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DVD-Watching Driver Charged with Murder
joke-boy writes "CNN reports that a driver in Alaska is being charged with second-degree murder for allegedly causing a fatality accident by driving while watching the movie 'Road Trip' in an in-dash DVD player. The driver contends he was just listening to music. Alaska has no laws prohibiting drivers from watching DVDs, although many other states do."
With a vehicle, it would seem more likely in Alaska you'd cross the median and strike an elk, grizzly, or something like that.
Sigs cause cancer.
That's something that I've never understood about laws that make for exacerbated charges if a crime is committed with X implement. If laws against armed robbery, assault, murder, causing a fatal accident, and the like are enforced the way that they ought to be then use of a gun, or of a knife, or of being in some altered state short of being stupidly out of control of one's faculties (drunk, high, etc) wouldn't need extra charges or laws.
I'll leave DUI laws alone for the most part, due to the extreme and immediate potential for harm that driving while intoxicated causes, but this 'DVD watching' isn't any worse than oogling pretty women along the side of the street and having an accident. The driver gets in trouble for the level of the damage, not the reasons he or she caused the damage. That's the driver's responsibility to handle on his or her own, and the driver made a bad decision that contributed to the accident that's called being stupid. I'd argue that specifically legislating things to be illegal will leave legal "that's allowed!" holes that can be used to counter in court. "But Your Honor, I was just changing my shoes, there's nothing against that! Everything that we're not supposed to do while driving is on the books as being illegal! This wasn't on the books!"
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
If anything I see this case as proof that we DON'T need to update the laws.
Reckless and careless driving are ALREADY illegal in every state.
This is where we get into trouble, lawmakers have these crazy ideas that they must be constantly making new laws.
Honestly I can't think of ANY new laws that are needed, we don't need new rules, additional restrictions, additional things which require licenses.
In fact there are quite a few things we need to abolish. DMCA, fishing licenses, gun restrictions, FOID cards, pretty much ALL spam/internet legislation that has been passed, pretty well all the government contract legislation needs either abolished or reformed in a manner that reduces restrictions and complexity.
Although we have certain guaranteed freedoms (I'll pretend there haven't been so many instances where they've been ignored, disregarded, or somehow overturned despite the fact that no branch of state, local, or federal government is supposed to have the authority to overrule them), what we don't have anymore is day to day freedom.
The average man, who is doing nothing wrong and living his life should have as few controls, restraints, and tracking as humanly possible. Instead he must register, submit, fill out paperwork, file for a SS#, submit to tracking via that number, maintain an updated legal address, etc.
If a man wishes to have money in the bank, the government wants to know about it, and more they want to know how much and if too much they want to know where it came from. I say, bust me for drugs and then you can investigate my bank accounts, otherwise, leave me the hell alone!
In short, new laws and additional restrictions are bad. Especially when the only purpose they serve is to tack on another charge to give the states attorney a better hand when plea bargaining.
Sadly, any law against DVD watching will likely take the form of a law against any computer or TV screen visible to the driver, like California has done. This is really ridiculous, because cars are starting to have them by default. Not just for speed and fuel guages, but for maps and music selection too.
I have a home-made car mp3 player that runs a heavily customized text interface (cplay) on a 4" LCD screen. The text is large enough to read without leaning forward and the angle is fine. It is mounted at the very top of the center console in front of the dashboard, *above* where the built-in stereo is. All the driver has to do is turn his eyes (or head) slightly, and the road is still in his peripheral vision. Control is via a standard 10-key keypad that is used by touch only.
It's as safe as I can make it, and far safer than some built-in mapping systems or (I believe) XM radios. But it will be as illegal as DVD watching in a few years, I bet. And I'll have to remove it for fear that a simple no-fault fender-bender will turn into a felony charge.
Another thing that annoys me is when people attack others for doing what almost everyone does, just because it happened to kill somebody. Who doesn't take their eyes off the road for a split second for any reason, ever? But when somebody causes a wreck fiddling with the stereo, the DA pulls out the murder/manslaughter charges. If that is just, then every instance of glancing away from the road should be attempted murder/manslaughter, and be just as strictly enforced. But, that would make sense...
or how about an IQ test?
I'd almost go along with this. We definitely need much stricter standards for driving. I think you should need additional testing to be allowed to use a phone while driving, too. It's clear that most drivers aren't capable of doing them both at the same time-- at least not safely.
In Japan, a driver's liceense is just that-- a professional license (at least it used to be). If you kill someone through professional negligence, you are in deeeep doodoo.
Works for me.
No, I meant what I said. Look here.
Denver Isuzu Suzuki
You know, we had a section in the Alberta Highway Traffic Act that expressly stated "no televisions or video systems except in a motor coach" and that "it must be at no time visible to the driver of the motor vehicle".
The laws were updated into the 2003 Alberta Traffic Safety Act, and that section has been totally removed.
Similarly odd was the removal of act that required all 4 wheel motor vehicles to have mudflaps and they be a minimum of 6" off the ground.
Is it justified to repeal laws when enough people stop following them?
> How do you know that he was watching a DVD? Did you read
> the article? Do you know what their proof was?
Before you chastise the parent poster further, it sounds like the he may have been watching a DVD. The passenger admitted to his wife as much:
> Within hours, Douglas called his ex-wife and told her he was
> not sure how the collision occurred because he was "spacing
> out on a movie they were watching," according to prosecutors.
Even if a DVD were playing on the dash, and the driver wasn't intentionally watching it, it's very likely the driver's eyes were drawn to the video. Our eyes are very sensitive to movement (particularly with our peripheral vision), and flickering video images draw our eyes' attention almost constantly. And if he took his eyes off the road for a few seconds, he could have gotten in an accident.
Insert simplistic political, ideological, or personal proselytization here.
Legal systems already have a concept to make life easier on prosecutors (not sure this is a good thing) which is called case law. IANAL, obviously, but the results of earlier cases sets precedent which is considered in later ones.
Hence, if there is an overwhelming history of cases being prosecuted along certain lines, it gets easier and easier to do so in the future.
Now I do already think we have too many laws, and I think that case law makes the legal landscape essentially a sandbox filled with land mines, but case law seems to make more sense (though it does serve mainly to employ lawyers) whereas writing law after law to catch every condition is simply not practical because people will always be inventing new ways to kill people, defraud people, and so on, and that means that over time, using a system which writes a new law for each thing someone can do wrong, we will have an infinite number of laws.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
surely though the decrease in driving ability due to use of a hands-free kit would be pretty much the same as say talking to a passanger, which itself is meant to be less dangerous than driving even slightly tired, driving while under anxiousness or stress is meant to also be dangerous at times.
I've heard research that suggests using the phone is more dangerous because a passenger will see that there's a problem on the road and shut up whereas someone on the phone won't. Talking to a blind passenger or a chile (who won't be caring about what's going on on the road) is probably as dangerous as using a phone though.
http://blog.nexusuk.org