Public Meeting 2
I attended the Victim Impact Panel, MADD, Mothers Against Drunk Driving, on September 22, 2008, at 6:00, at the county center.
This meeting was extremely interesting, and at some points hard to listen to. The stories that were told here were sad, unfortunate, and pretty graphic. We had the opportunity to listen to a few speakers. The meeting began with Susan Baker. She told the story of how she lost her daughter to a drunk driver, and how it has impacted her and her family. Her words were touching, and it is extremely difficult to feel what she is feeling after losing her 22-year-old daughter. The point of this meeting is to make everyone aware of the dangers when you get behind the wheel under the influence. Everyone that attended this meeting was required by their parole officer, and if they didn’t it was jail. Susan also gave out numbers that will take you home when you consumed alcohol, 800-AAA-HELP. This is provided by triple A and they provide this service that can avoid disasters like losing or taking someone’s life.
The second speaker was the most impressive. His name was Wes, I spoke to him after the meeting but he did not provide his last name. He was the drunk driver. On August 12, 2002 Dianne Korte was killed. She was the passenger, while Mr. Wes was the driver. The explanation of this story gave me goose bumps. To hear the horror, pain and agony that the girl’s family had to go through what he had to go through to recover was astonishing. Wes had to learn how to walk, and use the restroom all over again, but worst of all a life was lost because of driving under the influence. A direct quote from Wes: “Five minutes to make the decision to drink and drive but it takes a lifetime to make up for it”. He is speaking at the MADD meeting not because he has to, he did that for two years, he is doing it because he wants to. He will never be able to drive again, and he thinks about the accident everyday.
So in conclusion this meeting was interesting, sad, tough to listen to, but gave a wake up call on that it can happen to anyone. All the speakers stressed that MADD is not against consuming alcohol, they believe that once you have had one, DO NOT GET BEHIND A WHEEL!
Contacts Interviewed:
Susan Baker (Daughter killed in accident)
Robin Powell (Survivor, hit by Drunk Driver)
Deputy Richards
Tammy Philpott
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4 comments:
This a very thorough and detailed post. The quote was a nice addition at the end.
Nice job getting interviews. You might want to separate large paragraphs into smaller ones to make it easier to read on the Web.
It's always interesting to see how 2 people view a meeting differently. If not for your blog, I would not have known about Wes.
Also, August 12, 2002 was my 21st birthday. I was in Key West, and was happy to take a cab.
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