ugh

In December of 2010, Andrea Ruby, one of our ANSEP students, was killed in a car crash on the highway. At the time, I had supposed that the accident was due to the icy conditions of that winter.

Imagine my surprise to learn today that the collision was actually with a drunk driver, who "had marijuana in her system and a blood alcohol content of 0.279".

I have little familiarity with blood alcohol content numbers, so I Wikipedia'd that, and found that 0.279 means:

Stupor
Loss of understanding
Impaired sensations

Severe motor impairment
Loss of consciousness
Memory blackout

The driver, one Edna Hancock, claims that she bears no fault for the accident since Andrea's husband, who was driving, crossed the median into her lane. Although he was sober and she was drunk and stoned off her ass. And, at the same time, she also happened to be swerving to avoid a moose. Got that? He crossed into her lane while she was swerving to avoid a moose, and both of these things caused the crash, NOT the fact that she was drunk to the point of "Severe motor impairment", "Loss of consciousness", and "Memory blackout".

The judge, Jane Kauvar, who sounds like an utter delight, believed her and charged her only with DUI, not with killing Andrea. Hancock will serve 45 days in jail, and her license will be revoked for ninety whole days. The judge also gave her a verbal hand-patting:

"Yes, it’s long. This was your first DUI and if no one had been hurt or killed, obviously you’d be doing a lot less..."

Hancock, for her part, clearly felt terrible. Well, except that she didn't. "I really don’t want to go on record saying that I was the cause of that lady’s death. What I want to know is, what was he (Hunt) doing in the middle of the road?"

What I want to know is, what you were doing on the road at all, you monster?