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Texas County Will Use Twitter To Publish Drunk Drivers' Names

Posted by timothy on from the only-animal-that-blushes dept.

alphadogg contributes this snippet from Network World: "If you get busted for drunk driving in Montgomery County, Texas, this holiday season, your neighbors may hear about it on Twitter. That's because the local district attorney's office has decided to publish the names of those charged with driving while intoxicated between Christmas and New Year's Eve. County Vehicular Crimes Prosecutor Warren Diepraam came up with the idea as a way of discouraging residents from getting behind the wheel while drunk. 'It's not a magic bullet that's going to end DWIs, but it's something to make people think twice before they get behind the wheel of a car and drive while they're intoxicated,' he said."

10 of 301 comments (clear)

  1. Oh. by Adambomb · · Score: 4, Insightful

    And how will they compensate anyone wrongfully put on that feed for the damage to their reputation? The Court of Public Opinion can be brutal about these things, especially when they work in HR somewhere..

    --
    Ice Cream has no bones.
    1. Re:Oh. by Suki+I · · Score: 5, Insightful

      And how will they compensate anyone wrongfully put on that feed for the damage to their reputation? The Court of Public Opinion can be brutal about these things, especially when they work in HR somewhere..

      They typically ignore their own mistakes and make others pay for them.

      --
      Home of The Suki Series
    2. Re:Oh. by slarrg · · Score: 4, Interesting

      In a community of six million people, how many people do you think share the same name? I can just imagine someone in my community reading my name on this Twitter page and thinking it was me rather than one of the three other people I know about with the same name. What a mess.

      Worse, imagine getting fired because your clueless boss decided to fire people because their name was on the list and they drive a delivery truck. Even if you later prove that the person was someone sharing your name but living at a different address you're not likely to get your job back in an "at will" employment jurisdiction.

  2. "Innocent until proven guilty" by seifried · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I guess it's gone out of fashion. Sad.

    1. Re:"Innocent until proven guilty" by DJRumpy · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Except these people haven't 'mowed down three people'. They haven't committed any other crime than driving under the influence. No children were hurt in the making of this tweet. No damage done. No insurance claims filed. They were simply caught driving under the influence.

      People here keep associating these people with murderers, referencing the M.A.D.D. folks, ad-nauseum. The simple truth, is that the only crime here is DUI until it isn't. This isn't pre-cog court. These folks most likely would have gone home, and no one would have been the wiser if they hadn't been pulled over. Were they pulled over for weaving? Perhaps because the cop camps outside of some winery? They are being treated as if they did hit and kill someone, when such a thing hasn't happened. They are being pre-judged due to every drunk driver who happened to cause some accident.

      This does nothing more than to prosecute these people in a public court, without a trial.

      My sister was killed in a jeep driven by a drunk driver. Did I hate the driver? Yes. Was it totally his fault? No. I later learned that a construction company failed to put up signs warning that the pavement was uneven due to resurfacing. Could he have avoided the accident if he hadn't been drinking? Who knows. I can't claim to know the future, or predict events. I can only judge the facts after they are known. Somehow I doubt this blog presents the facts that are heard in a trial. This blog won't prevent DUI. It simply serves some sick need for people to butt into other peoples business so that they can feel judgmental and holier than thou.

  3. What? No Due Process? by hedgemage · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I checked the article to be sure, and yep, it says that those CHARGED will have their names published on Twitter. So, even if you are found not guilty, you are going to be publicly named as a DUI offender before you even get a chance to clear your name.
    I'm not trying to excuse drunk drivers, but for some reason, its seen as ok to make those charged or convicted of DUIs out to be the scum of the earth, wantonly careening down the roadways, seeking out innocents to mow down, when in fact most people who get DUIs are just ordinary joes who made a bad decision while not in the best state of mind.
    The idea that it is somehow ok to humiliate people who are supposedly INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY seems like a prelude to a morality police state.

  4. How to avoid this by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Change your name to something longer than 140 characters.

  5. Good idea by 91degrees · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Because we all check twitter feeds containing nothing but hundreds of random names on the off-chance that someone we know has been drink driving.

  6. Future News: Wrongfully Charged Awarded Millions. by jafo · · Score: 4, Interesting

    DUI is a terrible thing, and I won't defend it. However, I also know that beat officers will sometimes abuse their power. I grew up around sheriff's deputies, my mother worked in the department (in administration) and most of her friends were beat officers. So I got exposed to a lot of their stories.

    So, yeah, I'm sure that quite a lot of the people who get charged are guilty as hell. And I'm sure that some of the people who get cleared of the charges are cleared only on a technicality and they were guilty. If they have multiple tests

    However, I can imagine also that there are officers who, for whatever reason, may wrongfully charge someone. "I saw him leave a bar." Truth is he was the designated driver but had to go home early. "He was staggering." Truth is he had an inner ear infection that messed up his balance, or maybe he was messing with his smartphone while walking to the car. "He had dramatic variances in his speed." The truth was that he was doing the speed limit just fine until the officer started tailgating him, where he slowed down to reduce the chance of getting run into. What may be overwhelming evidence to the officer -- say if his breathalyzer in his car is broken, may be later found by the court to have other reasons, like the stumbling.

    This is why we have the courts hear the case before passing judgment, and the police don't do the conviction on the spot.

    The speed change part above happened to my wife a few years ago. She was pulled over and asked if she had been drinking because she dramatically slowed down. She slowed down because there was a giant SUV following her less than a car length away 55MPH. It was the officer's SUV. Why he wasn't in the next lane over, which was empty, I can't imagine.

    It is not the job of the "beat officer" to make a conviction -- it's the job of the courts to look at the evidence and make that determination. They can charge you with anything, and you can't make any defense of that charge to the officer. You have to make it to the court.

    The world today, here in the US, has a reality where posting something on the Internet, particularly from an official source like the police, will probably follow you around forever. And you'll never know if you didn't get that job offer because of this search result (which is probably highly ranked), because HR will tell you they just had a better candidate, if they tell you anything at all, because they don't want to be sued for making a bad decision.

    Sean

  7. Re:things have changed re drunk driving. by tangent3 · · Score: 4, Informative

    It doesn't seem so bad until it happens to you.
    Most of the victims of drunk driving accidents are innocent bystanders.