3 Strikes You're Out?

This article by Andrea Lorenze and Isadora Vail tell the story of yet another killing by a drunk driver in Austin, TX. Here, a 64-year old man was killed on the same day his granddaughter was brought into the world.

Although this story may resemble a lot of the drunk driving stories, this one imperticular puzzles me because the drunk driver recently jut got his driver's liscense back from being suspended the month prior to this accident. Suprisingly, the drunk driver had his driver's liscense suspeneded due to a total of three separate DWI charges. Under the law of Texas, a driver with a total of three DWI charges can be sentenced to up to a 10 year prison term, which makes me wonder why this man was even still on the road. Sadly to say, I guess it takes a drunk driver to take an innocent person's life for the max punishment to be given. Is this how are justice system is working for us, or against us? While our government is meeting to put restrictions on our water usage, innocent people are getting killed because the "justice system" is letting three-time offenders back on the streets with a slap on the wrist. Everybody makes mistakes and I am a strong believer in people changing and giving people a second chance. Everything a person does in life whether good or bad is a learning experience. But three DWI's? Three DWI's is no longer a mistake, this turns to stupidity and just outright carelessness.

The Austin Chief of Police and his team are taking serious actions against the drunk driver for the crime he committed and plan to began to become stricter on the drunk driving policies. Unfortunately, for the family of the victim, the Chief and his team are "a day late and a dollar short." It' is unbecoming that something so drastic had to happen for people to take action. This story almost makes you wonder if the drunk driver would of had stricter punishment for his prior convictions, would this fatal accident ever had even happend? Unfortunately, this question is one that will never be answered.

THIS ARTICLE CAN BE READ AT:
http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/local/2009/09/04/0904wreck.html