On September 15, 2019, another tragic wrongful death occurred when one person died after a crash involving a drunk driver in Rockland County. Officers were sent to Route 304 and Germonds Road in Clarkstown, New York around 1 a.m. for a report of a serious two-car accident. When officers arrived on the scene, they found the female driver of one vehicle was in serious condition. She was taken to a local hospital, where she was pronounced dead. Her identity is not being released at this time. The driver of the other vehicle, 22-year-old Michael Mercado, of West Haverstraw, was taken to the hospital for a non-life-threatening injury.
In another incident, an off-duty NYPD police officer was busted for drunkenly crashing into several parked cars and a bus stop on Staten Island, on September 14, 2019. David Hansen, 31, was arrested around 11:30 p.m. Friday at Van Duzer St. and Beach St. in Stapleton after the late-night wreck. The cop was charged with DWI and refusing to take a breathalyzer test. The parked cars were unoccupied at the time of the crash and there were no injuries. There have been a string of serious car accident crashes involving police officers who were driving while intoxicated in the last few years. Our White Plains lawyer’s who handle drunk driving car accident cases know that too often police officers allow their fellow officers to drive drunk by turning a blind eye once they flash their badge. This results in police officers who think they are above the law and take reckless risks with the public safety that they are sworn to protect.
Also a motorcyclist was killed in Brooklyn this week after being hit by a drunk driver. The driver was arrested and is now facing manslaughter charges in Brooklyn criminal court. In a strange twist his defense is that it was really his girlfriend who was behind the wheel when the accident occurred. Intoxication was obviously a major cause of the accident because the vehicle was traveling over 80 mph in an area where the speed limit was 25 mph. The impact was so hard that the motorcycle was split in half. Nevertheless a motorcyclist is now dead because of this drunk driving accident in Brooklyn and could not be saved even though he was rushed to the hospital.
As alcohol levels rise in a person’s system, the negative effects on the central nervous system increase, too. Alcohol is absorbed directly through the walls of the stomach and small intestine. Then it passes into the bloodstream where it accumulates until it is metabolized by the liver. Alcohol level is measured by the weight of the alcohol in a certain volume of blood. This is called Blood Alcohol Concentration, or BAC. At a BAC of .08 grams of alcohol per deciliter (g/dL) of blood, crash risk increases exponentially. Because of this risk, it’s illegal in all 50 States, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico to drive with a BAC of .08 or higher. However, even a small amount of alcohol can affect driving ability. In 2017, there were 1,837 people killed in alcohol-related crashes where drivers had lower alcohol levels (BACs of .01 to .07 g/dL). BAC is measured with a breathalyzer, a device that measures the amount of alcohol in a driver’s breath, or by a blood test.
Alcohol is a substance that reduces the function of the brain, impairing thinking, reasoning and muscle coordination. All these abilities are essential to operating a vehicle safely. Driving after drinking is deadly. Yet it still continues to happen across the United States.
