Reduce Highway Fatalities

Tennessee Department of Safety and Homeland Security officials today announced preliminary figures indicating the state has recorded the fewest number of traffic fatalities in 48 years. In 2011, there were 947 traffic-related deaths on Tennessee roadways, representing the lowest figure since 1963 when 941 people were killed as a result of a crash.

A Clarksville man finally finds out that he has to pay for his irresponsibility. The lesson not to drink and drive didn’t stick when he was first convicted of DUI. As the result of his failure to learn he left a 5-year-old girl with a torn trachea, torn colon and permanent damage to her spinal cord that has left her paralyzed from the chest down. I mean, 5-years-old and her life is irreparably changed.

The 25-year-old man was out with friends took drunk and ignored the pleading of friends for him not to drive. He convinced them that he could drive and took them up on the offer to follow him home. To the horror of his friends, he began to speed up and they dropped off when he reached speeds over 100-miles-per-hour. Moments later they were stunned as he crossed the centerline and slammed head-on into the vehicle carrying the child and her 20-year-old aunt. Our prayers go out to these two young women and their family and friends.

Drunk driving is one of America’s deadliest crimes. In Tennessee in 2008, 327 people were killed in crashes where the driver or motorcyclist had a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .08 or higher. At a sentencing hearing this past week the man pleaded guilty to numerous charges and was sentenced to serve eight years in the Tennessee Department of Corrections.

If you or a loved one is involved in a Tennessee automobile accident caused by a drunk driver contact the experienced Nashville automobile accident lawyers at Phillip Miller & Associates and find out about your rights and remedies. Call 615-356-2000.

Prison For Drunk Driver

Child Safety Seats Save Lives

A two-year-old Pulaski, Tennessee boy is in Vanderbilt Hospital in critical condition and his mother in jail after a single car accident on Fall River Road this past Sunday night.

According to local media reports, the boy suffered head injuries when his mother lost control of her car in a curve, overturned and hit a tree.

Both mother and child were properly restrained and according to the report, investigators said that “probably saved their lives.” The mother was arrested and charged with DUI and vehicular assault. Speed and drunkenness were the probable causes of the crash.

Motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death to children ages 2 to 14 and the leading cause of injury-related death for children under 2. When installed and used correctly, child safety seats and safety belts can prevent injuries and save lives. Young children restrained in child safety seats have an 80 percent lower risk of fatal injury than those who are unrestrained.

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Tennessee highway automobile accident contact the experienced Nashville automobile accident law firm of Phillip Miller & Associates and take advantage of a free consultation to determine your rights and remedies

Another Fatherless Child

As an experienced Nashville automobile accident lawyer, it breaks my heart to see any crash in which a baby is injured because it is not properly secured in a child safety seat and the parent was driving drunk. Reference a crash late last week in which a 30-year-old father died and his two-year-old son was injured when their vehicle failed to negotiate a curve.

The crash occurred in Jefferson County, Tennessee, and from my experience, it appears that it was caused by the alcohol, speed and/or distraction. Neither the deceased driver or the passenger were wearing their seat belts and the child was in a safety seat but it was improperly secured.

Alcohol was a factor in 10,839 highway deaths in 2009. In the past two decades, it accounted for 268,442 deaths. And 10 percent of people in the United States recently admitted to being drunk behind the wheel in the past year, a poll found. Drunk driving is one of America’s deadliest crimes. In Tennessee in 2008, 327 people were killed in crashes where the driver or motorcyclist had a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .08 or higher.

If you are the victim of a Nashville or Tennessee automobile accident we urge you to contact our car accident attorneys today for a free consultation. When you hire an auto accident attorney from Phillip Miller & Associates, you’re getting a qualified and dedicated lawyer. Details about our attorneys and staff can be found by viewing our website at www.seriousinjury.com where you can get to know the men and women who will be looking out for your best interest.

We Need Not Be Confused About Highway Safety

Oftentimes saving a life on the road is as basic as getting people to slow down, buckle up, or don a helmet. Tried and true countermeasures like these usually don’t grab headlines, but if they were more widely propagated across the nation they would yield an immediate reduction in motor vehicle crash deaths.

The number of people who die in crashes in the United States is at a record low. Still, there were an estimated 32,788 motor vehicle crash deaths last year, according to a preliminary projection by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).

Vehicles are safer than ever, and emerging technologies are starting to pay dividends in terms of preventing crashes or lessening there severity. New safety features take time to work their way through the vehicle fleet, though, so benefits can be delayed for years. “While we’re looking for the next big breakthrough in vehicle safety, we should keep in mind that many existing strategies at the driver and passenger level still can yield gains,” says Adrian Lund, Institute president. “Not only can most of these countermeasures be put to work now, but the benefits also would be swift.”

State laws have helped lift use of safety belts and motorcycle helmets and lower teenage driver crash rates. DUI/DWI laws and sobriety checkpoints have reduced alcohol-impaired driving. Red light cameras and speed cameras have gotten drivers to obey traffic signals and slow down, while roundabouts have reduced intersection crashes.

Still, lots of drivers flout traffic and restraint laws, intersection crashes and speeding-related ones continue to be deadly, and some teenagers take risky chances that have tragic endings. “We already have the tools to address these problems,” Lund says, “but they need to be better utilized.”

Basic doesn’t mean easy, he adds. “Making headway in many cases would require some state lawmakers to make bold moves to enact tough, enforceable laws.” A stumbling block is getting the public and state and local politicians on board with proposed changes.

Red light cameras and speed cameras are especially divisive, even though public opinion surveys show solid support for using cameras to enforce traffic laws. Motorcycle helmet laws can be just as controversial. Anti-helmet groups pressure state legislators every year to overturn helmet laws or reject proposals for new ones. This is in spite of the fact that helmets are the No. 1 countermeasure for preventing rider deaths in crashes.

Stay up to date on Tennessee highway safety information by visiting the website of Phillip Miller & Associates, a group of experienced and dedicated Nashville personal injury lawyers. Call 615-356-2000.

Don't Try To Flee Police Stop

Without further facts it would be difficult to determine what set of conditions would have to be present for a former District Attorney General to ignore a police car trying to stop him for erratic driving, and attempt to flee the scene. As my readers are aware, fleeing a police stop in Tennessee rarely ends in success for the driver.

In this incident, after about a 90 second chase, the former DA ended up crashing into another police vehicle that had join in the chase. Local media reports were unusually light on facts about the incident. We don’t know if anyone was injured or if an arrest was made or if a blood alcohol test was administered.

As an experienced Nashville personal injury lawyer, based on the fact that the original officer attempted to stop the DA because he was driving erratically, I’d say the driver was under the influence of alcohol or was having a negative reaction to medication.

Drinking and driving do not ever mix. Every day, 36 people in the United States die, and approximately 700 more are injured, in motor vehicle crashes that involve an alcohol-impaired driver. The annual cost of alcohol-related crashes totals more than 51 billion dollars.

There are effective measures that can help prevent injuries and deaths from alcohol-impaired driving, education is an important tool and enforcement with stiff penalties is critical to changing the drinking driving culture that has developed in our country.

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Tennessee automobile accident caused by a drunk, or otherwise impaired driver, contact the experienced Nashville automobile attorneys at Phillip Miller & Associates.

Tennessee Truck Fatality

A Tennessee man was killed early Tuesday morning after his tractor trailer overturned in Marysville, Ohio. According to local media reports the Lobelville, Tennessee man was driving a tractor-trailer along U.S. Highway 33 near milepost 18 when his vehicle drove off the North side of the road, went through a fence before rolling over in a ditch. He ws dead at the scene. My prayers go out to his family and friends.

Local police investigators don’t believe that alcohol was a factor in the crash, but what could have caused such an accident? At first several things come to mind; the man could have fallen asleep at the wheel. Investigators will surely look to hi log book and other electronic device to determine how long he had been driving.

He might have had a medical emergency and this would be determined by an autopsy, but the most probable reason is that the tractor-trailer driver was somehow distracted in the moments before he left the road. Driver distraction comes in all forms, cell phones, radios, CDs, MP3 players, eating etc. I am aware of dozens of distracted driver accidents caused by women drivers applying their makeup while driving down the interstate at 55 MPH.

Distraction from the primary task of driving could present a serious and potentially deadly danger. In 2008, 5,870 people lost their lives and an estimated 515,000 people were injured in police-reported crashes in which at least one form of driver distraction was reported on the crash report. The lesson for Tennessee drivers is to remember that when you are behind the wheel of a motor vehicle, especially on the interstate highways, you are piloting a deadly weapon.

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Nashville tractor-trailer accident caused by a distracted driver you owe it to yourself to contact the experienced Nashville tractor-trailer accident lawyers at Phillip Miller & Associates and take advantage of a free consultation to find out about your rights and remedies. Call 615-356-2000.

The other day I wrote on these pages about a 28-year-old Tullahoma woman who was hit by a pickup truck that subsequently left the scene of the accident. In that Blog I suggested that the driver was probably drunk, had lost his/her license for drunk driving related charges in the past, or had no insurance.

Local news media reported today that police arrested the driver and charged him with leaving the scene of an accident and driving on a revoked license. Other charges are pending.

This is a problem that is becoming increasingly acute, drivers who violate the law, lose their licenses and then take to the roads again, ignoring, or thumbing their nose at the law and the safety of others.

Despite improvements in US laws, it still is difficult to detect and arrest alcohol-impaired drivers once they are driving. The estimated chance of arrest when driving with an illegal BAC is less than 1 in 50. A preferable strategy would be to identify impaired drivers before they start the vehicle and prevent them from driving.

There is technology available to accomplish this, and today almost all states have laws that restrict some people convicted of DWI from driving unless their vehicles have been equipped with alcohol ignition interlocks.

These devices have a breath-testing unit that is connected to the vehicle ignition. To start the vehicle, the offender must blow into the device and register a blood alcohol reading below a predetermined level, typically set well below a BAC of 0.08%, the per se threshold for DWI in all states. Ignition interlock restrictions have been shown to be effective at reducing recidivism among repeat offenders, at least while the restriction is in place.

Until recently, laws requiring convicted DWI offenders to install interlocks pertained to repeat offenders or to first offenders with very high BACs (typically 0.15% or higher). However, as of September 2009, 12 states have expanded the interlock requirement to apply to all offenders, including first-time offenders. These states are Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois, Louisiana, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, and Washington.

In Tennessee the legislature, passed a law requiring all those convicted of DUI to  use the interlock device on their vehicle. The act also prohibits them from driving vehicle without the devices.

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Tennessee automobile accident caused by a drunk driver and you hope to recover all of the damages the law allows you need to consult with an experienced Tennessee automobile accident attorney like those at Phillip Miller & Associates. We offer a free consultation so that you can gain the information you will need to face this odyssey through the legal system.

Motorcycle Fatality

As an experienced Nashville automobile accident attorney, I can tell you for certain that when you mix an inexperienced motorcycle rider, excessive speed and alcohol, that you have a dangerous cocktail. Reference a recent case in Madison County, Tennessee in which a 52-year-old man died after he consumed alcohol, got on a motorcycle, drove at excessive speed, lost control, left the road and slammed into a culvert.

Every day, 36 people in the United States die, and approximately 700 more are injured in motor vehicle crashes that involve an alcohol-impaired driver. The good news is that the number of fatalities in drunk-driving crashes has declined 49 percent since 1982, going from 21,113 in 1982 to 10,839 in 2009, a record-low level. There were 10,000 fewer drunk-driving fatalities in 2009 than in 1982.

Drunk driving is one of America’s deadliest crimes. In Tennessee in 2008, 327 people were killed in crashes where the driver or motorcyclist had a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .08 or higher. That is down from 377 people killed in 2007 with a BAC of .08 or higher.

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Tennessee automobile accident casued by a drunk driver you owe it to yourself to contact the experienced Tennessee automobile accident attorneys at Phillip Miller & Associates for a free consultation to determine your rights and remedies.

Stupid is as Stupid Does

Last November a Blountville man was ruled by the court to be an Habitual Traffic Offender for having 5 DUI convictions. He didn’t get the picture and was arrested in April for driving drunk on the wrong side of the road on a riding lawnmower for his 6^th DUI.

Last week the 36-year-old man was sentenced to six years in the penitentiary and ordered to serve at least 35% before he is eligible for parole.

Drinking and driving do not ever mix. Every day, 36 people in the United States die, and approximately 700 more are injured, in motor vehicle crashes that involve an alcohol-impaired driver. The annual cost of alcohol-related crashes totals more than 51 billion dollars.

There are effective measures that can help prevent injuries and deaths from alcohol-impaired driving, education is an important tool and enforcement with stiff penalties is critical to changing the drinking driving culture that has developed in our country. In cases like this it appears the only way to keep people like this off of the road is to take them off of the street.

If you or a loved one is involved in a Tennessee automobile accident caused by a drunk driver contact the experienced Nashville automobile accident lawyers at Phillip Miller & Associates and find out about your rights and remedies.