Sgt. Darryl Quick of the Chesterfield County Sheriff’s Department is dead following a recent wreck while driving his personal car.
The man driving the other car, Michael Chad Lambert, 33, of Patrick, is charged with felony driving under the influence.
The legal system will determine his guilt or innocence in this case.
This, however, wasn’t Lambert’s first time being charged with DUI.
WBTW News13 reported that Fourth Circuit Solicitor Jay Hodge said his blood alcohol level registered at .16 — twice the legal limit in South Carolina.
WBTW further reported that Lambert’s 10-year driving record also shows that he’d been charged with DUI three times before. The record was provided by the state Department of Motor Vehicles to the Chesterfield County Sheriff’s Office, which released it to the media.
All too often in fatal crashes the driver at fault has had several previous DUI charges.
A recent check of a Pee Dee county’s bookings report showed a man charged with his sixth DUI offense.
There is hope that a strengthened DUI law passed by the legislature this past session will help in getting repeat offenders off the road and help and in jail if need be.
Mothers Against Drunk Driving reports that our state ranks second-worst in the nation for DUI deaths.
In 2006, MADD says more than 40 percent of traffic deaths in 2006 in our state involved drunk drivers.
The new DUI law increases criminal and other penalties against those convicted of DUI.
First-time DUI offenders face a fine of up to $1,000 and a jail term of up to 90 days.
Those convicted a second time can get up to three years.
Get convicted a third time, you can go to jail for possibly five years.
It’s hard to imagine a fourth time, but it does happen.
Those people face a mandatory seven years in jail.
Changes have also been made in the law for those who refuse to take a breath test when stopped.
The penalty goes from a mandatory six-month loss of your drivers license to a year.
But all that is little comfort to the friends and family of Quick and all the other victims.
Let’s hope law enforcement will continue its efforts to get these people off the road and keep them off.
And if they need help breaking their addiction they get that ,as well.
We realize that no matter what we do, some people will find a way to drink and drive.
That’s why the law needs to have such strict penalties.
Email
Facebook
Google
Twitter
Favorites
More
Advertisement