Drunk Drivers and Hit-and-Run Collisions Headline DFW News This Weekend

It  was another incredibly dangerous weekend on our North Texas roads. Intoxicated and hit-and-run drivers killed or injured innocent drivers in Dallas- Fort Worth. These were just the crashes reported in the newspapers:

  • At 9:35 p.m. on Friday, a Ford Focus hit a Kia Sportage, sending it over a guardrail and down a hill. The Kia driver was ejected from his car and died on the scene. The Focus driver was later determined to be under the influence of drugs and was charged with intoxication manslaughter.
  • A hit-and-run in Richardson just before 11 p.m. on Friday night left a motorcyclist with a broken arm. The northbound driver was changing lanes near Prestonwood Drive when they hit the motorcyclist. Police have no leads on the driver.
  • Early Saturday morning an Arlington police officer was treated for injuries after being involved in a crash with a suspected drunk driver. The officer was working to re-open lanes of I-30 after overnight construction.
  • Note that this is only one of the 10 DWI arrests made in Arlington Saturday night. This compares to a typical weekend night of four to six driving while intoxicated arrests, still a ridiculous number.
  • At 9 p.m. Saturday in Dallas, a man died after his speeding SUV spun out of control and careened into a ditch, ejecting him from the car. The driver was not wearing a seat belt and alcohol presumably played a role in the crash.
  • A collision on Berry Street in Fort Worth early Sunday morning tragically killed a woman and left a child critically injured.
  • Early Sunday morning, a wrong-way driver killed a man on I-30 in Grand Prairie. At around 5 a.m. a woman driving east in the westbound lane struck another car, killing its driver on the scene and shutting down I-30 for nearly five hours. The woman is in critical condition and police suspect alcohol was involved.
  • Note that this accident is the second fatal accident in January in Grand Prairie.

These are just a few of the hundreds of accidents across North Texas in January.

And in Houston on Saturday night, a man driving a pickup truck ran a red light and crashed into an SUV, killing a passenger and critically injured its driver. The truck driver’s blood alcohol content was an unbelievable .32 — four times the legal limit. The driver had already been convicted two times for DWI’s so he will automatically be sentenced to murder, not intoxication manslaughter.

We clearly have to do more to prevent collisions like these other than jail people and file lawsuits against them and their liability insurance companies.

Lights, signage, rumble strips and larger medians are all preventative measures I’ve talked about in the past that can keep drivers safe and alert. See my recent blog post about what TXDOT is doing to combat wrong-way collisions.

We also work to educate people about drunk driving through our work with organizations like MADD.

Every weekend should not be filled with DWI deaths and other preventable collisions like the one pictured below, taken at the scene of a crash case we are prosecuting.

If you or someone you know is injured by a drunk or hit-and-run driver in North Texas or in another collision, please contact us. We’ll fight to get you the compensation you deserve.

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