Drunk

Hooray for the wonderful new drunk-driving law, the lawyers' dream. Drunk-driving defense is now a growth industry. The tough penalties decrease the number of guilty pleas. Anyone cited for drunk driving now has a real incentive to plead not guilty and hire a lawyer for a full jury trial. Minimum fee: $6,000. But it's worth it to keep a conviction from your record. Who cares whether drunk-driving trials further congest our courts? The client who can't afford the full jury trial will hire an attorney to do some judge shopping and negotiate a plea to avoid jail.

Throughout the last decade, MADD had insisted that drunk driving and the overwhelming number of injuries and deaths caused by drunk driving are not just "accidents." Webster's dictionary defines "accident" as "an unpleasant and unintentional happening, sometimes resulting from negligence" and "accidental" as "happening by chance, outside the normal course of events." "Crash" is defined as "to fall or land violently out of control so as to be damaged or smashed." While a person who chooses to drink and drive may not intentionally choose to cause harm or destruction, they do make two very clear choices: 1)

Re "Cellphone Headset Use Isn't Safer for Drivers," July 12: Anyone who drives the L.A. freeways knows that cellphones don't belong anywhere near the driver's seat. When I see someone weaving or toddling along at 55 mph in the fast lane, I know that there must be a long- distance conversation going on, even if that driver isn't holding a phone. I often wonder if the party not in the automobile is a spouse, lawyer, doctor, boyfriend or child. In any case, I know that conversation should not be going on. It is dangerous!

The article about the differences in drinking and driving in Norway and the United States presents some startling and interesting statistics, which I can personalize, based on a recent trip to visit a cousin living in the Norwegian city of Oslo. My cousin met me and three friends when our cruise ship, the Royal Viking Star, docked. We were shown some of the historical sights of the city and then were driven to his home at a suburb of Oslo. Wine was served with a festive Norwegian native lunch, but neither my cousin nor his wife drank any alcoholic beverage.

More than 30 law enforcement agencies in Los Angeles County, including the California Highway Patrol, have joined forces to snare drunk drivers over the Memorial Day holiday in the largest such coordinated effort in the state. The operation will set up drunk-driving checkpoints across the county and increase patrols. The Los Angeles Police Department, various Sheriff's Department stations and suburban police departments are involved in the effort. "This is the first time anything like this has happened on such a large scale," CHP Capt.

The fired captain of the Exxon Valdez oil tanker, source of the worst oil spill in North American history, may fight allegations that he was intoxicated at the time of the accident by getting drunk under a doctor's supervision, his lawyer said today. Capt. Joseph Hazelwood, who failed an alcohol test 10 hours after the ship's grounding, may get drunk this week in Portland, Ore., to see how fast his body assimilates liquor, Seattle lawyer Michael Williamson said. "We're trying to find out the rate at which his body burns off alcohol--everyone's body burns off alcohol at a different rate," Williamson said.

Re "A Repeat Drunk Driver's Luck Runs Out," July 4: Sadly, the "friend" of the drunk driver who killed the preschool teacher in Redding, Calif., who says that Novis Levelle Lackey had "had a few beers but wasn't drunk enough to run off the road and kill a teacher," is in as deep a state of denial as I was years ago. I've been a sober alcoholic for over 15 years. I drove drunk at least four nights a week for a minimum of 10 years of my life, sometimes in blackouts, sometimes after only a "few beers," but was fortunate to not have injured or killed anyone else while I recklessly pursued my "feeling good" state (or avoidance of feelings)