Cycling, traffic safety, traffic justice, and legal topics; energy, transit and transportion economics
FINAL(?) UPDATE: sentencing occurred 10/14/2022; see discussion below.
10/29/2017 bicyclist killed in headon crash with wrong-way susp. impaired driver.
Summit Trail Road inside South Mountain Park, Phoenix. There were no specific location given, here is a sample of the Summit Road.
Continue reading “PD: Bicyclist killed by impaired driver at South Mountain park in Phoenix”
local story huge backup two dead mom/driver arrested on suspicion of
Saturday 10/21/2017 evening around 9PM. I-10 near Wild Horse Pass Blvd, just south of Ahwatukee /Chandler.
Are we safe yet?
Would more enforcement help?
Would wrong-way freeway detection have prevented this tragedy?
Answers: No, Probably, and No.
Continue reading “Driver arrested: deadly 5-vehicle crash on I-10 near Wild Horse Pass”
10/2/2017 Monday evening ~ 8PM. Police say impairment may be involved. Southern near Hardy. Two motorists died and a third is in critical condition. (died later)
Southern is one of Tempe’s series/network of high-speed arterial roads. High speeds are conducive to death. Pedestrians and Bicyclist do often become collateral damage, but motorists are the most frequent victims. Continue reading “2 Dead 1 Critical in Tempe Wreck”
Driver charged with endangerment and 2nd degree murder and in last week’s killing of Peter Rankin who was on the sidewalk. Medical reports say the driver had a BAC of 0.235, almost triple the legal limit (anything over .20 would be “super-extreme” DUI).
more here: pd-driver-hit-suv-killed-bicyclist-in-glendale-before-hitting-police-car
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Continue reading “Navajo Nation police officer charged with murder in deadly Glendale crash”
[update: 9/28/2017 — driver charged w/ 2nd degree murder]
Impaired drivers remain a serious threat to bicyclists. And pedestrians. And other drivers. And passengers.
9/22/2017 “just after midnight” Bicyclist (60-year-old Peter Rankin) killed incidentally when a suspected impaired, speeding driver (Kevin Richard Hevel, 30) sideswiped another vehicle; jumped the curb onto the sidewalk where he struck and killed the bicyclist, kept going (of course) and continued on to rear-end a Glendale police cruiser. Near 59th and Glendale Ave, in Glendale, AZ. Continue reading “PD: Driver hit SUV, killed bicyclist in Glendale before hitting police car”
A driver driving the wrong way on the freeway killed all four occupants of the other vehicle. Police have not revealed why they think driver was driving the wrong way, however, they did note that this year
“…DPS arrested 52 people suspected of driving the wrong way… Ultimately, each of the 52 drivers arrested was found to be impaired”.
So, 100% of wrong-way drivers were impaired. Wrong way driving appears to be an impaired driver problem. Continue reading “4 dead in I-17 wrong-way crash near Flagstaff”
“Keaton Allison, 21, had a BAC level of 0.25 percent, according to blood-testing results from the Maricopa County Office of the Medical Examiner.” — azcentral
see more at 3-dead-in-wrong-way-wreck-i-17-phoenix Continue reading “Report: Wrong-way driver who killed 3 very high BAC level”
fatal incident 8/27/2016; This was reported in the media at the time but I had missed it.
Cyclist Thomas J. Butler 39/M; 43rd Ave, just north of Bethany Home Road. It’s not clear when police say things like “The bicyclist tried to ride across the street, not in a crosswalk”; and there are inconsistencies in the data file; unfortunately the crash report itself is unavailable from the given file number, so the world will never know: Continue reading “Phoenix police: Bicyclist identified after being hit by suspected drunk driver”
This past Wednesday (6/28/2017) afternoon, another wrong way fatal crash and another driver is locked up. “Fixing” wrong way driving can most obviously be effected by removing impaired drivers from the road. Proposed, costly, technological gadgets to detect wrong-way can have only limited usefulness. Abc15.com reports that the wrong-way driver “… admitted to drinking before driving and blood tests came back with a blood alcohol level of .160”
Continue reading “Wrong-way driver faces homicide charge in death of motorcyclist on I-17”
Some recent news items. Also, be sure to check out the “cold medicine” guy from a few days ago…
6/6/2017 double-fatality ~8PM, began driving around airport, including through parking structures the wrong way and breaking through the arm/gate: Wrong way driver 56-year-old Ronald Wayne Mollenhauer killed another driver, Young Lee on a transition ramp between I-10 and SR51. A third driver was injured. Given the ww driver is dead, you probably won’t hear much about this again. Was he impaired by drugs or alcohol, or some other impairment? Most ww drivers are. We’ll have to wait for FARS to find out which will report any chemical testing results. Continue reading “More Wrong-way freeway driving; can detection help?”
Cold medicine? maybe, just maybe plain-old drunk. We’ll see. Interesting comment about victim’s rights, and appearing in court
A total of 13 people requested victim’s rights due to the driver using his vehicle as a deadly instrument… During Walker’s initial appearance, one of the alleged victims addressed the judge.
“We were inches from actually crashing into him, and that in itself is an emotional trauma,” the man said. “He’s not safe and he shouldn’t be out in society placing others in danger.”
It’s good to see ordinary people stick up for their rights and hopefully hold dangerous drivers responsible for their actions.
Despite all the hoopla surrounding wrong-way crashes “Wrong-way collisions are not a new phenomenon and statistically remain unchanged year over year in Arizona.”, nevertheless Gov Ducey wants action. It’s nice to focus attention on traffic safety but perhaps attention could be better focused on the vast majority of traffic fatalities and injuries that don’t involve a wrong-way driver? Continue reading “DPS: Wrong-way driver suspected of DUI blamed cold medicine”
This is the kind of driving that kills bicyclists…
(police) observed the driver swerving within his lane and nearly striking the curb several times
And pedestrians. And motorists. Drunk driving continues to be a significant factor in traffic fatalities and injuries. In Arizona, 272 of the 893 fatalities (30%) last year involved a driver who was legally drunk (BAC 0.08 or above). If it’s any consolation, nationally the figure is 29%. Continue reading “Arrested Mesa councilman has previous extreme DUI conviction”
5/5/2017 bicyclist Robert Dale Fox II was killed by driver Melanie Laverne Jones, and arrested on suspicion of 2nd degree murder
suspected and DUI.
The rear end collision occurred on SR95 between Home Depot and the USPS. (~ MP 249)
The outside lane appears to be quite ( ~ 14 feet plus a 2 foot gutter pan) wide, and the bicyclist was thrown into the curb. The motorist was likely swerved toward the curb. The body of that car is ~ 6 feet wide. Continue reading “Driver kills Bullhead City cyclist; is arrested”
4/14/2017 ~ 2am. A male wrong-way driver collided headon on the I-17 freeway near Greenway in Phoenix with a vehicle carrying two sisters. All are dead.
The wrong way driver had been traveling for (at least) several miles the wrong way. Continue reading “3 Dead in Wrong Way Wreck I-17 Phoenix”
[This is an old case: it happened in Tucson before 2009, but it has a bit of a twist… ]
December 1, 2006: A driver plows into the rear end of a bicyclist in a Tuscon-area Bike Lane (or probably more accurately, a shoulder), killing him. The young woman driving is drunk, very drunk. She tried for manslaughter, gets convicted of the lesser included charge of negligent homicide by the jury; here’s the twist, a phone call from jail while awaiting sentencing (from what i remember, all jail phone calls are monitored/recorded) causes her to receive the max sentence: Continue reading “Spewing Hatred”