Money grab: creative ways...

Guilty as charged!!

Fred

Between that and the article on the same site about the Minnesota Supreme Court ruling, it makes me glad that I'm on the short side of my life cycle but at the same time so, so sad that my kids and grandchildren are on the long end.

It's not so much the money as it is the twisted mind set.

Believe it or not, 99.9% of police officers are not going to charge you for a case they do not think they can win. First of all, they have to have probable cause to pull you over. Second, if after pulling you over and they ascertain that you are not under the infulence, they are going to cut you loose because they would rather go find someone that will blow a .08 or whatever your state limit is and go to court with that in their back pocket. Third, most police officers don't really care about helping out tow truck drivers, especially if it is going to get them in trouble with their supervisors for making a bad bust. And fourth, most of the tow truck companies money is made from private tows, not police generated ones, especially not DUI stops.

What does any of that have to do with legally forcing a vehicle owner to pay a private company in the event someone other than the owner is accused of a crime?

I'll bet you don't like redlight cameras either!

You need to understand that private property is only 'private' if owned by the government. State and local government can force the sale of your home to another person/corp. if that sale will result in increased revenue to the government. They can take away the use of your land by declaring that some bug they found there is an endangered bug (but you still have to pay taxes on the land).

Like a previous poster, I'm glad I'm on the down-hill side of my life.

I'm not calling you a drunk driver...
I'm not a drunk driver...
I'm not even the guy sitting next to the guy that called your piccolo player a drunk driver...

But I believe you are correct, it's all about the money. A lawyer friend told me a DUI arrest will cost you between 7K and 10K in PA. If you are involved in an accident it's also automatically assumed you are at fault.

No one should drive impaired. Let me repeat that, NO ONE should drive impaired. But that impairment makes the government a lot of money and seems to have little effect on accidents and DUI arrests.

Larry

For one, it should make the person owning the vehicle more responsible in letting someone else use the vehicle. If you read the entire law, it has to do with more than just DUI violations. For instance, if the vehicle has expired plates the police can impound the vehicle. If it is parked in a handicapped parking space, the vehicle can be impounded. If it is parked on a roadway so as to impede the flow of traffic, it can be impounded. I for one am not going to loan my vehicle to every Tom, Dick, or Harry. You should not loan your vehicle to someone who may abuse the privilege and go out and get hammered. And, if I did loan out my vehicle to someone who did that and wound up getting my vehicle impounded, they would be the one paying the fee. I may pay it up front, but they would be reimbursing me for the hassle that they caused me. And, they would never have access to the vehicle again. Also, one other thing; if someone used your vehicle without permission; that is a crime called grand theft auto, auto larceny, etc. Any number of things depending upon the state where you reside. If that would be the case, you would file a police report. Upon filing the report, I don't believe you would be liable for the impound charges even though that is not covered within this law.

I would think a person could avoid any fees/fines related to DUI laws and other laws such as the one mentioned by doing the following:

Don’t DUI
Don’t loan your vehicle to someone who will DUI
Don’t loan your vehicle to someone who will not stand good for fines/fees incurred because of them.

Goes without saying!

How will you know before hand?

Again, how will you know before hand?

I'm not going to list a bunch of 'what-ifs' but you seem to think that I can tell the future, I can't. Neither can I predict someone else's actions. If I could do either of those then I would agree with you. I would also be in favor of redlight and speed cameras.

Making me responsible for your actions is JUST PLAN WRONG! Jump on the drunk driver with both feet and make the fine and jail sentence hurt big time. The second time he is convicted of it, put him in jail and throw away the keys. If he kills someone while driving drunk then he should be charged with a capital crime. I have no sympathy for those who endanger others because of their intentional actions but trying to place the blame on someone else does nothing to correct the problem.

I don't think you need to be a fortune teller to spot a drunk. And if you can't, just don't loan your car out,then there will be no problem.
If you lend you car out, chances are you will end up having to have to pay from your pocket when a red light ticket arrives or the car gets impounded.

If you don't lend your car out, you won't have to predict anything. And you can't say you don't know better.

I didn't see anything whatsoever in the wording that limited punishment to someone loaning a car. They way it reads specifically puts that part of the punitive measure solely on the owner, regardless of ANY circumstances.

Knowing what a "drunk" looks like isn't relevant either for a multitude of reasons.

Re-read it. Read lines 25 through 37.

Now that you know the original law had already covered everything except for removing any discretion in regard to impoundment in order to make it absolute & mandatory, read lines 19 & 20 and finally 10 and 11.

What actions have failed in addressing 10/11 previously that leaves 19/20 as the only option? Why don't we see any wording that addresses alternative measures when the "operator" is not the registered owner?

It's always easiest to screw everyone rather than keep a clear goal and work toward it honestly & fairly.

Okay, I guess I'm too stupid to understand. Please tell me exactly what a drunk looks like. Bear in mind that I had a uncle who died of booze when I was 15 and I still can't always tell.

You say that I just shouldn't lend my car. Fine, the next time one of my kids wants to borrow my car because his is broken and he needs to get to work, I'll tell him he can't because BobDee said he might get drunk. The next time a neighbor wants to borrow my car to get to work, I'll tell him that BobDee said for my not to lend it because you might run a red light.

And people wonder why consideration and compassion are dying in our society? And they don't understand why young people never want to take responsibility for their actions?

Of course you would not be able to know with absolute certainty what someone else is going to do, but if you know someone well, you would know what they talk about, their habits and history of their actions. That will build to the point where you know you can trust them.

I believe it is my responsibility as a vehicle owner to not loan something as dangerous as a vehicle to anyone I do not trust to not DUI.

Also, before I would loan a vehicle to someone, there would be explicit understanding between us that they will be held responsible for any fees/fines they incurred due to their actions and the fact I will not tolerate them DUI.

Of course someone could violate that trust and you could get stiffed for the fees/fines. If they kill an innocent family while DUI you will also have to deal with that.

But as the saying goes, fool me once shame on you. Fool me twice shame on me.

Most of this loaning and character discussion is moot under the proposed law as I read it.

The changes specifically require that the vehicle be impounded and require the owner to pay towing & impoundment charges, period. It removes any discretion AND specifically omits any consideration of the relationship between the owner and the person charged.

Assuming you actually know who was charged with being in "actual physical control" of your vehicle then you might have no expense and a short delay in getting your vehicle back. Otherwise you'll have to follow due process AND will be unable to recover any damages from either the government OR the towing company, period.

One of the first things stated in the text is that Washington State has tried everything else to no avail so "Any inconvenience on a registered owner is outweighed by the need to protect the public;".

They already have an impound law that hasn't reduced incidents of driving under the influence, so these changes will surely do so (again, according to the text).

I don't buy that premise but this is typically how legislators get off the hook for actually spending time thinking about ways to solve things. "If it only saves one life ..". Well, it likely will but how about something that saves more and actually targets the offender?

Here's a quick one- If the offender is found guilty and the vehicle isn't solely registered by them the penalties double.