The Redhead and I met Alan halfway on a highway that is the quickest route to a wet county. I was collecting my rebarreled Garand. There's a gift from your higher power. New barrel, installed, then test-fired and set on Mechanical Zero by a gun guru. You can't pay for something like that, you just thank God for the blessings.
We were just a few miles from the county line when I noticed a pickup drifting across the double stripe. Clear day. 2:30pm. Very little traffic. I hardly needed to swerve and I checked him in the rear-view mirror. He never corrected, drifting all the way across the highway and disapearing over the shoulder with a little puff of dust.
"Want to see a dead person?" I asked the Redhead as I braked and turned the 4-Runner around. She didn't, but we needed to go look anyway.
The shoulder dropped steeply, too steeply to be seen from the highway above. The pickup was wedged in the bottom of a shaded creekbed among some hardwoods. The truck was smoking and honking faintly. He was already out staggering around and (surprise) talking on his cell phone. A big healthy looking drunk youngster. 20 maybe.
I looked him over for blood and bones sticking out and had him turn around. He seemed to be fine just drunk and in shock. Young guy with a polo shirt, jeans and good teeth. You probably couldn't hurt him with a baseball bat and three tries. Idiot. Airbags saved him from anything but a soft beating. Sore tomorrow. Plus his truck, or somebody's, was fubared.
I folded the plastic cover of the steering wheel back to cut off the horn. The airbags were all smoldering and smoking up the interior. Half a case of cold Budweisers were loose on the floorboards. I guess he missed the TV ads they put out about drinking responsibly. Might have been coming back from a long night in the TOTALLY NUDE! GIRLS! GIRLS! GIRLS! joints on the highway.
He was calling his dad on the phone. I looked up at the highway and noticed how concealed the crash site was.
"You aren't going to pass a blood test," I advised him, "So if you call 911 you are going to be arrested, jailed for a few days and it's going to cost 20.000.00 and plus all the court and parole time. You need to clean the beer out of the truck and get someone to come get you. You don't look hurt to me. I'm leaving now. Good luck."
When I looked back from the shoulder above he was tossing beer down the creek about 30 yards from the crash. Not far enough for even the most inexperienced LEO to miss.
Probably, he's going to lose his citizenship, end the afternoon handcuffed in a jail cell that smells like sweat, piss and vomit while a weekend judge sets his bail at 50,000.00 and a few of his fellow incarceratos pick him over. It's a slam dunk with the no-refusal blood draws they are doing, so he would be done. No voting, no guns. Lifetime police suspicion from now on anytime he crosses their path. It can be argued that he deserves all that, and more.
It might be true, but it wasn't going to be true with my assistance.
He could have killed someone. He could have killed himself. He might already have killed someone. He might in the future. Drunks deserve death or anything that happens to them. All true. And unknown.
Wonder how it went? Every day could have a complete novel written about it.
We got home safely. Had a glass of wine with dinner and silently toasted the mingled destinies of men.
Update: Folks disagree, some with good grace and some so threatened that they seem a little snarky. That's the way it goes on the internet. Check the comments.
Using my normal powers I found out who the kid was and called his cell phone to see if I could get more story. No return call yet but I'll keep working it.
8 comments:
Great Story! You can't make that kind of thing up.
Wonderful telling!
So even when people put your life and a loved one's life in danger, you are willing to just let him be. Even assist him with avoiding the consequences of his actions. Interesting.
Would you show the same generosity if he had stolen something of yours, or heaven forbid hurt someone you hold dear? At what point do people deserve to suffer consequences for behavior that endangers others?
By aiding him in continuing this kind of behavior, you are doing nothing but passing the buck.
And, just to correct your "logic" a bit, a first time drinking and driving offense is a misdemeanor where I live. I have never heard of it being a felony in any of these 50 states, so to say that he would never be able to vote or own guns for the rest of his life is false.
Mixed feelings here. The guy needed to be suffer more than he did, in my opinion. I wonder now if YOUR "bailout" will lead to someone else's more expensive bailout down the road. Pun intended. Seems like he should learn some personal responsiblity here - seems like he learn to be accountable for his actions, and I'm not sure he figured that out.
I know how lacking in common sense the cops & deputies around this area can be when dealing with someone who's had a beer or 2 - how they are all too eager to see them in jail, to collect the $$, which is really all they care about, but this guy you dealt with? WAY past the "hey, it was just one beer & he's fine & any normal cop should be able to see that, but maybe won't, so I'll advise him to not call the authorites" point.
Personal repsonsiblity, personal accountability. He needs to learn it. He needs to learn he lives in a world where the cops CAN draw blood, whether we think it's right or not.
Think maybe you amassed some bad karma here. Even though I AGREE with you about the stupidity of SOME of the drinking & driving laws/nonsense. This guy needs to be off the streets for a while.
Let's see if the destruction of his truck and the direction of his family have any effect before we make help the state make a non-citizen of him.
But everyone is absolutely right and clear on one point: I'm not going to help enforce unjust laws or laws that come with extreme penalties.
Wonder how this DID turn out? When we came back by 20 minutes later, the shoulder was clear above the wreck site.
"Let's see if the destruction of his truck and the direction of his family have any effect before we make help the state make a non-citizen of him."
What are we to do if his parents buy him a new truck and a few more cases of beer? Go back in a time machine and then address the problem? That ship has already sailed.
There are no redeeming qualities about drunk driving, whatsoever. I wonder why you would defend such behavior.
And secondly, the state would take no action at all against this young person's citizenship. Do you even know what the penalty is for a first offense of drunk driving in your area?
You have called for jury nullification for a pedophile case in an earlier post due to a perceived procedural violation by a prosecutor. Now you seem to be proud of not only failing to report a possible crime, but actively assisting a probable drunk driver with avoiding being detected by the police.
I am curious Robert, are there any "just laws" in your opinion?
"I have never heard of it being a felony in any of these 50 states, so to say that he would never be able to vote or own guns for the rest of his life is false."
In Massachusetts, first time OUI is a misdemeanor punishable by up to 2.5 years inprisonment. This meets the federal definition of a felony for the purposes of felon in possession.
I'm for leniency on first time DUI/OUI for people who blow just over the limit and are caught for reasons other than dangerous driving, because I think the recent limits are too low, and leaving a restaurant a little too soon after having some wine with dinner shouldn't ruin your life.
If you are drinking in a vehicle and get drunk and wreck, you should have the book thrown at you. Lifetime ban from driving, at a minimum.
Hopefully he wont be in the paper next week after driving drunk again only this time killing a family.
Then we will know that someone had a chance to make society a slightly better place and chose not to.
I have changed my mind. I am a big girl & I can do that - I can accept I was wrong. The lovely K. & I had a discussion about karma, odds, why people are where they are when they are, the 2nd chances people get & why they get them.
That argument/discussion, in addition to my knowledge of how this particular offense is treated around here has led to my no longer mixed feelings. If in fact one could call the police & say "Hey, this guy is drunk, he's screwed up his truck, no one's hurt, he just needs to sleep this off in the drunk tank" (you know, the way it used to be handled when we were kids) and know that the loss of the truck and the scare the kid suffered, plus an awful night in jail, would hopefully wise him up a bit, one might consider doing just that. However, that's not what would happen. If it's a first offense, he will lose his license for up to 6 months, possibly more if open containers are in the vehicle. He WILL go to jail. For more than just the one horrible night I mentioned above.
So I've re-thunk it. I think I was wrong. I think the kid got lucky. I hope he knows it. He was calling his dad, so the police would probably have never known about it anyway.
I apologize to Robert here & now.
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