One man lost his life, and two other people in the SUV in which the deceased man had been a passenger sustained serious injuries, when their vehicle was struck from behind by a car driven by a person police later charged with driving while intoxicated and speeding recklessly. This particular fatal DWI rear-ender occurred at the intersection of E. Independence Boulevard and Village Lake Drive in Charlotte, North Carolina (NC), on the night of May 25, 2014. Sadly, the tragic incident is far from unique.
Even though public health and law enforcement officials in North Carolina had joined their colleagues across the United States to discourage drunk and drugged driving over the three-day Memorial Day holiday weekend, dozens of people fell victim to impaired drivers in the Tar Heel State. Looking beyond the most recent period, just fewer than 8,500 injuries resulted from DWI crashes in North Carolina during 2012. Some 462 of those injuries proved fatal.
As North Carolina personal injury and wrongful death attorneys who have helped many grieving family members who lost loved ones to negligent and reckless drivers, we are always shocked that anyone would take the risk of getting behind the wheel after drinking too much alcohol or abusing drugs. The chance of killing or permanently disabling a fellow human being, to say nothing of risking arrest and personal harm, should be enough to keep drunk or stoned individuals out of the driver’s seat. Since it rarely is, we will continue fulfilling our mission to hold drunk and drugged drivers financially accountable for the damage they wreak.
EJL