Why is drunk driving punished so lightly in the United States?

Question

In many countries, especially in Europe, drunk driving is a serious crime with very harsh pentalties. In the United States, over 40,000 people die each year in traffic crashes. Alchohol is a factor in tens of thousands of those crashes, yet drunk drivers get very light sentences. My wife and I were almost killed by a hit and run drunk driver and he only got 18 months of work release.

Answer 1

Because it is a crime that the judges, prosecutors and lawmakers are all likely to commit. When a judge is imposing a sentence for burglary, rape, property damage, etc., he knows he will likely never commit any of those crimes. When he is imposing sentence on somebody caught driving drunk, he might be thinking about the party he drove home from a couple weekends ago, feeling lucky that he didn't get caught. Same goes for prosecutors who would fight for long sentences. Lawmakers could fix this by coming up with a mandatory minimum sentence for DUI, but after a few years, they would probably all be in jail themselves.

Answer 2

For one, the court system is all about how much money you have. If you have a good attorney, you can pay your way out of almost anything. I.E. (OJ Simpson).

Second, we have an overloaded court system and prison system. A drunk driver is more likely to be released than a murderer, burgulary suspect, or child molestor. Court systems are very liberal, (believe it or not) and believe a drunk driver needs counseling, not jail time.

Third, It depends on the municipality issuing the citation. An officer can decide if the charges go through the municiple system, which is a misdemeanor, or the district system, which generally is a felony charge. Most municipalities prefer that DUI's go municiple (misdemeanor) so they can get most of the money from fines.

There are no good answers for this situation. Well there are, but it will not be accepted by the masses. Drinking alcohol is part of popular culture in America. Alcohol is big business.

If it makes you feel better, my uncle got 75 years for drunk driving, killing a girl in a head on collision. Here is the link to his department of corrections page > http://docapp065p.doc.state.ok.us/servlet/page?_pageid=394&_dad=portal30&_schema=PORTAL30&doc_num=398482&offender_book_id=213127

Answer 3

I think that because alcohol is legal here in the US - and I've heard that being a police officer(occupation wise) is the highest in alcohol abuse. And in turn - because it's legal the Judges have a high rate of alcohol abuse also. I learned this in school and I don't have a direct web site to send you to. I wish I knew the statistics for smoking pot compared with alcohol abuse, that results in death or traffic accident. There is a man that lives here in my small town. He has had seven (7) DUI and DWI's and hasn't seen a jail cell yet. Daddy has money. It's just a screwed up system and no one has the guts to stand up and fight for what is right. So sometimes you just have to live with the way things are. Good Luck in the future.

Answer 4

Because as someone else had said, the root of the problem is the license. If you make it tougher to get the license, a majority of these deaths would not happen (hypothetically), because the people who *do* have license's would be more cautious and aware drivers. Make it MUCH harder to get a driver's license in the first place! Have common sense questions as well as "Do you know the law?" questions. If we know that 95% of Americans consume alcohol, we should stop making it so easy to get behind the wheel of a major piece of metal. Make license requirements stricter!!!

Answer 5

Good question . I agree whole heartedly. I think its because so many lawyers ,judges , and law-makers drove over the limit at one point in their lives. So I think when justice is served , there is a bit of sympathy for the perpetrator as well as the victim. My idiot ex -boss hit someone while drunk in 1983 ( no deaths ) got his license suspended for 5 years .Hit someone else in 1990 . Didn't spend a day in jail , what a travesty .

Answer 6

I totally agree with you. You can blame the judges, and the sympathetic juries for that. Yesterday I read that they let a child molester go, who had sodomized a 11 year old special needs child, because the person struck a plea bargin because he admitted to other crimes. He was only given probation. These are the two crimes that need to have much stiffer penalties and no plea bargaining. I am going to write our state governor about this incident. You should do the same. Too much is disregarded because they try to blame illnesses for the crimes.

Answer 7

Alabama D.U.I. penalties for a first offense is up to a $2100.00 fine, up to 1 year in jail, and your driver's license is suspended for 90 days.
This increases drastically for the second and third offense. The fourth offense is considered a felony and carries a fine of up to $10,000.00 and up to 10 years in prison.

I have been told that Alabama has some of the toughest D.U.I. laws in the nation.
If someone has an accident while D.U.I., especially one that results in an injury or death, they are usually charged with a felony assault or homicide in addition to the D.U.I.

Answer 8

Punishments are still too light, I agree. I know some one who got pulled over, and received only a fine.
Fortunately, our justice system is cracking down. Recently a man in Texas (I'm afraid I know longer have the article URL) was sentenced to life for repeated offenses.

Answer 9

State by state rules. and laws we do not Have national Laws for this kind of thing. Nj has some of the toughest in the USA from What I hear. When most judges and congressmen are big drunks it is hard to get laws that stick.

Answer 10

Because the standards of what is "drunk" are so ridiculously low, that most cities use it solely as a revenue stream. It's not about public safety- it's about taxing the bejeezus out of a segment of society that they know NOBODY will stand up for. They'd rather spend their time collecting fines from everybody who had a single beer, than incarcerate people who are dangerously intoxicated.