Dangerous Highways Lead to DWI Arrests

 Posted on February 02, 2021 in Uncategorized

Oddly, and sadly, intoxicated driving puts highway safety design to the test. Intoxicated drivers get into accidents because of impaired perception and slowed reaction times. The safer the highway design and its lighting, marking, and signage, the less likely an intoxicated driver will cause an accident. The more-dangerous the highway stretch, the more likely the intoxicated driver's impaired perception and slowed reaction times will cause an accident. Police officers come to expect it: drunk drivers getting into accidents right where accidents tend to happen because of confusing highway signage, poor highway markings, or other highway-safety design issues.

A Dangerous Stretch of Highway

One recent reported incident provides a good example of a notoriously bad highway design triggering a DWI arrest. The story reports an early 2021 motor-vehicle crash into a Bryan, Texas RV park, right where residents say high speeds along the dangerous highway make late-night crashes inevitable. "From midnight to 2 a.m., people treat this street like Eldora Speedway," one resident reportedly complained, while expressing hope that city leaders would finally address the highway-safety issue threatening the RV park.

Perhaps city leaders will, given that the crash reportedly totaled one RV, damaged another, and injured two park residents, one of them badly enough to end up in the hospital. Dangerous highway stretches can add to the frequency of accidents and the severity of their injuries. But the story notes one other salient point: the allegedly intoxicated driver's arrest on DWI and deadly conduct charges. Sure, if the driver hadn't allegedly been intoxicated, the accident might well not have happened. But if the highway had been safer in the first place, an intoxicated driver might well have navigated it safely.

Safety First

States and locales generally build and mark highways to meet safety standards. But they also use accident data to study and fund highway-safety improvements. A spate of accidents at a certain point along the highway may result in a slower speed limit, clearer signage, improved highway markings, a new stoplight or stop sign, or even a change in the highway's construction. States and locales also listen to resident and motorist concerns over highway safety, sometimes responding to complaints and petitions.

For your own safety, be conscious of your capability to safely navigate notoriously dangerous stretches of highway. Of course, don't drive while intoxicated. But also don't drive dangerous stretches of highway when tired, ill, distracted, or suffering from any other condition that might impair your perception and slow your reaction times. Accidents bring immediate attention from police. An accident is bad enough, but an accident's harm compounds when resulting in a DWI or other arrest.

Dangerous-Highway Defense of Accident Charges

A driver arrested on a DWI charge can't exactly blame a dangerous highway for the intoxicated driving. But DWI Specialist Doug Murphy explains here how he does defend certain DWI charges. And when the dangerous highway design, rather than intoxicated driving, is an accident's cause, that proof may defend other charges, like intoxication manslaughter, arising out of a DWI motor-vehicle accident.

As the 2021 Houston DWI Lawyer of the Year, Doug Murphy has the expertise to defend DWI charges and related charges arising out of serious motor-vehicle accidents like the one the above story describes. Read here why you should hire a DWI Specialist for your defense of a DWI charge, especially one involving an injury-causing accident. As a Board Certified DWI specialist and one of only two Texas lawyers holding both DWI Board Certification and Criminal Law Certification, Doug Murphy knows how to aggressively defend DWI and related charges. Contact Murphy & McKinney Law Firm, P.C. online or at 713-229-8333 to discuss your case today.