It was a very difficult holiday season for one Kirkland family. Nabila Lacey’s husband, Steve, was killed by a drunk driver last summer, leaving her and her two young children without the father and partner they so dearly loved.
“My children are suffering,” said Lacey during a news conference last week in Seattle. “They spent the holidays wishing for the one gift they couldn’t have and that was to have the most wonderful father back in our lives.”
King County Prosecutor Daniel Satterberg, Washington State Rep. Christopher Hurst (D-Enumclaw) and Pierce County Prosecutor Mark Lindquist are hoping to make incidents such as these less frequent with stiffer penalties for DUI accidents resulting in vehicular homicide.
“A criminal sentence is supposed to punish the offender and protect the community,” said Satterberg. “For drunk drivers who kill, our current law accomplishes neither goal.”
Patrick Rexroat faces vehicular homicide charges in the death of Steve Lacey after hitting his BMW on N.E. 85th Street in Kirkland.
Rexroat, who plead not guilty to the charges, was allegedly driving with a blood-alcohol level of 0.29, more than three times the legal limit, at the time of the crash. If convicted, Rexroat faces a maximum sentence of 31 to 41 months in prison or 3 1/2 years.
But House Bill 2216 would increase that to 78-102 months in prison for vehicular homicide caused by a drunk driver.
“I’ve seen terrible carnage at these collision scenes and know the immeasurable suffering of surviving family members because some idiot chose to drive drunk,” said Hurst, who was a police officer for 25 years. “It is time that we made the punishment fit the crime.”
The legislation also calls for an increase in the sentence ranges for vehicular assaults and vehicular homicides based on reckless driving or disregard for the safety of others. Currently, the sentence range for a vehicular homicide based on reckless driving is 21-27 months in prison.
The Bill would increase that penalty to 51-68 months. A vehicular homicide under disregard for the safety of others would increase from 15-20 months to 21-27 months in prison.
For drunk drivers convicted of vehicular assault, the penalty would go from 3-9 months to 6-12 months.
Washington State Sen. David Frockt is also planning to introduce a bill aiming to increase the sentence ranges in drunken driving cases.
“Given the incredible number of public awareness campaigns after all these years on TV and radio, people know, or should know, how reckless a decision it is to drink and drive,” said Frockt.
Frockt said that 13 co-sponsors have already signed on to support such a bill.
Rep. Roger Goodman (D-Kirkland) also plans to submit a new bill during the next legislative session that would require anyone convicted of killing a parent while driving impaired to pay child support to the family of the victim.
Goodman is also planning to submit a bill that would increase the penalties for impaired drivers if kids are in the car during a DUI crash.
Sadly, Lacey was not alone this year in Kirkland.
Kirkland police report that they made 474 DUI stops in 2011.
A second man, Brian Nakatani, was also killed when he was hit by an impaired driver, while cycling home from work on the morning of Dec. 8.
In that crash, Nathan Jeremie Godwin registered a blood alcohol level of .078 45 minutes after the incident.
Washington State Mothers Against Drunk Driving organization reported that there were 170 traffic fatalities as the result of impaired drivers in 2010.
The Washington Traffic Safety Commission reports that during 2010, drinking drivers killed 188 people, representing more than 40 percent of the 458 people who died on Washington’s roadways.
