Randy Cassingham's Blog

I don't know how much this will deter drunk drivers. The Air Force put a new wrecked car at the main gate every month or so, but there were always more DUIs in the squadron roster on Monday morning.

I do know that this is going to seriously tick off the neighbors. In a time when housing prices are hitting all-time lows, and owners are needing to sell fast or risk foreclosure and bankruptcy, something like this is going to ruin the impression buyers have of the neighborhood. Three years is long enough for a number of owners to want to move away.

So why is the whole neighborhood being seriously punished for one moron? After all, it's not like the neighbors had a choice on whether or not she moved there.

I wouldn't be surprised if the neighbors got a lawyer of their own to get this ruling changed.

This will not keep her from drinking but it sure will make her neighbors mad. Good thing she doesn't live in some of our cities here in Southern California. She would get cited for violation of city ordinances and face the possibility of losing her house because the City can sue you to force you to remove inoperative vehicles from your property. I don't think they would care that a Judge ordered it to be there.

Justice would be better served if she was ordered to spend the same time in custody, kicking her addiction... and thinking about what she did. Why subject innocent people to such an eye-sore... a week maybe - but not three years!

I think it's rather appropriate that the car will annoy her neighbors. Let us hope that the neighbors focus their anger where it belongs; on her, not on the judge. Perhaps then she'll get the lesson intended: that her actions, for good or ill, really do affect others whether they deserve it or not.

Well, I think it's more of a "let's see what comes of this" idea than provoking a guaranteed outcry from her neighbors. The picture seems to indicate a not very dense neighborhood anyway. Clearly, like many of us, this judge is hoping to find some effective way to stop chronic drunk drivers, and he is experimenting with the idea of obliterating their usual invisibility.

Who knows what will work with these cases? I am given to understand that in Sweden even one DUI receives a $10,000 fine and loss of one's driver's license for a year, and that it has been very effective. If that's true (is it, Randy?), then maybe that's the way to start.

This will upset the neighbours and have no effect on the driver, but it may have more effect on her if they cut it down to the front seats only and replace her lounge with the car's front seats. That will give her a constant reminder dozens of times a day when she sits to watch television. I think the judge forgot some people don't go out during the day and so won't see it.

I doubt it will help her stop drinking, especially if the first two DWI's didn't sober her up. Fortunately it looks like she doesn't have any close neighbors, or the sight of that car for three years may drive some of them to drink!

Her continued ability to drink and drive can probably only occur with the at least tacit consent of her neighbors and society in general. Of course, if they don't know what is happening, they are not able to do anything, and if they consider the prevention of crime to be someone else's (the police's) job, they also won't do anything personally to prevent it.

Putting the car in her yard is a step in the right direction, but it might be even more effective if they required a sign explaining that the car was smashed because she was a third time drunk driver. Otherwise, she could tell people that she was the one hit by someone else. I'm definitely not sympathetic to HER situation, though I do feel some sympathy for her neighbors. As our culture currently functions, I'm not sure what good it will do to irritate her neighbors, they can't do much about her drinking, unless she is getting drunk at neighborhood BBQs and local parties, in which case they could refuse to serve her at those functions. I find it unlikely that the shaming would prevent her from drinking, she would be more likely to just relocate elsewhere and continue.

The sentence only makes effective sense, to me, if the judge is trying to motivate her neighbors to get personally involved in some way, perhaps to follow her around and prevent her from drinking and driving by some sort of physical intervention? Or at least encouraging her neighbors to call the police when ever they see her driving intoxicated. Requiring prominent posting of her photo in local bars and clubs, with a stipulation that she not be served intoxicating substances might be helpful.

If society in general were taking personal responsibility for each of our protection, enough that having everyone who knows her situation be proactive enough to call the police and report her driving, each time she drinks and drives, and actually physically restraining her from doing so, this sort of situation would happen much less frequently. It might help if a DUI conviction was followed by mandatory imprisonment for every offense from the second time onwards. By the third strike in this offense, I'd be voting for life in prison. No matter how wonderful she might be the rest of the time, she does not have the right to make the choice to endanger others' lives.

The point about the neighbours and the eyesore factor is well made. Perhaps it should be placed in her lounge room.

This is yet another sad example of a Judge not considering the true result of his rulings. Bravo for wanting to take drastic measures against a repeat offender, but why punish her neighbors? Why not just keep her in jail longer - where she belongs? Six months for ruining a family's life is too short. She WILL end up killing someone.