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Post by RonMiller on Aug 18, 2004 18:12:37 GMT -7
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Post by Grug - American Neanderthal on Aug 18, 2004 18:33:45 GMT -7
So they know he was driving while drinking I take it? This just such BS in so many ways I don't even want to start. Whats next? naughty thoughts gets your internet prividge revoked?
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Post by RonMiller on Aug 18, 2004 18:58:45 GMT -7
The article states he only drinks on weekends now and does not drink and drive. Also he has a great work record, according to his lawyer.
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Post by RetNavySuppo on Aug 18, 2004 21:32:26 GMT -7
There is another side to this type of situation.
My mother lives just outside Tampa and is now in a nursing home, having slipped into the mental netherworld of Alzheimers. In the beginning stages of the disease she was still driving her "tank" (a Ford Crown Victoria and she is 4' 10"). Her driving was becoming more erratic and dangerous as the disease progressed. Her neighbors and even her insurance agent (a long-time family friend) were calling me here in Georgia raising a stink about it. Regardless of my pleas, she would not surrender her car keys. I even offered to hire a driver for her every other day to preserve her mobility and independence. No deal.
I even talked to the police and they said they could do nothing about it but cite her for violations. By the way, I was talking to the police after they arrested her for hit-and-run. She had side-swiped a car (no injuries) but didn't stop. Instead she had just driven home completely unaware that she had hit someone. The police tracked her down through witnesses. When the police showed her the damage to her car, my mother didn't know how it had happened. Luckily, her insurance agent was tight with the police and the charges were quietly dropped. I asked the police what I could do and they told me I couldn't do anything. They said only her doctor could notify the DMV of the driving danger she posed.
I called her doctor and reminded him that he had a duty to notify the Florida DMV about any hazardous patients. He was very reluctant to do this because most of his patients were the elderly. If the other patients found out that he was "squealing" on his patients to the DMV, he would lose many, if not all of his elderly patients.
This was sort of what Nationwide insurance does in Florida too. If they cancel insurance on elderly drivers, they will anger their other elderly clients and lose too much business. What they do instead is to simply raise the problem driver's car insurance premiums until they are so expensive that the problem driver either stops driving because it costs too much money or drives without insurance. This wasn't going to work with my mother because my parents retired with substantial financial assets and could afford any premium increases.
As a last resort, I hired a Florida attorney and had him inform the doctor that I was preparing to sue him for not complying with the law and endangering my mother. That worked and my parents never forgave me.
So sometimes, it is incumbent for a doctor to put public safety ahead of patient privacy. Would you want your child to be crossing the street while my mother was driving by?
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Post by stetto on Aug 19, 2004 3:08:02 GMT -7
RetNav makes a very good point concerning the other side of the coin, but isn't this country the one where you're innocent until proven guilty?
I can see the state mandating that once you've been reported as such by a doctor or whoever, that you would have to go in and demonstrate your ability to drive safely and competently, perhaps even several times over say a span of a year or two. Driving is NOT a right, as so many morons have now determined in this country--You have to earn the priveledge. I have no problem with a questionable license holder being held to a higher standard.
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Post by Grug - American Neanderthal on Aug 19, 2004 5:49:31 GMT -7
Medically impaired is a condition that is always present while drinking is a selective activity. What is the eventual end of the road if we continue what that doctor did, if you drink at all you cant drive?
Like Stetto says, we are supposed to be proven guilty, not have to prove your innocence.
A little side note we had a neighbor who's father recently died from cancer, he was elderly and the last year or so suffered increasingly dementia. It got to the point they had to take all his car keys, his keys from his ATV and his riding lawn mower keys and this was with someone with him 24 hours. So I can understand how tough it is to deal with people who dont want to quit driving because of ability, but that is a little diffferent than potential impairment.
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