Embarassing drunk drivers

How do you shame a drunk-driving suspect. Well, one California community is trying by holding the trials in front of high school students:

Mark Flores’ drunken driving case started last fall when his Lincoln Continental was spotted weaving on a residential street at 2 a.m. A blood test after his arrest revealed an alcohol level at nearly twice the legal limit. The case ended Friday with Flores’ conviction in the most unusual of courtrooms: a high school auditorium in front of about 100 fidgety teenagers. Flores, 25, a full-time student in graphic arts, agreed to have his case tried at James Lick High School in San Jose as part of a state-funded program that exposes seniors to real drunken driving trials. He faced a real judge and prosecutor, and he is scheduled to be sentenced later this month on the two misdemeanor DUI offenses. (from AP)

Comments

[Sal Leyva]

Not a bad idea, but I've never been sure why something that kills as many people as drunk driving isn't also treated as a criminial offense: speeding.

In both cases drivers should have to spend a day or so in jail while being booked, and that experience should also be related to the students in attendence. Trial is one thing, sitting around in a cell with some of the least upstanding citizens is quite another.

[Benjamin Brown]

How about shaming those Drunk With Power? Like the war mongers in Washington D.C., the corrupt International Bankers in London and Geneva and the paranoid meglomaniacs in Tel Aviv.

[summerteeth]

the best way to shame drunk drivers is what arkansas & ohio are doing - specialized color-coded plates signifying DUI convictions

[Russell Miller]

This might be enough to stop a first time offender. It probably won't, but it's possible.

Repeat offenders really can't be shamed, they're going to keep offending until they die or until they kill someone, as they think it's their deity-given right to drive drunk no matter what the effect on anyone else. Those people deserve to have the book thrown at them. But if the book is thrown at them in front of a group of high school kids, I'm all for it. It won't shame the offender, but maybe it'll make the kids think twice.