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Family Legal Guide
Copyright © 2000 American Bar Association

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The California graduated licensing law--entitled the "Brady/Jared Teen Driver Safety Act of 1997"--is named for two teenagers who were killed in separate car crashes in Southern California. The law sets out a comprehensive licensing process for teens. Teens aged 15 years and 6 months may apply for an instructional permit after successfully completing a driver's education course and training. The law requires an instructional permit for six months that includes 50 hours of driving practice supervised by a parent, driving instructor or licensed driver over age 25. Ten of the supervised hours must be at night.

For the first six months of the provisional license, drivers are prohibited from transporting passengers younger than age 20 unless accompanied by a parent or an adult age 25 or older. A family exemption allows teens unaccompanied by an adult to drive immediate family members under age 20 during the first six months at any time of the day or night as long as the teen has a letter from his or her parent authorizing it. The first year of the provisional license includes a nighttime driving restriction from midnight to 5 a.m. Employment, school activities and medical necessity are exceptions to the restriction. A six-month suspension of the license and a one-year term of probation is imposed when a driver accrues three or more traffic violation points in a 12-month period.

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By Christina A. Samuels

It was the crossbow that really made an impression.

In a video Greg Margheim showed his driver education students last week, a Massachusetts man got so furious that he fatally shot another driver with a crossbow during a road altercation.

The gruesome event was just one of several that Margheim's Woodbridge High School students confronted Friday during a unit on road rage, now mandatory in the Virginia driver education curriculum.

Margheim also let the youngsters talk about their own experiences with aggressive driving.

Almost every student--some who claimed to be blameless, others who admitted they were not so innocent--had a tale. They have been cut off in traffic. Tailgated. Flashed with headlights. One teenager was in the car with her mother, who was driving, when another driver jumped out of his car and started screaming at them.

Another said an angry driver followed her to a friend's house and parked outside for 30 minutes before driving off.

"It makes you scared," said Janell Wicker, a 16-year-old sophomore in the class who said she has been honked at. "You don't know how people are going to react."

Driver education courses across the region are adapting to growing concerns about aggressive driving and road rage. By including material about the phenomenon, its causes and how to defuse sticky situations, educators hope to help tomorrow's drivers stay calm.

In Virginia, the state legislature made it mandatory in 1998 for driver education classes to include a unit on preventing aggressive driving. Students learn how aggressive driving starts--often when one driver wants to teach another one a lesson. Students also learn how to manage their own anger and how to avoid confrontations.

In Maryland and the District, where virtually all driver education is handled by commercial driver schools, there is no specific unit on aggressive driving. However, students are taught techniques intended to reduce confrontation. Last year, Maryland created a driver education curriculum that must be followed by every licensed school in the state.

"We really don't provide a specific lesson, but we do teach many different skills that can assist the driver," said Richard Scher, spokesman for the Maryland Motor Vehicle Administration. "If we didn't include that, we wouldn't be doing our jobs, considering that we live in the second most congested area after Los Angeles."

James Sorrell, a public school driving instructor for more than 30 years, puts young drivers through their paces at Woodbridge High and teaches classes to adults who want penalty points taken off their licenses. He, too, has noticed an increase in the attention paid to aggressive driving.

So Sorrell tells his students to keep their hands off the horn and avoid looking at other drivers--even to apologize.

"Say I've just been in a fight with my wife, and something happens. You're trying to signal, 'I'm sorry,' and I don't want to hear it," Sorrell said. "The biggest thing is to never, ever, ever make eye contact."

Young drivers, though they have more accidents than the general driving population, appear to be no more prone than others to driving aggressively, said Norman Grimm, director of driver and traffic safety services for AAA Mid-Atlantic.

"I don't think they're angry drivers. They're inexperienced drivers, and they don't understand risk-taking," Grimm said.

Those two ingredients can spark traffic confrontations. Liana Wooten, 15, a sophomore at Woodbridge High who has seen an irate driver confront her mother, said she has been tailgated and cut off, apparently for driving too slowly.

"I don't really pay attention to it ever since that person yelled at my mom," Liana said. "I see it so much. It's crazy out there. I'm not going to do anything to endanger myself, because that just scares me to death."

So, is the message getting through to students? The classes are too new for statistical evidence to show whether young drivers will have fewer accidents because they know the root causes of road rage.

But Linda Bell, head of the department that oversees driver education, said she already sees more caution among some students.

"They shouldn't be scared, but they do need to know the stuff they do in the hallways can get them into a lot of trouble out on the road," said Bell, head of the physical education department.

Sometimes their sheer inexperience can get them into trouble with other drivers.

"It's very difficult for them to stay calm when they are having to concentrate so hard on the driving process itself," Bell said. One hopeful sign, she added is that other drivers can be more tolerant when faced with inexperienced drivers.

Students in Margheim's class said they have taken away some useful information from the aggressive driving unit. Sophomore Ben Westling, 15, said he's learned that aggressive driving starts even before a driver gets behind the wheel.

"When they get in their car, they're already pissed off," he said. Sometimes he feels the same way, especially when people drive "really slow."

"I turn the music up and tap on the steering wheel. That helps."

Classmate Antwanette Daniels, 16, admitted that she got a little mad when a driver started tailing her as she practiced driving with her father.

"My dad was like, 'Just ignore him,' " she said. Her father knows about ignoring other drivers, she explained: Once another driver pulled up next to him on the highway, trying to egg him into a race. Antwanette was in the car at the time.

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Hal Dardick , Chicago Tribune

The Chicago Tribune reports that an effort in Aurora, Illinois to enforce a noise ordinance directed at blaring stereos from vehicles has combined the forces of the Near West Side Neighborhood Association with community police officers. Under "Operation Boombox," as the effort is called, residents in the neighborhood group use two-way radios to notify nearby squad cars if they hear a blaring vehicle stereo, allowing police officers to arrive quickly at the scene and determine whether a violation has occurred. If so, officers can impound the vehicle, the article says.

The article reports that Scott Pettit, a member of the neighborhood group, moved into his large Victorian house five years ago. He soon learned that his neighborhood had a gang presence, which included many cars driving past his home with blaring, souped-up radios. Pettit said, "Where I live happens to be part of the crime loop. My neighbors moved. One of the reasons they moved was they had a small kid and couldn't live with the noise anymore."

The vehicle boombox problem was so bad, the article reports, that the city of Aurora passed a then-unique noise ordinance in March 1996, that has since been copied by other communities, including Cicero. Under the ordinance, police can impound a vehicle if amplified noise from it can be heard at least 75 feet away. In order to get the vehicle back, the driver has to pay a $75 fine, and the owner has to pay a $250 impoundment fee, a $75 towing fee, and $20-a-day storage charges, the article says.

While the ordinance was good in theory, Pettit and other members of the Near West Side Neighborhood Association said it was not being enforced enough to have an impact on their neighborhood. Neighborhood group members aired their complaint at a mayoral campaign forum in March, which also was attended by police officers. One of those officers, community policing Officer Shireen Long, said she realized that if the police got the residents involved in the enforcement process, the problem would be solved. So, starting in late May, the Near West Side Neighborhood Association and the community policing division headed by Sgt. Paul Barrett launched Operation Boombox. Members of the neighborhood group simply use their two-way radios to notify nearby squad cars when they hear a boombox from a vehicle two or more residential lots away, which amounts to about 100 feet. Police arrive at the scene quickly and make an arrest if necessary.

(...)

The article says on May 23, the day the operation started, five people were cited and all of their vehicles were impounded. On Friday, when police conducted their second Operation Boombox effort, two people were received citations. Police Sgt. Barrett said impounding cars gets the attention of the teen-age violators' parents, the article reports.

(...)

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Adela Gooch, The Guardian Foreign Pages

According to The Guardian, the noise levels from mobile telephones is such a nuisance that people are demanding legislative action. The growth rate of mobile telephone use is higher in Spain than anywhere else in Europe, according to the article--from one million to 18 million in just five years.

The article said that the noise level in public places often exceed established decibels (dB) levels (55 to 65 dB) that the World Health Organization set. So the Centre for Scientific Investigation, Spain's primary research center supports the demand for legislative action.

The article said that Spain's national pastime, la charla (small talk, talking just to be talking and chatty citizens that use mobile telephones for personal reasons are the reason that mere "noise pollution" has escalated to shouting and physical brawls.

The article said that mobile telephone companies, in an effort to stop legislation, have published "guidelines" for using the telephones and asked users to use the text message system.

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Family Legal Guide
Copyright © 2000 American Bar Association

1.Breaking the driving laws or abusing a motor vehicle can result in the loss of driving privileges, even if we learn about if from a source other than the police. You never know who may be observing you.

2.You will strive to maintain the grades, conduct, and attitude at the same high level as when we granted you driving privileges.

3.No one else should be allowed to drive a vehicle entrusted to you. This means that you may not lend your vehicle to friends.

4.If you are ever in a condition that might render you less than 100% competent behind the wheel of a car, phone us at home or wherever we are. This will not result in the loss of driving privileges.

5.You are never to be a passenger in a car in which the driver should not be driving. A call to come and get you will not result in the loss of driving privileges. If you cannot reach us, hire a taxi. We will pay for it and there will be no punishment.

______________________________ Signed by Teen Date:________________

______________________________ Signed by Parent Date:________________

Dear Dr. Driving:

I'm a freelance writer doing an assigned article on road rage for Futures, a magazine published by Scholastic Inc. that is distributed to high school juniors and seniors. I have found the material on your web site to be very helpful and have seen you quoted in many articles during my research. I would like to request a specific quote from you to use in my article. I am looking for a quote that dramatically describes how big a problem road rage has become/is becoming in the U.S. If there is something you can say that will help make it particularly relevant to kids in our audience, that would be great.

TIA for your cooperation.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Please transmit this to your readers:

Open Letter to Teen Drivers by Dr. Leon James

Dear young persons,

By the time most adolescents begin their career as drivers, they have experienced years of road rage or aggressive driving, as passengers in their parents' car and with other drivers. Add to this the many portrayals of "bad driving" scenes on TV and you can see how ingrained this habit becomes. Road rage or aggressive driving is a cultural habit we acquire subconsciously and automatically as we grow up.

Most drivers have road rage though it may not show in the open. Road rage is a feeling of rebellion and anger against others on the road or against road restrictions and regulations. Aggressive driving is a type of road rage which is expressed by tailgating, lane hopping, passing dangerously, failure to yield or signal, racing the engine, playing loud music, not wearing seat belts, scaring your passengers with risky behavior, and yelling or making insulting gestures. These are angry responses to other drivers who seem to be in your way. According to government officials, aggressive driving is now the Number 1 problem in transportation today.

Speeding dangerously and racing are also types of road rage, being angry responses to regulations that forbid these activities. Drinking and driving is a type of road rage too, showing an angry rebellion against authority and a raging disregard of the well being of other drivers and pedestrians who are injured and killed by imparied drivers.

What are the results of road rage? Consider these facts:

1. In the US, about 45,000 people die every year of car crashes--as much as the total fatalities in the entire Viet Name war.

2. 16-24 year olds represent 24 percent of total fatalities.

3. On a per population basis, drivers under the age of 25 had the highest rate of involvement in fatal crashes among all age groups.

4. The intoxication rate for 16-20 year old drivers in fatal crashes in 1994 was 14.1 percent. The highest intoxication rates were for drivers 21 to 24 and 25 to 34 years old (28.1 percent and 26.8 percent, respectively).

5. Every minute of every day of every year, a young person between the ages of 15-20 is inured in a motor vehicle crash in the US.

6. Car accidents are the No. 1 cause of death and injury among children.

7. Alcohol was involved in 41% of all traffic fatalaties in 1994, resulting in 17,000 deaths.

8. Each alcohol-related death costs our nation an average of 37 years of life lost--in contrast to 16 years for cancer and 12 years for heart disease.

9. There has been a steady increase in DWI rates and alcohol-related fatal crashes among women, especially younger women.

10. DWI or DUI accounted for about 1.4 million arrests in 1994, about the same as arrests for larceny or theft, or arrests for drug abuse.

11. In 1996, about 35% of college students report having driven after drinking alcoholic beverages.

12. More than 50% of the people jailed for DWI are repeat offenders.

13. The cost of motor vehicle crashes and injuries in 1990 was $138 billion, representing the present value of lifetime economic costs for 45,000 fatalities, 5.4 million non-fatal injuries, and 28 million damaged vehicles--per year.

14. On average, a pedestrian is killed in a motor vehicle crash every 96 minutes.

15. A toddler shot dead in the car after his father flipped someone the bird in traffic.

16. A 55 year old man is facing murder charges after shooting a youth for tailgating.

17. A young mother is forced to jump to her death over a Detroit bridge by a motorist she had sideswiped.

18. A high school student in Honolulu was convicted of causing the death of an off duty policeman who fell over a highway rampart in a scuffle with the youth after they both stopped to settle the score that started with tailgating and a chase.

19. A Cincinnati woman received a jail sentence for vehicular manslaughter charges for causing the death of an unborn child after a tailgating and chase battle with a pregnant driver ended with an overturned car.

20. An Auckland (Australia) irate motorist followed a school bus driver back to the garage, "scorched his ears and pinned him to the bus with his car."

Conclusion: it is necessary for each of you to take personal responsibility for containing the road rage epidemic. Be brave. Be noble. Be rational. Ask yourself how you are contributing to the problem. Discuss it among yourselves. Take action. Form little groups where you meet regularly and help one another become good drivers, compassionate drivers who are thinking not just of yourself but others on the road. Help each other do a driving personality make-over. Do a random act of kindness as a driver every time you are behind the wheel. Encourage your parents and elders to respect road regulations and other drivers.

I invite you to review many possible ideas and strategies at Dr. Driving's Web Site

Take care and drive with Aloha spirit!
Leon James
DrDriving

I understand that I will only be allowed to drive when I am willing to abide by the rules and regulations established by my parents.

I recognize that driving a car is a very serious matter. I recognize that...

____ Automobile accidents are the leading cause of death of people 16-20 years old.

____ I am more likely to die in an auto accident than from any other cause.

____ Recklessness or errors that I make while driving could kill or hurt me, kill or hurt passengers in my car, and/or kill or hurt people in other cars and pedestrians. Among those that could be victims of my driving mistakes are: babies, children, my friends, my family members, parents of children, and many others.

____ I will abide by laws regulating driving. I will observe and abide by posted speed limits. I will abide by rules established by my parents. I recognize these are for my protection and the protection of others.

____ I understand that the car I drive is property of my parents, even if I pay for part or all of it, even if it is given to me as a "gift." I drive the car only with permission.

____ I understand that my parents and I must be able to reach a written agreement in order for me to be permitted to drive. I understand that the terms of this agreement may be changed based on how I handle the freedom and responsibility of driving. The rules will get stricter if my parents judge that I am not doing well. It will get somewhat less strict if my parents judge that I am doing well.

____ We will review this agreement and perhaps make changes to it on ______________(date) or earlier if my parents or I wish to do so.

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Sabrina Smith

FORT WORTH, Sept. 11 - Traffic accidents are the leading cause of death among teenagers. That’s enough to really frighten any parent with a child near driving age. NBC 5 Consumer Reporter Sabrina Smith explains a possible solution for companies who want to see how employees are driving the company vehicle.

It's also a solution for you if you're wondering how your spouse drives the car on that short trip to the store, and a solution for parents who are anxious to find out what goes on when their teenager takes a spin in the family sedan. Mike Rowan dreads the words, "Dad, I need your keys." He worries whenever teenage daughter Ashley gets behind the wheel. But is she as bad as he suspects?

He bought Smart Driver to find out. It's a car monitoring system that records a driver's every move without their knowledge.

Ashley said, "When you're driving, you don't think your parents are going to be watching." Michael Deer is a distributor for the device that plugs into the dash, and later into your computer to show you how fast the driver was going, how far, and any traffic violations. He said, "Most of them you can conceal pretty well by stuffing it right under the dash."

Deer said, "With teenagers, it's how many miles they're driving and how fast they're out zooming around, and all that data gets uploaded into the Smart Driver software, and it prints you out a report."

Ashley's report showed a total of 912 violations. She drove faster than 65- miles-per-hour more than 100 times and reached maximum speeds of 86 mph.

Ashley said, "I pushed on the gas a little too much."

Her dad said, "It's a teaching tool for kids because they're always going to deny they went that fast or they revved the engine that much. When you write it down on paper, I mean it's hard to deny what's printed up here." Ashley said, "It really made me realize how fast I was going."

Smart Driver costs about $300 and can archive up to one month's worth of activity. But the device only works on cars made after 1996.

Driving at night is more of a challenge than many people think. It's also more dangerous.

Why is night driving so dangerous? One obvious answer is darkness. Ninety percent of a driver's reaction depends on vision, and vision is severely limited at night. Depth perception, color recognition, peripheral vision are compromised after sundown.

Older drivers have even greater difficulties seeing at night. A 50-year-old driver may need twice as much light to see as well as a 30-year old.

Another factor adding danger to night driving is fatigue. Drowsiness makes driving more difficult by dulling concentration and slowing reaction time.

Alcohol is a leading factor in fatal traffic crashes, playing a part in about half of all motor vehicle-related deaths. That makes weekend nights more dangerous. More fatal crashes take place on weekend nights than at any other time in the week.

Fortunately, you can take several effective measures to minimize these after-dark dangers by preparing your car and following special guidelines while you drive.

The National Safety Council recommends these steps:

Prepare your car for night driving. Clean headlights, taillights, signal lights and windows (inside and out) once a week, more often if necessary.

Have your headlights properly aimed. Misaimed headlights blind other drivers and reduce your ability to see the road.

Don't drink and drive. Not only does alcohol severely impair your driving ability, but it also acts as a depressant. Just one drink can induce fatigue. Also, avoid smoking when you drive. Smoke's nicotine and carbon monoxide hamper night vision.

If there is any doubt, turn your headlights on. Lights will not help you see better in early twilight, but they'll make it easier for other drivers to see you. Being seen is as important as seeing.

Reduce your speed and increase your following distances. It is more difficult to judge other vehicle's speeds and distances at night.

Don't overdrive your headlights. You should be able to stop inside the illuminated area. If you're not, you are creating a blind crash area in front of your vehicle.

When following another vehicle, keep your headlights on low beams so you don't blind the driver ahead of you.
If an oncoming vehicle doesn't lower beams from high to low, avoid glare by watching the right edge of the road and using it as a steering guide.

Make frequent stops for light snacks and exercise. If you're too tired to drive, stop and get rest.

If you have car trouble, pull off the road as far as possible. Warn approaching traffic at once by setting up flares or reflecting triangles near your vehicle and 300 feet behind it. Turn on flashers and the dome light. Stay off the roadway and get passengers away from the area.

Observe night driving safety as soon as the sun goes down. Twilight is one of the most difficult times to drive, because your eyes are constantly changing to adapt to the growing darkness.

If you are drinking, do not drive. If you plan to drink, designate a non-drinking driver.
Support the strengthening and vigorous enforcement of impaired-driving laws. These laws save lives.
Young drivers are at particular risk to be involved in alcohol-related crashes. If there is a young driver in your family, strictly enforce a zero tolerance policy with alcohol. All states have a 21-year-old drinking age law.
Your best defense a drunk driver is wearing your safety belt.

The law does not, however, expect you to anticipate a pedestrian darting out into the roadway.

Family Legal Guide
Copyright © 2000 American Bar Association

By Thomas J. Gibbons Jr. INQUIRER STAFF WRITER

A South Philadelphia man was charged in the death of Kevin Holmes, 18. Holmes' girlfriend saw the shooting.

(...)

In just seconds yesterday morning, two cars crashed near a parking space on a busy Center City street. And within minutes, one motorist was dead, a victim of road rage who suffered a fatal wound in front of his girlfriend and her child.

Kevin Holmes, 18, a senior at Olney High School, was shot once in the chest in the dispute, which was reported about 11 a.m. in the 2000 block of Walnut Street, Philadelphia police said.

(...)

The shot that struck Holmes, a North Philadelphia resident, narrowly missed his girlfriend and her toddler son, who was with them in the front seat of a brown 1986 Oldsmobile station wagon, police said.

"Some words were exchanged between both parties," said Capt. Thomas Lippo, describing the accident. "As a result of that, the suspect got out of his vehicle, walked up to the victim's vehicle, and fired one time, striking him in the chest."

Holmes then pressed on the accelerator and drove the vehicle for a short distance before he lost control and passed out. The car ran into two cars parked on the south side of Walnut before coming to a halt directly in front of a day-care center.

(...)

Lippo said Holmes had been driving west on Walnut when his car was struck by a green 1994 Plymouth Sundance, which was pulling out of a parking spot. The Plymouth was driven by Stephen Palmer, 25, a resident of Sigel Street in South Philadelphia.

After the shooting, the driver fled, Lippo said, but witnesses gave police a description of his car and license-plate number. Investigators tracked the car to Palmer's home on Sigel Street and began to watch it.

(...)

One police investigator involved in the case said Palmer's actions were clearly a case of road rage.

Lippo, however, declined to describe the case as road rage. "As far as we know, this is nothing more than an auto accident that went awry," the captain said.

(,,,).

Reached at her home last night, Mitchell said the incident happened quickly.

"The guy hit Kevin on the side of the car," she said. "Kevin stopped, and the guy got out of his car, reached for something in his car, and put it in his pocket. He came to the car and he told Kevin to get out."

Mitchell said that her boyfriend felt the driver was going to do something violent.

"He closed the door and he started to pull off," she said. "The guy came to the car and fired a shot at Kevin's chest."

(...)

Palmer was being held at Police Headquarters last night, charged with murder, weapons violations, drug offenses, and related crimes. Investigators said they found narcotics in Palmer's possession. He was awaiting arraignment today. The murder weapon was not immediately recovered.

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By Alice Keesing Advertiser Staff Writer

Thousands of Hawai‘i teenagers who can’t get into driver’s education classes at school may find a long waiting list for private lessons that could cost as much as $600.

(...)

A driver’s education course becomes mandatory beginning Monday for all prospective applicants under 18 before they can take their driver’s license exam. The new law is intended to make Hawai‘i’s roads safer and requires Island youths to take 30 hours of classroom instruction and six hours of behind-the-wheel lessons.

(...)

Department of Transportation spokeswoman Marilyn Kali agreed that the new law is creating some uncertainty.

(...)

Public high schools will provide the cheapest way for students to get the mandatory driver’s education course. Most high schools provide an after-hours class, which costs just $10.

But those classes already are overbooked. Sasaki has held lotteries for the last three years to determine who gets into Roosevelt’s classes. This month, 300 students vied for the 30 seats available.

And there are some areas — including Lana‘i, Hana on Maui and Pahoa on the Big Island — where the Department of Education does not have instructors, leaving students looking for other alternatives that may be hard to find and which could cost as much as $600 — the maximum fee allowed by law.

(...)

Oide said a group of private driving schools are planning a nonprofit association that will award scholarships to those in financial need. And the YMCA, which is starting classes in January that will cost the maximum amount, also is planning scholarships and financial aid.

Yet, even when families find the money, they may still have trouble finding a class.

The DOT estimates between 10,000 and 15,000 teens become eligible for their license each year. The Department of Education can teach 3,000 a year, and the YMCA plans to reach up to 8,000 once its program is fully implemented. It will start classes on O‘ahu in January and hopes to expand to the Big Island, Maui and Kaua‘i by April.

To make up the remainder, the DOT has been working to increase the number of private instructors in the state — about 80 have either completed or are in the process of certification training. However, Kali agrees that some teens may initially face a wait.

(...)

Kali said instructors have gone through a 104-hour course and have practiced their in-class and behind-the-wheel teaching.

(...)

Brown and other instructors also are concerned about the YMCA’s plan to use simulators to teach the behind-the-wheel portion of the class.

"I don’t believe five hours on a simulator is any way equivalent to four hours behind-the-wheel," said Oide, who served on the DOT’s Driver’s Education Task Force to help implement the new law.

Oide said one problem is that simulators have a limited field of vision and therefore cannot teach students to reverse or check for blind spots.

Students who take the simulator course will be required to take an additional two hours of behind-the-wheel training, but Oide believes that’s still not enough.

YMCA Vice President Glenn Tsugawa said the simulators are state-of-the-art and give students the opportunity to learn the basics of driving and make mistakes without real-life consequences.

(...)

The driver education course will cover the road rules and techniques of driving, it will show teens how to change a tire and set up flares in an emergency situation, it will include information about buying a car and insuring it and it will deal with attitudes of driving and sharing the road.

"We’re hoping to make better drivers out of our teenagers so we can decrease the number of injuries and fatalities that are occurring during the first year they have their license," Kali said. "Sixteen-year-olds have more crashes than any other age group."

In California, a similar law resulted in a 50 percent reduction in crashes for teens, Kali said, and it’s hoped Hawai‘i will have the same success.