http://www.lakeconews.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=25045:thein-team-dui-saves-lives&catid=29:opinion

Team DUI successfully finished this school year, marking our sixth year of educating our youth on the true realities of driving under the influence.

Our team would like to extend our appreciation to Lake County educators for their support in allowing us the opportunity to foster working partnerships with Lake County school districts, working together to help keep our youth and others safe.

Our team also would like to share our appreciation with the countless individuals throughout Lake County for your continual support.

Underage drinking is a serious problem throughout our nation. Alcohol is the drug of choice for youth and the leading cause of death and injuries among teenagers.

Team DUI was formed as a countywide volunteer educational outreach program designed to raise awareness of the consequences and dangers of  Orange County DUI through prevention with the focus on the youth of our communities in order to help prevent one more senseless death or injury.

Because of the educational prevention efforts of Team DUI to help keep our roadways safer for everyone, injuries have been reduced and lives, young and old, have been saved and more will be saved.

During this school year, Team DUI delivered 16 classroom and assembly presentations throughout Lake County schools, addressing students from seventh through 12th grade levels.

We covered topics relating to driving under the influence, the impact it has on the victim, the offender, families, friends, the community and the value of parents discussing the issues with their children which has resulted in opening up needed lines of communication between parent and child.

Our team worked tirelessly to get our message across to our youth. Our speakers came forth with inspirational courage and fortitude as they endured months of emotional stress, reliving painful stories in order to help safeguard our youth now and into the future.

Through Team DUI, not only were our youth better able to understand the legal consequences of DUI, they were also able to see and understand the other side of DUI; the side that has life altering consequences. Students listened with their minds and their hearts. Our team has made a major difference, working to change the culture among our youth as they cope with teen peer pressure.

Each member of Team DUI fulfills a different role, but the message we deliver is very powerful when we work together.

The members of Team DUI are extraordinary individuals who are inspirational in their dedication to the safety of our communities. Each member of Team DUI is a hero in their own right.

Our team has touched the lives of many people throughout our entire county.

The legacy of Team DUI will live on in the lives of our youth as they will have a better chance to live to become responsible adults.

Never underestimate the power of the committed people of Team DUI to bring about change in the good fight against drinking and driving.

Team DUI wishes everyone a safe and enjoyable summer.

http://www.sidneyherald.com/news/article_b4fc8fe8-9eea-11e1-89a7-001a4bcf887a.html

Over the past year, DUIs in Richland County have risen substantially. Statewide, the economic loss is in the hundreds of millions of dollars. What can be done?

A new campaign is in the works, which got under way last week. It’s called The Domino Strategy. It’s a social marketing campaign that encourages the public to pay attention to the size, content and amount of alcohol consumed every time they drink, basically educating the public on what responsible drinking looks like.

The Domino Strategy was developed by the U.S. Air Force in Cheyenne, Wyo., and has since been taken by the U.S. Navy and other states. “It was talked about at the state level for the state DUI Task Force last year,” said Mary Friesz, DUI Task Force coordinator, “so it’s moving across the country.”

Here’s how the strategy works. Those participating follow a “0-1-2” guideline, hence domino. Zero: No drinks for anyone who is under 21; operating any type of vehicle or machinery; pregnant, trying to become pregnant or breastfeeding; recovering alcoholics or those chemically dependent; or those using certain medications. One: No more than one standard drink per day for women. Two: No more than two standard drinks per day for men.

The strategy is a three-month process with the first being the counting portion. The DUI Task Force asks the public to count their drinks for the first month and become familiar with normal drinking limits.

When the first month is up, then the second wave of the campaign begins. “Once they’ve been educated on how many then we’re going to concentrate on the size,” Friesz said. A standard drink means 12 ounces of beer, 5 ounces of wine or 1.5 ounces of 80-proof distilled liquor. “Then we’re going to concentrate on what’s in it.”

Because no alcohol is the same, drinkers may want to know exactly how much alcohol is in their beverages. Whereas a light lager beer may contain 4.2 percent alcohol, wines may contain 13 percent, rum 42 percent and whiskey 50 percent alcohol. “You have to start reading labels and know what’s in your drink,” Friesz said. “Keeping our community health and in turn by limiting the size and the content, it’s keeping us safe.”

The DUI Task Force, Friesz said, isn’t about telling the public what to do. Rather, it’s focusing on educating about what is healthy and what are the safe drinking limits. “We’re not a branch of law enforcement, we’re just tying to educate and try to help the community. We’re hoping that by sharing this information that they will make the safer, healthier choice. We want to help them make a safe, healthy choice.”

The number of DUIs has been driven up dramatically as are second and subsequent DUIs. “That’s where the concern of teaching what the healthy limits comes in,” Friesz said. “Ultimately we want to reduce the DUIs.”

That means it’s up to adults to set the standards, she added. Parents are role models for their children. So perhaps by teaching parents how to drink responsibly, the uptick in DUIs can be curbed in the future.

During the three-month campaign, the  Orange County DUI Task Force will have a number of materials available, including bookmarks with calorie, size and alcohol content information, brochures, refrigerator magnets and cards for wallets. Resources can help a person count and remember what size is appropriate.

“By no means are we telling people what to do,” Friesz said. “The DUI Task Force is here to educate.”

http://www.bellinghamherald.com/2012/05/16/2523559/spokane-man-gets-prison-time-for.html

A Spokane man admitted he was driving drunk when he was arrested in March for his fifth Orange County DUI and got a deal cutting his prison time almost in half.

Jeffrey Alan Kern, 58, pleaded guilty Tuesday in Franklin County Superior Court to felony DUI.

In exchange for his plea, Deputy Prosecutor Teddy Chow agreed to drop the driving with a suspended license charge and recommend a sentence well below the standard range of about four to five years in prison.

Chow said Kern was cooperative and agreed to resolve the case early, which supported the recommended sentence of two years and five months in prison.

Kern has prior convictions that gave him an offender score of seven, but Chow said many of those happened in the ’70s and ’80s.

“When this occurred, he was fairly new out of prison,” Chow said. “I think he really needs treatment and asks the court to require treatment while he’s in custody again.”

Defense attorney Karla Kane said they agreed to recommend the top of the standard range that Kern would have if he only had four DUIs.

Kern was arrested March 3 by a Washington State Patrol trooper who saw him going 50 mph in the 70 mph zone on Interstate 182 in Pasco.

Kern was not wearing a seat belt and when the trooper tried to slow down to get behind him, Kern slowed down to about 35 mph, court documents said.

The trooper had to brake suddenly so he could get behind Kern to pull him over, documents said.

Kern’s eyes were watery, bloodshot and very droopy, documents said. He had a blood-alcohol level of 0.13 percent.

Kern was arraigned in April and had his trial set for May 23.

Judge Craig Matheson agreed to follow the sentencing recommendation and told Kern to “make the most of your time over there. Get yourself sober so you don’t have any further driving problems.”

Trial of suspected gang member starts today

The trial of a suspected gang member accused of being involved in an attack on a rival gang member at a Pasco apartment starts today after a judge refused to allow his attorney to withdraw.

Stephen Esteras Morfin, 21, of Kennewick, was in Franklin County Superior Court on Tuesday afternoon as his defense attorney Scott Johnson told the court that there’s been a breakdown in communication between the two of them, court records show.

Judge Craig Matheson told Morfin that Johnson is a competent attorney and denied Johnson’s request to withdraw from the case.

Deputy Prosecutor Teddy Chow then amended the first-degree assault charge against Morfin by alleging Morfin was armed with a gun at the time. A mandatory five-year prison sentence will be added for the gun if Morfin’s convicted.

His trial starts at 9 a.m. and is expected to last two days.

According to court documents, he is accused of going to a Pasco apartment with two other men Feb. 10 and assaulting a Pasco woman and her daughter, who are said to be part of a rival gang.

When officers arrived at the B Street apartment after a 911 hang-up, they found Sylvia Guerra, 33, and her daughter, Selina Cortez, 18, who both appeared to have been assaulted, documents stated.

Broken furniture and glassware also were found in the apartment.

Morfin is accused of assaulting Cortez with the gun after a fight broke out when he went to the apartment with Isidro Licon and Edgar Arroyos.

The three men apparently had gone to there to see Guerra’s boyfriend, but when Licon saw Guerra in the apartment, he yelled at her.

Cortez then came out of a bedroom and began defending her mother by yelling at Licon, documents said.

Licon allegedly threw Cortez to the ground, pulled a pistol out of his waistband, put it in her face and said he was going to shoot her, documents said.

Guerra tried to stop Licon but Arroyos reportedly hit her in the face.

Morfin and Arroyos, who has a June 20 trial pending for one count of first-degree assault, were arrested a couple of days after the incident.

Licon had been on the run, but was arrested by Benton County sheriff’s deputies last month.

He’s facing a trial in Benton County Superior Court for possession of a gun and has not appeared in Franklin County on the assault charge.

http://www.stltoday.com/news/state-and-regional/missouri/dui-arrest-for-father-of-slain-alaska-barista/article_d4432c6b-8b86-5e8e-93c9-15080641ff44.html

The father of a murdered Anchorage barista was arrested early Tuesday for investigation of  Orange County DUI and assault, accused of driving away from a strip club while intoxicated and threatening a doorman who tried to stop him, police said.

Anchorage police arrested James Koenig at his home, Lt. Dave Parker said. Koenig is the father of homicide victim Samantha Koenig.

The Anchorage Daily News and KTUU report that Koenig had been at the Great Alaska Bush Company, a popular club, with Terry Reeves, father of an Air Force airman recently found murdered near Anchorage.

Witnesses said Reeves left the club with Koenig, Parker said, adding that Reeves was at Koenig’s home at the time of the arrest. Reeves was not accused of any crime, the police spokesman said.

KTUU reported that Koenig offered his assistance to the young airman’s parents when they flew to Anchorage to help search for their son, Clinton Reeves of Raytown, Mo.

Koenig denied threatening the club doorman and refused to take a breath test, Parker said.

Koenig declined comment to KTUU after posting bail. He did not immediately return an Associated Press call for comment.

Terry Reeves also declined comment to the station. Parker said Tuesday night he believed Reeves was en route back to Missouri.

Samantha Koenig, 18, was abducted Feb. 1 from the coffee stand where she worked, her body found two months later at the bottom of a frozen lake north of Anchorage.

Israel Keyes has been charged with kidnapping and killing the young woman, and using a debit card to obtain ransom money. Keyes, a 34-year-old self-employed contractor, was arrested in Texas about six weeks after her disappearance.

Clinton Reeves, 22, failed to report for work April 23 at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson near Anchorage. His rental car was found later, with uniforms and groceries inside.

The younger Reeves was found dead last week in a ditch north of Anchorage in what police said was a homicide. Another airman has been arrested on evidence tampering charges in the case, but authorities have not named him as a suspect in the murder.

http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_20635207/dui-mom-hit-100-mph-suv-make-childs

A Northern California mother arrested for drunken driving hit 100 mph in her SUV while trying to make her child’s birthday party.

The San Francisco Chronicle ( http://bit.ly/Kt9FYL) says 34-year-old Katherine Russell was behind the wheel of a Toyota 4Runner that sped past a California Highway Patrol officer in a U.S. Route 101 construction zone.

The SUV hit 100 mph by the time the CHP officer caught up with her Friday night in Rohnert Park, which is about 50 miles north of San Francisco in Sonoma County.

She told the officer she was late to her child’s birthday party.

The CHP says Russell’s blood-alcohol was more than three times the legal Orange County DUI  limit to drive.

She was booked for investigation of drunken driving, driving without a license and various traffic violations.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jli4oy3CRwlMWo7TK-oG8sN83dgw?docId=0399383dd3914694bb8581e356dbc022

A marijuana blood limit for drivers was rejected Tuesday for a third time in Colorado, as lawmakers from both parties argued about how to fairly gauge whether someone is too stoned to get behind the wheel.

The bill would have made Colorado the third state in the nation with a blood-level limit for marijuana, much as the nation has a blood-alcohol limit of .08.

Currently, drugged-driving convictions depend on officer observations.

The Colorado Senate fell a single vote short on the bill setting a drivers’ blood standard for THC, the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana. The measure failed on a 17-17 tie, one vote short of the number needed to advance it.

Earlier Tuesday, the state House signed off again on the bill that would limit drivers to 5 nanograms of THC per milliliter of blood. Sponsors talked about Colorado’s rising arrest rates for people driving under the influence of drugs, as well as data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration showing more drivers in fatal accidents test positive for marijuana.

“It is past time to get this done,” said Republican Rep. Mark Waller, sponsor of the bill.

However, marijuana activists and some lawmakers from both parties argued that the blood standard is an unfair measure of driver impairment. They pointed out that more than 90 percent of Colorado’s drugged-driving criminal cases already end in convictions, so they questioned whether the 5 nanogram limit would change behavior.

“I don’t think it’ll make our roads any safer,” argued Democratic Sen. Pat Steadman of Denver.

Some Republicans opposed the bill, arguing that the measure considered Tuesday should have targeted more than just marijuana use.

Opponents tried to amend the bill to exempt state-certified medical marijuana patients from the limit. The amendment failed.

“Impaired is impaired, whether you have a (medical marijuana) card or don’t have a card,” argued Republican Sen. Steve King.

After the amendment failed, the entire bill collapsed. Its fate appeared to hinge on the absence Tuesday of a lone senator — Republican Sen. Nancy Spence of the Denver suburb of Centennial.

Spence opposed the Orange County  DUI measure last year, but changed course and gave the marijuana DUI a single-vote margin of victory in the Senate earlier this year. That bill didn’t clear the House, though, as that chamber was embroiled in a last-minute standoff over civil unions for same-sex couples.

The pot bill came back to lawmakers in a special legislative session. However, Spence has been out of town all week and didn’t make it to Denver for the vote. Her absence meant defeat for the bill.

While it’s already illegal to drive while impaired by drugs, states have taken different approaches to the issue. More than a dozen states, including Arizona, Michigan, Illinois, Iowa, and Rhode Island, have a zero-tolerance policy for driving with any presence of an illegal substance, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Minnesota has the same policy but exempts marijuana.

Nevada, which is among the 16 states that allow medical marijuana, and Ohio have a 2 nanogram THC limit for driving. Pennsylvania has a 5 nanogram limit, but that’s a state Health Department guideline, which can be introduced in driving violation cases.

Voters in Washington state will consider a 5 nanogram THC driving limit this fall on a ballot measure about marijuana legalization. A legalization ballot measure pending in Colorado specifically leaves the question to lawmakers.

Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper added drugged driving to a list of measures he asked lawmakers to consider in the special legislative session expected to end Wednesday.

The White House Office of National Drug Control Policy has asked all states to adopt blood-limit, drugged driving laws and set a goal of reducing drugged driving in the United States 10 percent by the year 2015. But the White House doesn’t tell states what nanogram limit to set for illegal drugs.

Law enforcement lobbyists in Colorado have vowed to keep trying to enact a pot DUI standard. Tom Raynes of the Colorado District Attorneys Council argues that even though medical marijuana is legal in Colorado, it’s not dosed like prescription drugs and is easily abused.

“Folks don’t know what they’re taking,” Raynes said. “It’s like a doctor offering a bowl of drugs and saying, ‘Reach in, take what you think you need and go ahead and drive.’ … We’ve got to get a handle on this.”

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