. I.e., they cooked the arrest report to claim things which did not show on the videotape of the arrest. They have to make a lot of arrests and convictions to justify over $100K a year in overtime. So sometimes the DUI cops will cut corners. BTW, these guys testify so much that they get very good at testilying.

The second case was a cancer patient on chemotherapy observed by an assistant DA driving behind him as looking “confused” and “lost” while driving. She called him in and he was immediately picked up.

We know there were no drugs on board because he had a quite through tox screen. Nonetheless, he told the arresting officer he occasionally took pain medication for his metastastic cancer.

So they brought charges on that. BTW, even thoug it is not relevant to this case, tolerance develops so quickly to opiates that they do not affect driving ability at all, as a practical matter. All this was worked out years ago in the leadup to allowing methadone maintenance.

The case was brought to my attention. I immediately diagnosed obvious “chemobrain”, a quite common consequence of cancer chemotherapy. The symptoms are quit specific and consist of not knowing exactly where you are.

Thus the “confusion” observed by the DA. Even after I spotted the problem, the DA attempted to pressure the terminally-ill accused into pleading guilty to DUI for driving with “chemobrain”. I suspect this was an attempt to avoid liability for a bad arrest. Happens all the time.

I hinted that this case was so outrageous I would call my friends in the media about it. So it eventually got dropped. Can you imagine picking up cancer patients just for having chemotherapy.

BTW, needless to say, neither chemobrain nor the type of epilepsy my friend has are associated with an increased incidence of traffic accidents. But what is most distressing is that this does not matter to the DUI mafia. It was also pretty obvious that the neither the DA nor the cops had ever heard of chemobrain, which affects as many as half the persons who get chemotherapy. Clearly this is not mentioned in their so-called “courses”. Which makes me wonder just how many of cancer patients are picked up for it.

BTW, my sister in law (who recently died of breast cancer ) had chemobrain so bad that she had to take her 10 year-old daughter along to navigate, but was otherwise mostly unaffected.

By tracker on Sep 9, 2008

James,

I hope I am correct in the assumption that you are referring to the unconconventional application of what should be the wisdom needed in defining the law. LE is not limited to those who possess a drivers license and neither choose to obey or disobey the laws regulated to allow a civilized population to travel freely, safely, and quickly far greater distances than any other country in the world.

From Maine to California we have the contingency of the lower 48 as they are called because we have borders between Alaska and Hawaii. This gives us 48 different sets of state laws,which are often abused by county mounties too numerous to count and then these armies are reinforced by local town ship and city ordinances and regulations which have become collection fees and toll booths to shore up the local economies. Some of the revenue collected is never seen beyond the local government.

The ownership of a vehicle and possession of a legitimate drivers license can be a great fund raiser nation-wide. The majority of people dedicated to serving in LE are honest hard-working citizens who take pride in respecting the rights of citizens, however there is a percentage of those who abuse the power and privilege to serve.

I have written many letters citing incidents nation-wide which I have experienced,witnessed or heard of. I came just short of being arrested once for simply trying to prevent a man from killing a woman with his bare hands in a parking lot.

She was on her knees and had her hands tied with
blue tiedown straps. He continuously was punching her in the face and when I grabbed him he shouted for me to “back off M-F this was police business”. No police car, no uniform, no one from the crowd gathering interested enough to stop or question him on why he was publicly executing a woman in a cruel and unusual fashion in a private, but public place.

I backed off, but did not appreciate the M-F comment. I moved several paces back, knelt down and told his victim to lay down and not resist. He shouted, “that’s it M-F you are under arrest for obstructing justice”.

Two other men ran toward me coming out of the small crowd gathered and showed me police ID badges as they cuffed me and read me my “right to remain silent rights”.

Contrary to advice given by NMA, I refused to be silent. I shouted to the crowd the violations this man was putting against this woman. The police officer who was beating the woman was no longer beating her, he was detaining me. I was placed in an unmarked car as I told my kidnappers I would file charges with Internal affairs because I was on Private property making a legitimate purchase when people were calling for someone to stop this man from killing this woman.

When I mentioned the situation of a Mr. Rodney King being beaten while restrained by officers in California years earlier, my kidnappers returned me to the lot and demanded I leave. I filed the IAD complaint, but because I refused to come up with legal fees for an attorney I simply voice my constitutional right to speak the truth and rely on the people who witnessed that incident to testify to my story.

I was never allowed to know what happened to the officers, or the victim without the privilege of an attorney.Chances are good that I never should have interfered in this incident, but to this day I hope it saved that womans life.

By Hubcap on Sep 9, 2008

Sesquiculus, you are so right!

The last time I was on a jury panel–it was for a DUI–a toxicologist was excused for being a toxicologist.

The judge then asked if anyone belonged to or actively supported any “rights” organisations.

He was cool with the ACLU, but I was tossed the instant I mentioned NMA.

By Hubcap on Sep 9, 2008

“By Larry G. on Jul 9, 2008
I am a police officer here in Virginia and can tell you that checkpoints do work and ARE an effective deterrent.”

Whenever there is a news report about a checkpoint in my area of San Diego, it’s always something along the lines of “out of 1200 vehicles stopped, 130 tickets were written for equipment or paperwork violations and two DUI arrests were made.”

Please explain how that is effective in anything more than ignoring the rights of the 1198 people who were perfectly sober.

By Sesquiculus on Sep 9, 2008

From “Forensic Medicine”, Gordon and Shapiro, a representative text from the main-stream scientific literature– i.e., it is in accord with “Dauber”. The cop-shop literature (which comes from “captive” and non-medical sources) is not.

1) “Except in extreme cases,a blood alcohol test is unlikely to be reliable as a simple and single test for drunkeness”.

2) “…Attempts to estimate the amount of alcohol affecting the brain, when based on analysis of breath or urine may therefor be quite fallacious and misleading…”

3) ” A physiological nystagmus occurs in about one in five of normal persons ”

4) “Murphree et al state that a significant nystagmus-inducing effect may be produced by the congeners in alcoholic beveridges.”

5) “…For example, according to Jenner’s criteria, 47 percent of persons may be considered as under the influence of alcohol at a blood alcohol concentration of 150 mg per 100 ml ( i.e., 0.15% ). In other words, 53% of persons would, by the criteria employed, be sober.”

I could go on and on. The other main-stream texts are similar.

This is why there has been no real main-stream consideration of the evidence in DUI cases, as there has been for DNA evidence. If this precedure were done, it would likely call into significant question much of the evidence used to convict persons of DUI.

By James Young on Sep 9, 2008

{What exactly did we bring on ourselves?}

The disrespect, the fear that you bring with you, the fear that has replaced the trust of the people. You isolated yourselves from the people when you abandoned your walking beats and knew all the people in your area, insulating yourselves in virtually soundproof cocoons, speaking a different language and buying into the institutional mantra that you are the thin blue line between civilization and chaos. The people neither trust you nor even like you anymore and, yes, you brought it on yourselves.
{ We risk our lives daily to protect our neighbors and you and youe conspiracy theorist friends concoct stories of crime lab wrongdoings and corrupt judiciary. Your positions,assertions and comments are disgusting and unfounded, you should be ashamed.}

On the contrary, I’m proud of the questions that we have raised against the conventional wisdom. I propose no conspiracy because it is not necessary. However, we have proven stories of crime-lab malfeasance, perjuring cops, corrupt judges, and politicians in for the money rather than the people. We saw cops prostituting themselves beginning in 1974, happily writing tickets under the guise of safety for things that had been perfectly legal before. The law was a lie and those who perpetuated it or enabled it were liars as well. It would have all been funny if it had not been so serious a blow to the freedoms that idealize America.

As to the danger of protecting neighbors, etc. Bullshit. Your career doesn’t even rank in the top ten most dangerous and you’re not protecting anything. You are looking for people making mistakes, often benign, and you pounce like a duck on a junebug. You don’t protect me and I don’t ask for your protection; in fact, I’d rather be left alone than left to depend on LE to “protect” me.

{I think [you're] well aware the positions I mention are those on DUI. Those positions are clearly self serving and in no way are supported by any science or fact. }

NMA positions specifically call for reason and science. If that is self-serving, please serve up some more.

By sesquiculus on Sep 9, 2008

My credentials: MD,PhD, pathology residency, certified, American Board of Toxicology and American Board of Medical Toxicology, American college of clinical toxicology, etc. Real red meat training. Your credentials are?

Fact is, trained neurologists under clinical conditions sometimes have difficulty detecting nystagmus. Says so right in my toxicology and neurology books. Perhaps LEO come from better stock .

The cites you make are to cop-shop captive institutions, training facilitiesm, etc. intended to provide “evidence” and have never been properly vetted with real doctors, real neurologists, etc.. Very likely, because they would not pass muster under “Daubert”. At least, not in the tox books I read.

Contrast this with DNA evidence, which has really gotten a work-over from main-stream science. Evidently, nobody from the law-enforcement world has dared to put the evidence that is commonly used in DUI cases to this kind of scrutiny. I wonder why..

As for the “rebuttable presumption”. The legal issue is whether someone is intoxicated, not their blood alcohol level. One principle in American jurisprudence is that the accused has the right to present evidence that he is not guilty. The old law recognized this.

Another principle is that it is better to release ten guilty parties than convict one innocent one. The DUI laws turn this on its head.

BTW, it is true that impairment down to .03% or so blood alcohol can be measured in some persons using delicate laboratory methods. However, the teaching among toxicologists (real ones, not those who work for police departments) is that, “as a practical matter” driving per se in most persons is not significantly impaired below .05%.

Also, the 4-5-fold increase in accidents at 0.08% is probably somewhat artifactual because it represents people who get into accidents and then have their blood alcohol level measured. Anyway, it is about the same as talking on a cell-phone while driving, a much lessor offense or, in many places, not an offense at all.

By Randy on Sep 8, 2008

There goes James Young trying to defend drunks on the road again. There are studies that someone with a BAC of .08 is more than 5 times more likely to get in an accident than normal. Those are just numbers on a report to James Young though. He and many here would rather there be no police or government as stated in past posts on this site. The back woods in Kentucky away from all people and with their home made still would be the best place to be for such people. Sorry for anyone living in Kentucky.

By Larry G. on Sep 8, 2008

Well let’s start with line 1….I have seen no legitimate point raised.
Line 2…toxicolgy degrees from which institutions and how many years related to forensics or criminal justice?
Lin 3….its “nystagmus” not “nystagmous” and how exactly would you have trouble observing a “distinct horizontal involuntary jerking of the eyes….light in no way affects nystagmus. If your going to suppose false arguments at least read and understand what “could” cause a false nystagmus i.e. caloric nystagmus,post rotational nystagmus,psychokinetic nystagmus or fatigue induced nystagmus. I have little faith in your credentials or your study on this topic.

Line 4…..toxicology play little if any part in determining ones level of impairment or ability to drive. In fact NHTSA studies show signifigant loss of motor function and concentration at thresholds well below .08 in fact showing studies performed by american medical association in 1997 and 2002 show signifigant impairment begins at BAC levels as low as .03 which is supported by NHTSA studies.

Line 5 and finally…..not only is innocence presumed when charged with dui but the defendant is offered a chance to challenge every aspect from SFST results cand breath testing,officer observation of suspects demeanor and drivind as well as post stop driving ques or pre exit interviews. Perhaps you would be better served to attend a NHTSA DUI detection course prior to responding to my post so as to better understand what you are arguing as well as our DUI methods. For anyone who reads this post to accept your argument….. you would essentially have to believe ALL police officers are corrupt and that the criminal justice system as a whole is corrupt. As far as im concerned th folks posting these anti police, anti-dui law messages are conspiracy theorists with too much time and too little intgrity….just my two cents worth

By sesquiculus on Sep 8, 2008

It is pretty standard for people in the criminal justice system to immediately question the motivation of anyone who points out defects. Ad hominem attacks are much easier than responding to legimate points.

My statements come from over 20 years expereince as a forensic toxicologist. Donno about elsewhere, but here in Houston the DUI business is severely corrupted. E.g., some DUI cops make hundreds of thousands a year in overtime payments. So they are hardly disinterested.

BTW, I always laugh when LEO’s claim they can diagnose “nystagmous” on the roadside when a trained physician sometimes has trouble with this in his office, without all those pesky car lights. So the prosecution starts out with its main witnesses perjuring themsleves and goes from there.

From a toxicological point of view, the laws defining intoxication at 0.08% offend principles of equity. They were primarily passed due to MADD hysteria and convict many people who are probably not really a significant risk. The old laws ( DUI at .1% with a “rebuttable presumption” of inxoxication up to .15% ) made more sense because they were more carefully considered and were not so polically-motivated.

BTW, I never saw anybody meet the “rebuttable presumption”. But the very fact it was there satisfied questions of equity and presumption of innocence. In line with classic US legal tradition, the accused was actually provided the opportunity to prove to the jury he was not intoxicated. If this was such a problem, why did they take it out?

By Larry G on Sep 8, 2008

James Young Writes:(Unfortunately your brethren’s actions speak much louder than your words and they brought it on themselves.)

What exactly did we bring on ourselves? We risk our lives daily to protect our neighbors and you and youe conspiracy theorist friends concoct stories of crime lab wrongdoings and corrupt judiciary. Your positions,assertions and comments are disgusting and unfounded, you should be ashamed.

{Those self-serving positions include promoting reason and science as the basis for traffic flow and traffic laws. Larry, if you have any evidence to support your faux assertion, now is the time to present it; if it does not exist, you need to withdraw it)

I think your well aware the positions I mention are those on DUI. Those positions are clearly self serving and in no way are supported by any science or fact. YOur tactics are clearly misleading and one sided, and I believe support my statemnt that those who are behind this site must have been previous offenders.

By sesquiculus on Sep 8, 2008

According to news reports, in Houston, some police officers on the DUI squad were making over $100K a year on overtime. In fact, several DUI cops were making more than the mayor. The way they justified this was a lot of arrests, making a lot of money for the city.

The necessity for volume to justify the salaries caused the DUI squad to take shortcuts. As I note above, one trick was for a compliant judge to unduly pressure defendents to plead out.

This way, you can put any old thing on the arrest report and not have to back it up by evidence. When my friend refused to cooperate and plead guilty to get out of jail, they had to destroy the videotape(s) because these did not correspond to the arrest report (which you cannot easily change).

BTW, I have been watching shenangans from these people for decades. Once, in response to a direct question from a prosecutor, I testified that I had seen frank fakery from the Houston Crime lab. The judge dismissed the jury and admonished me severely. Imagine her surprise when the state closed down the crime lab for such fakery six months later.

By James Young on Sep 7, 2008

Larry G. writes: {I can also tell you that police are not us vs. them as previously indicated on this site.}

Unfortunately your brethren’s actions speak much louder than your words and they brought it on themselves.

{This organization should be ashamed of it’s self serving positions. I wouldn’t be suprised to find that many of its officers or staff have previous DUI convictions.}

Those self-serving positions include promoting reason and science as the basis for traffic flow and traffic laws. Larry, if you have any evidence to support your faux assertion, now is the time to present it; if it does not exist, you need to withdraw it

By Sesquiculus on Sep 7, 2008

I’m an MD PhD who does forensic work. Over 20 years of expereince has convinced me the local police often (er) cook evidence. In fact, the state closed down the Houston police department crime lab because they pretty much faked everything.

A friend of mine who had a closed head injury with seizures got picked up by the DUI squad here in Houston. Basically, for looking “confused”.

He had had a previous DUI seven years before. So they threw the book at him. In retrospect, the first DUI may also have reflected his seizures.

He demanded a trial while sitting in jail. The judge then informed him that if anyone who could afford to bail out could not get a court appointed attorny. Totally illegal under Texas law. But, she would let him out immediately if he would plead guilty. He refused and said he wanted a trial. BTW, the judge is married to a Houston cop.

As many as three videotapes were taken of the incident. all disappeared. At which point, I bailed him out. I figured the Houston Police Department was up to its old tricks and had cooked the arrest report, expecting him to plead out. You can lie all you want, if the case doesbn’t go to trial. When he didn’t plead out, they “disappeared ” the videotape(s). All of them.

Over a year later, the case goes to trial. My friend had a beer for lunch. The judge claimed she smelled alcohol on his breath and told him she would tell the jury, unless he immediately pled out. Which he then did.

Months later, I have yet to get my bail money ($2000) back. Arguably, this is payback from the judge for getting in the way of “the plead out or else” qame.

By Larry G. on Jul 9, 2008

I am a police officer here in Virginia and can tell you that checkpoints do work and ARE an effective deterrent.

I can also tell you that police are not us vs. them as previously indicated on this site.

We do however aggressively enforce the DUI laws allready on the books, as most of us have seen the end result of DUI drivers which is always an innocent individual who is injured rarely the DUI offender.

I will also share with you that I will prosecute a fellow officer for DUI as fast as a civilian….I have zero tolerance for this violation, as it is tantamount to pointing a loaded firearm at every other driver you share the road with while DUI.

This organization should be ashamed of it’s self serving positions. I wouldn’t be suprised to find that many of its officers or staff have previous DUI convictions.

By Becky on Jul 8, 2008

I don’t agree that this organization is pushing for liberal enforcement or penalties for impaired driving. They are merely stating that some of our enforcement methods are costly and ineffective, while some others violate our fundamental rights. For example, taking away a license before due process completely contradicts ‘innocent until proven guilty’.

Last Christmas, my cousin and his newborn baby were involved in a head-on collision with a very drunk driver and his drunk girlfriend - at 10 in the morning. This was the driver’s 6th drunk driving incident in 20 years. Yes, 6 violations in 20 years, and the man was still driving and violating the law. Obviously, our current methods of controlling this behavior are ineffective. You are right, drunk driving does kill; that’s why I support organizations who are not afraid to step back and say, ‘there has to be a better way to do this.’

What I would like to see is someone will come forward with a solution and reason behind it. Not just, ‘I thought of this, so let’s try it.’ A rational, cost-effective system to handle both first-time and repeat offenders, based on conclusive research and statistics. Ideally, I would like to see a system that will free up some of our police resources. Especially in the bigger cities, more police are needed in the neighborhoods where violent crime occurs everyday because we don’t have the manpower to reduce it.

By What? on Jul 5, 2008

Are you kidding me? The stipulations and punishment from drunken driving are not near as harsh here in the US as they are in other parts of the world. Give me a break. Although this organization states they do not condone drunken driving, they sure are pushing for liberal enforcement and penalities. Let’s face it, drunk driving kills. Do you think police officer’s really see it as “police vs. civilians”? Probably not. They are doing the job prescribed to them. The whole point of established DWI/DUI laws is to be a proactive stance on a fatal problem.

By jim on Jul 1, 2008

Great, now what?
Do you want a donation? ok.