Driver To Face Trial For Fatal Classic-Car Crash *DELETED*

[Guest imported_CarFreak]

Post deleted by CarFreak

[Matt Harwood]

How the heck to you "miss seeing" a 22-foot long, 6000-pound car with a massive chrome grille and 30-inch tall whitewall tires? Negligent homicide is the <span style="font-style: italic">least</span> this guy should be tried for. If he really stopped at the sign how did he miss seeing the car <span style="font-style: italic">and</span> accelerate to a speed sufficient to flip over a Duesenberg? Answer: negligence. He didn't stop and he didn't look.

Someone's not telling the truth, and I'm guessing it isn't the dead people.

I also find it distasteful that the reporter again tries to shift the blame to the Duesenberg for not having seatbelts--as if that would have helped.

[Barry Wolk]

There wouldn't really need to be speed involved in flipping the Deusey. I can easily envision a situation where the offender merely had to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. His car was merely the ramp that the large tires rode up on. The inertia of the 6,000 lb. car would easily flip it.

I am led to believe that the car pulled out in front of the Deusey rather than striking it from the side. Can anyone verify this fact?

I believe this repeat offender should be made an example of. Running stops and reds is becoming epidemic.

[Guest bkazmer]

The Duesenberg was not equipped with seat belts. The other car was not equipped with a competent driver - a more serious defect. And no, Mr defense lawyer, most of us have not missed seeing a 6000 lb car and killed 3 people.

[Guest Skyking]

They ought to throw his lawyer in jail too!!

[Shop Rat]

Here is what I was told by Bill Davis. Some of you probably know him. He judges at the Concours shows and has something like seven or eight Rolls Royces and two or three Bentleys in his collection. For the past several years he has brought the pea soup green Rolls in his collection to the Hershey Region show.

Anyway, a couple months ago he was in town (he is usually off traveling) and came to the dinner meeting. A friend of his had actually seen the car after the wreck. What the guy told Bill was that it was hit from the side, that it looked like the Volvo was speeding and the guy put on the brakes which caused the car to nose-dive down like a wedge and that is how it got under the Deusey and flipped it. When I mentioned to Bill Davis that the story said the guy was only going 10 mph he said that his friend said, "No way the car was going that slow. It has to be a misprint in the paper."

Anyway, that is the story from someone that saw the car.

[Guest AlK]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">

I also find it distasteful that the reporter again tries to shift the blame to the Duesenberg for not having seatbelts--as if that would have helped. </div></div>

Matt:

This is a standard reporting technique by any and all news media who also happen to be in bed with the insurance companies in an effort to give the ins. co. ammunition to get out of paying off on the bet that they made. You can read any news article you want on a motor vehicle accident and see it. If the accident resulted in severe injury and/or death and no seat belt was worn they hammer it home. If a seat belt was worn they say nothing. Conversely if no death or injury occured because the party was thrown from the car and not harmed you don't heat about that. You only hear about the lack of a seat belt if there was death and/or injury. It's called "you are only going to hear the facts that support my cause and nothing that does not".

[Dave@Moon]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"> It's called "you are only going to hear the facts that support my cause and nothing that does not". </div></div>

Which begats "<span style="font-style: italic">I am only going to hear the facts that support my cause and nothing that does not"</span>, and thus party politics is born.

Seat belts might very well have helped, even in this horror. Period.

You can now go about your paranoid delusions about insurance companies getting rich off seat belt royalties and/or an evil desire to keep their customers alive.

[Barry Wolk]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Seat belts might very well have helped, even in this horror. Period. </div></div>

That is quite doubtful. The vehicle flipped five times. Five contacts with the road bed would have left them all quite dead. This was a convertible with the top down. You need to look at the facts, not the rhetoric.

[Guest Skyking]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">

That is quite doubtful. The vehicle flipped five times. Five contacts with the road bed would have left them all quite dead. </div></div>

And to think, all this happened at 10 MPH! yea right!

[Shop Rat]

One thing is, the car did not belong to the man that was driving it so it was not his car to put or not put seatbelts in. But he and his wife did make the decision to put their two kids into a car, probably in violation of local laws, without seatbelts or restraints of any kind. Neither of them will have to live with that decision, or the fact their surviving child will grow up without them or it's sibling.

Unless it was a life and death situation, and there was no other choice, I would never put a child into a vehicle without a proper seatbelt or car seat. One of the first things Bill did when we got the 1958 Chevy we had was to install seatbelts front and rear because he son, who was twelve at the time, was living with us and would be in the car.

Sure, for generations kids rode in cars unbelted and they did not all die. But millions of young lives have been saved by wearing seatbelts and riding in car seats with restraint systems. Statistics prove that the odds are in your favor if you do.

[Guest Skyking]

Statistics also prove that people drive too fast!

[Bill_Sohl]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Statistics also prove that people drive too fast! </div></div>

What statistics? Who's statistics?

Bill Sohl

[Shop Rat]

Just go out in your car/truck any day and drive the speed limit and see how many people FLY by you. Just the other day I had a guy right up on the bumper of my station wagon trying to get me to go over the 15 M.P.H. speed limit in a school zone. When we got to the end of it he flew around me in the left-hand turn lane. Oh how I wish there had been an officer there that day to see how he drove.

[DizzyDale]

Dear Skyking,I drive about 35,000 miles a year,mostly on the thruway.Yea thats me in the right lane GOING the speed limit and i DON'T pass anyone.....EVER.I never had a problem with speeders but speeding and NOT paying attention is a death sentence.Do you think at some point in time EVERYONE else is going to figure out that if they SLOW down they might get a little better gas mileage,AWWWW it doesn't matter since gas got CHEAP in the last month .diz

[Dave@Moon]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"> You need to look at the facts, not the rhetoric. </div></div>

Still, seat belts <span style="font-style: italic"><span style="font-weight: bold">might</span></span> very well have helped (nobody's chances are <span style="font-style: italic">ever</span> helped by being unbelted)...

...but there's a larger problem.

People use tragedies like this to excuse laziness in installing and using belts, <span style="font-style: italic"><span style="font-weight: bold">just like</span></span> others use them to criticize cars without belts. First of all you have the fatalists, who deny the benefits of safety devices because (apparently) they're not 100% fail-safe. There's genius for you! Then there's the fiction that you can be "<span style="font-style: italic">thrown from the car and not harmed</span>" (repeated even here). The belief that that happens with anything like a frequency that makes belt neglect sensible is childish/dumb/arrogant/foolish/myopic/....and far too common.

The facts on seat belts are well known. Sadly too well known. It's not rhetoric.

[Shop Rat]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Then there's the fiction that you can be "<span style="font-style: italic">thrown from the car and not harmed</span>"</div></div>

How I wish that were true in every case. Several years ago an eighteen year old girl lost her life one night when it was raining, she went around a curve too fast and both she and her friend were thrown from her purple Ford Ranger truck. Her friend survived with a few injuries. The owner of the much loved purple truck was not so lucky. That very truck rolled over her and crushed her under it's weight. She was dead at the scene of the wreck.

Her dad kept coming out to the barn crying after she died. He did not know where else to go. She had been so happy there with her two horses. Her favorite mare was given to her best friend at the barn. The other one was sold.

She was his only child and the light of his life. Most likely she still would be if she had slowed down and been wearing her seatbelt.

[Guest imported_Dwight V.]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Dear Skyking,I drive about 35,000 miles a year,mostly on the thruway.Yea thats me in the right lane GOING the speed limit and i DON'T pass anyone.....EVER.I never had a problem with speeders but speeding and NOT paying attention is a death sentence.</div></div>

It's not the speed, it's the inattentiveness and overall poor driver skill that causes accidents. Speed isn't the cause, though it may increase the severity of the results.

Speed limits are often not set by engineering practice but by the whim of government officials. Most are set too low. Most people will drive a speed they are comfortable with, which is why most speed limits are ignored.

My gripe is with the lack of attention people assign to the very important task of driving, and the complete lack of anything other than a pulse required to get a license in this country.

You may drive the speed limit to your heart's content, so long as you don't impede my ability to pass you safely should I choose to do so.

<span style="font-style: italic">My strong opinion as a competition license holder and someone who has spent hours and hours obtaining instruction in car control.</span>

[Charles2]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"> It's not the speed, it's the inattentiveness and overall poor driver skill that causes accidents. </div></div>

In fact, regardless of how much "high performance drivers training" a person has, the faster you are going, the less time you have to react to the unexpected. In that respect, speed does indeed cause accidents.

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"> You may drive the speed limit to your heart's content, so long as you don't impede my ability to pass you safely should I choose to do so.

</div></div>

A person traveling the legal speed limit on any road is under no obligation to get out of the way of someone who wants to go faster. The faster driver must simply wait for a safe place to pass and, until then, follow the slower car at a safe distance. Tailgating and other forms of juvenile behavior simply exacerbate the situation. Perhaps the person who wishes to exceed the speed limit could consider either leaving a bit earlier or learning patience; both are free and can save considerable stress and gas.

[DizzyDale]

Dear Dwight V,I wrote I NEVER PASS, cause EVERYONE on the posted 55 or 65 hiway is going anywhere between 70 and 85 and the speed limit is obviously the LAST thing they are paying attention to.The competition license you hold enables you to react better to others screw-ups....thats ALL,you gotta remember you are sharing the road with EVERYONE from a 16 year old with a learners permit drivin for the FIRST time with his Dad to a very senior citizen who can not see past the hood ornament. I just wish that anyone that did not attend Skip Barbers driving school would SLOW down,STAY to the right and if you did attend Skips school you keep it at the track or early Sat. or Sun. mornings on the thruway when you can go 130 and up all by your lonesome. diz

[R W Burgess]

Hey Dizz, where's this thruway? I want to test out my truck. I'm never had it over 90mph yet! <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/shocked.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Wayne

[6219_Rules]

Most of the SCCA drivers I know are very attentive and drive by the rules of the road. Sure it is a temptation to use the speed of the car and your knowledge to outdrive the common driver. I've done it. Many times. But one severe accident under totally normal conditions due the inattention, or debilitated awareness of one driver, taught me that no matter how good you are, the odds are against you.

I am with Diz on this. I do not go over the limits purposely (I have sped up too soon out of slower areas going from 45 to 60. Gotta wait to reach the sign, then speed up) and I try to follow the rules of the road ... all of them. Why? Because it gives me time to use my advanced training to benefit. You have a much better chance to avoid someone elses error if you are following the proper distance behind and at or below the limit, depending on traffic, road conditions and visability. Since this is an antique car site, I will also add that because I tend to drive very old cars, I have to take the reliability and general shape of the car into consideration. So, if everyone is running at 85 on a 75 mph limited highway, with a lot of traffic (so I would have difficulty maintaining 75 on cruise control for instance) then I let the general 2 to 3 second rule apply to speed. I may only travel 45 to 50 but that is what the traffic would allow even on a bright day. Stay to the right and be defensive, which does not mean passive ... it means to be very aware, watching a mile ahead if possible and a mile behind; using all mirrors.

Its fun now. I really enjoy driving, following the process. My son, at 21 and a competition driver with training above and beyond the SCCA requirements, drives more aggressively but just as carefully. I wish he would not run 5 over though. Unfortunately you cannot control anyone else but yourself.

Seat belts are a must. I hate them but they work. All that having been said, you still cannot control for the driver losing control, flipping the median and smashing into your car headon. So you do what you can and drive responsibly, safely and defensively.

Oh...on the driver of this accident. I feel for him. It is a shame to spoil a potentially good life with this kind of tragedy, but it is a hard lesson. Whether or not the family should or should not have brought the kiddies, the responsible party is the kid who hit them, for whatever reason. It is one thing to look at all sides and judge, but we have got to stop blaming the victims, especially if they cannot defend themselves.

[Shop Rat]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Whether or not the family should or should not have brought the kiddies, the responsible party is the kid who hit them, for whatever reason. It is one thing to look at all sides and judge, but we have got to stop blaming the victims, especially if they cannot defend themselves. </div></div>

My point was and still is, most likely they broke the law by putting those children in a car without benefit of seatbelts or child restraint systems. That is a fact that cannot be gotten around. In West Virginia the law is absolute, it does not have a clause about antique cars. If children are riding in a vehicle they must be properly restrained with seatbelts or an approved child restraint system.

Yes the fault of the accident goes on the driver that hit them.

But the parents had a legal obligation to follow the law, and a moral obligation to do every thing they could reasonably do to protect their kids, and they didn't.

[Guest Skyking]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">

What statistics? Who's statistics?

Bill Sohl </div></div>

Anyone who isn't a rocketscientist...

[6219_Rules]

OOPs. My bad...I did not know <span style="font-weight: bold">WEST</span> * Virginia's law on seat belts was that strict. That would apply to adults as well? How is this going to effect the owner of the car? Can they be sued or are charges of negligent homicide being brought for not supplying the safety equipment? I imagine, that could get quite sticky.

I know in Colorado, seat belts are required if standard equipment or if they are in the car as add ons, and work, then they have to be belted.

* I stand corrected...again. <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

[R W Burgess]

I think you mean West Virginia Randall. Here in Virginia you are only required what was stock equipment as of Date Of Manufacture.

No seat belts? No Violation!

No Cat Converters? No Violation!

Antique Vehicles? No Inspection Required!

It's a wonderful state, isn't it? No State Regulators telling you what you have to do to your car.

Wayne

[6219_Rules]

Oh gosh, Olley! I did it again! Sounds to me like WEST Virginia is a great place to avoid at all costs, like most of the east and south. <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

"What this town needs is an enima!!!!" The Joker - Batman <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

[Guest my3buicks]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Whether or not the family should or should not have brought the kiddies, the responsible party is the kid who hit them, for whatever reason. It is one thing to look at all sides and judge, but we have got to stop blaming the victims, especially if they cannot defend themselves. </div></div>

My point was and still is, most likely they broke the law by putting those children in a car without benefit of seatbelts or child restraint systems. That is a fact that cannot be gotten around. In West Virginia the law is absolute, it does not have a clause about antique cars. If children are riding in a vehicle they must be properly restrained with seatbelts or an approved child restraint system.

Yes the fault of the accident goes on the driver that hit them.

But the parents had a legal obligation to follow the law, and a moral obligation to do every thing they could reasonably do to protect their kids, and they didn't. </div></div>

Is this fact or opinion, anyone else fro WV confirm this?

[Guest J446]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"> <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"> It's called "you are only going to hear the facts that support my cause and nothing that does not". </div></div>

Which begats "<span style="font-style: italic">I am only going to hear the facts that support my cause and nothing that does not"</span>, and thus party politics is born.

Seat belts might very well have helped, even in this horror. Period.

You can now go about your paranoid delusions about insurance companies getting rich off seat belt royalties and/or an evil desire to keep their customers alive. </div></div>

Ditto that. Placing children in a car without seat belts/or not belting them in is a criminal act.

"The Lawyer should go to jail also..." In Iran perhaps. In the US thankfully that is not the practice.

[Guest J446]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Whether or not the family should or should not have brought the kiddies, the responsible party is the kid who hit them, for whatever reason. It is one thing to look at all sides and judge, but we have got to stop blaming the victims, especially if they cannot defend themselves. </div></div>

My point was and still is, most likely they broke the law by putting those children in a car without benefit of seat belts or child restraint systems. That is a fact that cannot be gotten around. In West Virginia the law is absolute, it does not have a clause about antique cars. If children are riding in a vehicle they must be properly restrained with seatbelts or an approved child restraint system.

Yes the fault of the accident goes on the driver that hit them.

But the parents had a legal obligation to follow the law, and a moral obligation to do every thing they could reasonably do to protect their kids, and they didn't. </div></div>

Is this fact or opinion, anyone else fro WV confirm this? </div></div>

Federal law on child abuse is quite clear on this. Children are protected by these laws everywhere in the US on US flagged vessels, and aircraft. They MUST be belted in/provided with mandated safety equipment anywhere is the US. Period.

[Shop Rat]

Hopefully this link will show up. It is regarding seatbelt and child restraint laws around the country.

http://www.hwysafety.org/laws/state_laws/restrain.html

Here is an even more thorough one.

http://www.hwysafety.org/laws/state_laws/restrain2.html

[Guest Skyking]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">

"The Lawyer should go to jail also..." In Iran perhaps. In the US thankfully that is not the practice. </div></div>

My guess is, you're a lawyer!

[Guest J446]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">

"The Lawyer should go to jail also..." In Iran perhaps. In the US thankfully that is not the practice. </div></div>

My guess is, you're a lawyer! </div></div>

Nope just someone who's proud to live in a land where people are innocent until proved guilty and are entitled to legal representation.

"All 50 states and the District of Columbia have child restraint laws. Child restraint laws require children to travel in approved child restraint devices, and some permit or require older children to use adult safety belts. The age at which belts can be used instead of child restraints differs among the states. Young children usually are covered by child restraint laws, while safety belt laws cover older children and adults. Because enforcement and fines differ under belt use and child restraint laws, it's important to know which law is being violated when a child isn't restrained. Child restraint laws are standard for all children covered except Colorado, Nebraska, and Pennsylvania. In Colorado, the law is secondary only for children ages 4 through 5 years who must be in booster seats. Nebraska's law is secondary only for those children who may be in safety belts and standard for those who must be in a child restraint device. In Pennsylvania, the law is secondary only for children ages 4 through 7 years who must be in booster seats.

Ideally, all infants and children in all vehicles should be covered by safety belt laws or child restraint laws or both. But differences in the way the laws in various states are worded result in many occupants, especially children, being covered by neither law. Lawmakers are eliminating these gaps by amending their child restraint and safety belt laws. They also should make certain that police can stop drivers to enforce restraint laws covering older children. In 36 states and the District of Columbia (Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, and Wyoming), all children younger than 16 are covered by one or both laws.

[Bill_Sohl]

The statement was made that people drive too fast and that's supported by statistics. To which I asked, what statistics:

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Just go out in your car/truck any day and drive the speed limit and see how many people FLY by you. Just the other day I had a guy right up on the bumper of my station wagon trying to get me to go over the 15 M.P.H. speed limit in a school zone. When we got to the end of it he flew around me in the left-hand turn lane. Oh how I wish there had been an officer there that day to see how he drove. </div></div>

The point being offered here does not prove people drive

too fast. All it does is show anecdotal evidence that some people are jerks, and that some people drive above the posted speed limit. In my history, there's a major difference in driving on highways vs two-laners. Many highways have artifichally low (IMHO) speed limits and as a result the vast majority of drivers go faster than the posted limits.

I go with the flow. I am passed by others and I pass others myself.

[Oxnard Montalvo]

I've noticed that when I'm running late people drive way too slow, and when I've got all the time in the world people drive much too fast.

[Dave@Moon]

In an effort to make this discussion more useful to AACA members (and others), <span style="font-style: italic">Does <span style="font-weight: bold">anyone</span> live in a state where Child Restraint Laws are <span style="font-weight: bold">specifically</span> suspended for antique cars?</span> Where I've lived it's always been a <span style="font-style: italic">very dark</span> grey area at best!

[Guest sixpack2639]

They are in SC Dave. Here is a link to the SC seat belt laws http://www.buckleupsc.com/seat_belt_law.asp and it specifically says "This law does NOT apply to....A driver or occupants in a vehicle not originally equipped with safety belts." Carl

[Guest trevor ward]

I have been reading this thread with interest, and there

has been a lot of observations and suggestions...but

oxnard wrote just back a bit <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I've noticed that when I'm running late people drive way too slow, and when I've got all the time in the world people drive much too fast. </div></div> I reckon this is a very well observed

comment and not too many would be able to convince me otherwise

Trevor... '64 le sabre.... Hibernating right now

[Guest De Soto Frank]

"Most of us have not missed seeing a 6,000 lb car and killed three people"...

SEVERAL TIMES !

Apparently, the "alleged" driver at fault has quite the blemished driving record to start with...this may be his first recorded vehicular homicide, but according to some of the related news accounts, has been cited numerous times for speeding and other moving violations.

Time to take his license.

And while seat belts MAY have helped the folks in the Duesenberg (and I generally feel that safety belts are a good idea, and yes, kiddos should be strapped-in), there is a TREMENDOUS amount of bad driving these days: speeding, tailgating, swerve & dart, passing on the right, etc...I wish there were enough cops to apprehend the law-breakers so that they realize there are rules for driving and that there are consequences for breaking them...BEFORE somebody gets killed.

Statistics be damned, I know what I see every day in my 50 mile commute to & from work...it's really frightening most days.

( And while I'm "wishing", I'd like a Packard Twin-Six Special touring for Christmas too!)

Arrive alive !

Frank McMullen

[Guest Skyking]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"> there is a TREMENDOUS amount of bad driving these days: speeding, tailgating, swerve & dart, passing on the right, etc... </div></div>

And nine out of ten times they have a cell phone in one hand and a coffee in the other.....