U.S. Capital

Impaired Driving Is Not Just About Drinking

Jul 16, 2014

Austin Personal Injury Lawyers

Austin Personal Injury Lawyers – Perlmutter & Schuelke, LLP

Austin, TX (Law Firm Newswire) July 16, 2014 – The term impaired driving does not just refer to driving while under the influence of alcohol.

“A recent study, released by the University of Colorado School of Medicine, indicates that the number of drivers under the influence of marijuana has jumped drastically since the drug was commercialized in that state in 2009. This problem could well be happening in Texas,” says Brooks Schuelke, a personal injury attorney with Perlmutter & Schuelke LLP in Austin. The numbers used to conduct the Colorado study were taken from the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) for the period from 1994 to 2011. There are 21 states with medical marijuana laws, plus D.C. Texas is not one of those states.

Colorado’s information showed that at the beginning of their research, which included the first six-months of 1994, fatal car accidents with at least one driver under the influence of cannabis was 4.5 percent. By the end of their research timeline, the last six months of 2011, the percentage had skyrocketed to 10 percent. This study echoes another done in 2011 by Columbia University, authored by Dr. Guoha Li, a professor of epidemiology. This study examined nine other larger drugged driving studies.

“The result was that drivers who tested positive for cannabis within three hours of using were more than twice as likely to be in a collision. An added revelation was that the risk of a wreck was higher if the cannabis levels in the urine were higher,” adds Schuelke.

Over the last decade, many studies of this nature have been presented to the public without any compelling conclusive data that smoking up does increase the risk of a collision by two or three times. Chuck Farmer, the director of statistics at the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety states that the vast majority of studies relating to marijuana use and driving do indicate it has a “very strong bad effect on driving.”

While it does appear that cannabis consumption may affect reaction time and a driver’s coordination, the jury is still out as to whether or not it may depend on the amount of the drug consumed and just how it was consumed. “Which may be a red herring,” suggests Schuelke, “as being impaired is being impaired in the eyes of the law. Whether that is alcohol or cannabis, if an accident happens because a driver chose to negligently consume a substance that impaired their ability to drive safely, they must still be held responsible for their actions.”

Learn more at http://www.civtrial.com

Perlmutter & Schuelke, LLP
206 East 9th Street, Ste. 1511
Austin, TX 78701
Call (512) 476-4944

View Larger Map

  • Is Your Insurance Company Paying Fairly?
    Last week, local news station KXAN ran a great story on the problems that consumers encounter trying to get insurance companies to pay their claims.  Unfortunately, I see this on a daily basis.  When you’re hurt or injured, insurance companies seem to employ the old deny, defend and delay tactics to try and minimize what […]
  • Amusement Park Safety
    Earlier this week, several people were injured in a roller coaster accident at Six Flags in Valencia, California.  Apparently, a tree fell on the track, injuring two people and causing a number of others to be stranded for hours. That’s tragic.  Amusement park injuries occur more than we think, and they are often severe. But […]
  • Get Ready To File Your Chrysler Ignition Switch Claims
    As you probably know, Chrysler admitted earlier this year that just over 2.5 million of its vehicles had defective ignition switches.  The switches were faulted in at least 165 deaths and countless more serious injuries. In an effort to control litigation costs, Chrysler has set up a claim process that will serve as an alternative […]