Wood’s Drunk/High Arrest
This makes me think...
State Rep. Jeff Wood (I-Bloomer) had a blood-alcohol level of 0.15 - nearly twice the legal limit - when he was arrested on suspicion of drunken driving and possession of marijuana, according to a police report released Monday.
Wood, 39, was also suspected of possession of drug paraphernalia after he was stopped at 2:11 a.m. Friday on I-39/90/94 in Columbia County by the State Patrol. Wood had driven onto the center median and smashed through a caution sign a few minutes before he was stopped, says the State Patrol report.
0.15 is definitely drunk, but not horribly drunk. But Wood was swerving, hitting a sign, and generally out of control. Personally, I don’t think that a 0.15 drunkenness would make Wood drive so erratically. This makes me think he was more high than drunk.
Just speculating…
It’s really a crap shoot as to how a person responds to a certain BAC. I’ve see .08s that couldn’t function at all, and a .28 that could pass most of the FSTs.
Posted by Jed on December 16, 2008 at 0617 hrs
So was the bong warm or cold?
Either way - serious lapse in judgement… the guy doesn’t know anyone who could have given him a ride home?
But when you are drunk and stoned - I’m guessing judgement isn’t exactly operating at peak. In the case of Woods - I’m not sure that’s possible even when he’s sober.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 16, 2008 at 0740 hrs
True, .15 is not “horribly drunk”, but keep in mind, Wood is a small man in stature, which probably affected him more than it would a 6 foot, 200 pound man.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 16, 2008 at 0933 hrs
I don’t think marijuana should even be illegal, but this guy is a special piece of work. I’d like to see him disappear and find another job.
Posted by scott on December 16, 2008 at 1006 hrs
Only in Wisconsin would people not think that .15, almost twice the legal limit, is that drunk. The next line in the arguement: he only hit one sign and snowbank, he was not that drunk.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 16, 2008 at 1031 hrs
0.15 is not horribly drunk?
.10 is the old legal limit for most states, and .08 is the current legal limit.
Its generally accepted that after .11, you start seeing slurring of speech, staggering and loss of motor control. So while he may not be falling over drunk, thats certainly someone who should never be behind the wheel… pot or no pot.
In fact, given his BAC, I think mentioning the pot is pretty pointless except to bolster the story and more than likely had little effect on his ability to drive. The booze did the trick.
Posted by Nick on December 16, 2008 at 1039 hrs
I am a former drunk driving prosecutor and I’ve seen cases where people are out of control at .10 and others where someone was at .24 and got busted for not using a turn signal. It all depends on the driver. A higher BAC increases the risk that the driver will be out of control, but the correlation is not perfect.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 16, 2008 at 1051 hrs
The fact that he decided to drive 4+ hours home after drinking anything is poor judgement. If he was planning to drive home, he should not have had even one. Driving that long in the middle of the night is hard enough, I am one that even completely sober would have trouble staying awake on the drive home.
To address the marijuana, he is likely not telling the complete truth about that. how many people just walk up to someone and say “here you go buddy, have a good drive home”? he claims it was isolated and that he is not a regular user but I think that is rather hard to believe.
Don’t know if I think he should step down but if he gets treated any different than an average Joe then I believe he should step down.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 16, 2008 at 1110 hrs
I don’t think marijuana should even be illegal
Yeah, I agree, but he should also be prosecuted for driving while stoned if that turns out to be the case.
He was really stupid if he got hammered prior to a 4 hour drive.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 16, 2008 at 1205 hrs
“I don’t think marijuana should even be illegal”
Sorry - it needs to be illegal. I certainly don’t want a stoned truck driver crashing into me on the freeway.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 16, 2008 at 1255 hrs
That kind of presumes that making it illegal is discouraging people either from using it or from driving while under its influence. I doubt either of those things is true.
Posted by scott on December 16, 2008 at 1257 hrs
Driving that long in the middle of the night is hard enough, I am one that even completely sober would have trouble staying awake on the drive home.
Yeah, thats the hypocrisy in all of this for me.
I’ve been stone sober and so tired I was a danger to myself and others. But had I been pulled over, I can pretty much guarantee I would have probably just been given a warning. Or if not, I am SURE the penalty for “sleepy driving” is nothing close to the consequence for drunk driving. Yet if you ask me, both are equally as dangerous.
In fact, me personally I can guarantee that at .08 I’m a WAY better driver than I am when I’m falling asleep.
Thats why I think the method of drunk driving enforcement is just all around misguided.
We shouldn’t be dropping the limit lower and lower. That isn’t the problem.
You look at the “wasted in wisconsin” research the journal did and the overwhelming majority of drinking related crashes are between 1 and 3 am. That in combination that whenever you read stories about a drunk that crashed its not a .08 or even a .10. Its the .25’s and the .23’s etc.
In this case, .15… eh… we’ll never know, but I’ll bet .15 when you are well rested is COMPLETELY different than .15 when you are dead tired and drowsy…
Its generally accepted that after .11, you start seeing slurring of speech, staggering and loss of motor control.
sorry… that is not generally accepted…
According to a Brown University study they list the following symptoms at corresponding bac’s.
slurred speech isn’t mentioned until .14 to .15
“loss” of motor skills isn’t mentioned until .20
0.11 - 0.12 Coordination and balance becoming difficult; distinct impairment of mental faculties and judgment.
0.14 - 0.15 Major impairment of mental and physical control; slurred speech, blurred vision and lack of motor skills; needs medical evaluation.
0.20 Loss of motor control; must have assistance moving about; mental confusion; needs medical assistance.
http://www.brown.edu/Student_Services/Health_Services/Health_Education/atod/alc_aayb.htm
In fact, given his BAC, I think mentioning the pot is pretty pointless except to bolster the story and more than likely had little effect on his ability to drive. The booze did the trick.
Have a lot of exeperience with pot there Nick???
Again… I’m sorry to rain on you assumption parade, but studies have shown that people exhibit the same symptoms from being under the influence of marijuana as they do from drinking.
http://alcoholism.about.com/cs/pot/f/mjkids_faq13.htm
An intelligent assessment of this situation is that none of us sitting behind the keyboard know “what did the trick”.
This dude might be a “great drunk driver” but he was mega tired.
We’ll never know.
The facts remain the same. When you are smashing into things, you ain’t fit to drive. I don’t care if you are drunk, stoned, tired, or crying cause you were dicing onions in your car. You are smashing into things. Thats not acceptable.
Its time we started prosecuting crimes, not potential crimes. We are never going to prevent people from driving impaired with laws (whether impaired is drunk, tired, (see above reasons)) But we are going to make criminals out of a whole lot of people who don’t deserve to be.
If I was “king”
If you get pulled over for a non-intoxicated driving reason (speeding, headlight out, etc) and you are drunk, it should be a non-criminal offense (assuming no other factors occur) (see below)
If you get pulled over BECAUSE what you are doing is demonstrating probable cause for being drunk, your first offense is not a crime, your second offense IS (assuming your second offense there was probable cause to pull you for dui) (again, not speeding, light out, etc)
If you hit something its a crime. Plain and simple. If you hit something because you are tired. Its a crime. If you hit something because you are drunk… Its a crime. If you hit something because you are stoned… its a crime.
And then we start building severity from there. You hit something a second time, and the punishment goes up severely. Or you hit something and you have a .2 bac and that is punished more severely.
But we need to stop the non-sense of trying to address a problem (wasted driving) with a non-problem (legally intoxicated driving… the .08 to .12) crowd
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 16, 2008 at 1401 hrs
Please, Owen, do not speculate about such sensitive matters. Unless you have actual hard evidence to support such claims, posts like this are just rumors. They undermine the credibility of this site and of you, the poster.
Respectfully,
Leonard.Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 16, 2008 at 1424 hrs
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