jgadamski

If I own a bar where I serve a driver who later is involved in a collision, the trail of liability would extend to me and my business. Is Tmobile and Sprint exempt from such culpability?

FBinNY 

You can answer this for yourself. What if, instead of being the bartender who served someone you knew or should have known was drunk, you were simply the guy who brewed the beer. As such, you would've had no way of knowing the conditions under which it was consumed, so would you be you responsible or culpable?

SurfNTurf

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FBinNY 

So much for the deterrence effect of harsh sentences.

SurfNTurf

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B. Carfree

That's not quite the right analogy. Once a keg or bottle of beer is brewed and out of the brewery, it's up to the sellers at the point of contact to prevent what horrid outcomes they can, or at least prevent the ones that the law dictates. T-mobile and other cell phone suppliers are more like the bartenders here (where the folks manning the factories that make their toys are the brewers).

They have the ability to shut down the signal to moving vehicles, but choose not to. Current law does not impose this upon them like it imposes a mandate to not serve drunks on a bartender, but if the rate of carnage from distracted drivers rises to whatever threshold gets the public's attention before autonomous cars become dominant, they might just see the law change.

vol

If some think jail sentences are too harsh, how about, instead of that, revoking the driver's license permanently, for life?

The prohibiting owning a cell phone during her probation somehow seems laughably symbolic and useless to me.

FBinNY 

Yes, it is possible to shut down a cell phone when it's moving, but that has issues of it's own. Namely passengers in cars, on trains and buses would likewise be blocked out.

In any case, while cell phones are the cause de jour, I'm not nearly as convinced as some here that there's crisis of the proportions people believe.

Long before cell phones we had distracted drivers, from people eating, putting on makeup, tending to unruly children in the back seat (by law), tuning radios, reading maps, reading newspapers, and doing all sorts of things in their cars.

Cell phone use is just one more thing, and it's trendy to blame all distracted driving on cell phones, but the data on accidents and fatalities doesn't support that assumption. If cell phone use were the problem it's made out to be, we'd expect to see an uptick in the data, but there's barely a ripple, and the rates remain within a very narrow band. That means that either cell phones are not a major new hazard, or that they are, but the effect is offset by some other hazard in decline.

molten

How did you get your pardon? (a) cell-phone is the latest fad, as fads create trouble everytime [other than economic advantage]; (b) the "soft" come during the time, of the dem party.

rydabent

This sentence? totally ignores the fact that there is a mother in a cold grave FOREVER. As in almost all these cases where the criminal courts DONT hand out justice, I hope the father and the children recieve justice in civil court. They can sue for wrongful death. They should sue for all the killers car insurance will pay plus more, so there will have to be payments every month for years, to remind the killer what she did.

I simply dont understanD the thinking of the judge and others here that have the attitude-------Oh gee thats too bad the cyclist was killed but NO big deal things like this happen. NO THEY DONT HAVE TO HAPPEN IF PEOPLE WERE RESPONSIBLE!!!!!!!

SurfNTurf

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genec

Bus passes are a nice idea... but bottom line, if the person is that bad on a bike, I don't want them anywhere near a car. My bottom line is still "if you kill someone with a car, you lose your driving privilege forever." That simple. And yes, for those of you about to spout constitutional law... one has the right to a speedy trial and all... and if found guilty... etc etc.

dynodonn 

With the addiction to driving being so great in the US, the majority of US road infrastructure designed for autos, and mass transit being poor or non existent in many areas, I can see why our local law enforcement cites many motorists daily for driving on suspended or expired licenses. Revoking someone's driving privilege usually is not enough.

genec

I realize it is more symbolic in nature than anything else... as unless you physically lock someone up or monitor them 24/7, you cannot stop someone from driving...

However... the symbolism and hassle are sending a message, at least to that person... they screwed up and therefore no longer have that privilege. I think the fact that driving is a privilege is something all too easily overlooked by the average motorist. We see just that sort of lack of understanding every time some clown proposes to license and tag bicycles. Driving is a privilege, not a right... and that message needs to be remembered.

Wolf Dust

IMO the killer should have their cell phone taken away for life and have to ride a bike for transportation for the next 20 years.

genec

how exactly do you take away a cell phone for life, when all you have to do is run down to walmart and get a "burner phone?"

Wolf Dust

They can all be tracked. If the killer's caught using one they get 5 years prison time no matter what...that would certainly deter me! Seems pretty simple.

genec

Sure cell phones can be tracked... but how do you know your killer is using one... they are available over the counter, as easy to buy as a soda... which is why they are often used by folks that don't want to be tracked.

The killer would have to be caught red handed using one... just as they would also have to be caught driving without a license... neither sentence can be enforced without 24/7 direct monitoring of the offender.

genec

Quick frank discussion here... as I have already been over this countless times with another poster... First and foremost, "but the data on accidents and fatalities" doesn't include cell phone use directly... this has not been tracked, there is no direct reporting structure on this, and to do so would likely require a warrant... something that DAs et al are not willing to get to prove that a cell phone is "the cause." Heck DAs et al barely go after any motorist that causes a death on the road... unless alcohol or some other drug related impairment is suspected. So really, there is NO DATA showing that cell phones are a major collision causing distraction.

Second, cell phones have come into favor at about the same time as airbags... and most collision stats are based on deaths... so if auto related deaths happen to decrease due to the new tech of airbags just as cell phone use was increasing, there would be no "uptick" in the numbers to point to a specific thing.

Last, while voice and conversation and passengers and the like have been typical distractions in the automobile for decades... new smartphones demand that you actually LOOK right at them to read texts and trigger touch screens and facebook et al... no matter of yelling at kids or fiddling with radio knobs or even sucking on a soda demands that same kind of "eyes on" attention.

Reading maps, newspapers, and doing makeup are of course a very "eyes on" sort of thing... but fortunately we never had those distractions in numbers as high as 1 in 5 drivers doing them, while on the road.

Wolf Dust

If a judge told you in court that if you were ever found using a cell phone you would get an automatic 5 years in prison, how comfortable would you feel about using one?

genec

Well right up front we tell people the consequences of drinking and driving... at my local DMV they have posters all over telling you the costs of a DUI and the fines and jail time... I don't see that such information has yet stopped DUIs.

BTW the DMV also mails out DUI info every year with auto registrations...

Sure we can try to educate, but no matter how we try, we cannot make people actually learn.

vol

First, they could still use phones owned by their relatives/friends. Second, more importantly, cell phone is not the only problem; they could still use other distracting devices. I think permanently revoking driver's license both is a good alternative as punishment (in the absence of jail sentence) and officially removes a bad driver from the road. Practically, they could still try to drive without a license, but that's much harder and they can't do it too often. If they are jailed for 5 years, some are complaining it's too harsh (e.g. if the killer driver is parent to infants--but what about the victim's infant children??), and yet they could still driver after the 5 years sentence (or simply after the probation perhaps without ever having to really serve the sentence). There is no perfect solution, but careless drivers must be effectively removed from the streets and roads.

SurfNTurf

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vol

Young Child Caught On Video Driving A Car During Rush Hour

Deontologist

Harsh sentences do little if anything to deter others from doing the same. If harsh sentencing worked so well why are we moving away from the death penalty in many parts of the world? Why not go back to when people got drawn and quartered, or burned at stake, or drowned, or bled out, or all of these things at once?

Psychology says that there are many facets to deterrence. These are:

1) The harshness of the punishment. If I'm going to be executed for doing something, then I might reconsider my actions.

2) The swiftness of the punishment. If I'm going to be 90 by the time I'm caught and punished, I probably won't care too much.

3) The certainty of the punishment. If there's a good chance I'll get away with it ... I don't care! Why do people steal bikes? Because for one, punishment anything but certain. Yes, there are a handful of YouTube videos of bike thieves caught on camera ... one with 2 million views. That video certainly is harsh; the thief is stalked by the rightful owners of the bike and fed into the back of a police car and his face has been seen by 2 million people. The video however does not say anything about the swiftness or certainty of punishment for other would-be bike thieves. So bikes will keep getting stolen no matter what the guy who made the video wants.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhIBWnUHrfw

Harsh punishments simply make the rest of the population feel good about themselves and how "moral" they are.

The 90 days of jail with the 2 years of no cell phone usage is a smart sentence in my opinion. The victim's family said they were fine with the sentence. Putting a 20-some year old for many years probably won't do anyone any good. Plus it's not often mentioned that she has to pay over 15k in restitution and she has to speak to 20 drivers' education classes.