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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Drunken Drivers In California May Be Tagged With ‘Dui’ Plates

Scripps-Mcclatchy Western Servic

A vanity plate it’s not.

Cruise California highways these days and you can see a wide variety of specialized license plates. There are pictures of Yosemite and Tahoe. There are license plates with star, hand and heart symbols. UCLA graduates can honor their alma mater with a picture of their university mascot.

Now, if state Sen. Ray Haynes has his way, drunken drivers soon will have their own personalized, if un-welcome, license plates.

Under a bill introduced by the Murrieta Republican, repeat drunken drivers would be forced to drive around with red license plates and white letters that read: ‘DUI.’

“This is a way for ordinary citizens to quickly identify drunk drivers,” Haynes said.

Anyone guilty of more than one conviction of drunken driving would be forced to use the license plates for two years or for the length of his or her probation. Plates would begin with the letters “DUI” (“driving under the influence”) and would be followed by six numbers.

Haynes said if you see a motorist weaving down the road, a DUI license plate would let other drivers know the person probably is drunk.

Paula Myers, a member of Mothers Against Drunk Driving in California, said the group most likely would support the measure.

“We feel that by having the plates, they do help put the community on notice,” Myers said. “It may help us to be more cautious, more careful. Right now, they’re kind of incognito until it’s too late.”

But Katherine Sher, legislative advocate for California Attorneys for Criminal Justice, called the measure a “strange way” to tackle the problem.

“There are a lot of stupid drivers on the road, and we don’t have license plates that say ‘STUPID,”’ she said.

Sher said the measure would serve merely to humiliate drunken drivers.

“It’s kind of taking people who have broken the law in the past and splashing big red letters on their license plates and putting a big red ‘D’ on their clothing so the entire community looks at them and shames them,” Sher said. “It really doesn’t get you very far.”

In California, drunken driving arrests and fatalities have been falling steadily. The California Highway Patrol said drunken driving fatalities fell by 17 percent between 1992 and 1995; the number of DUI arrests dropped by more than 23 percent in the same period. In 1995, more than 93,000 people were arrested for driving under the influence and 656 people were killed in DUI accidents on state highways.

Highway Patrol officials attribute the decline to tough DUI laws and less public tolerance for drunken drivers.

People convicted of drunken driving twice within a seven-year period already face suspension or revocation of their licenses, depending on whether the crime is a misdemeanor or felony and on other factors, including whether the driver opts for alcohol-abuse treatment, said Riverside County Deputy District Attorney Diane Harrison.

Because of the steady decline in DUI fatalities and arrests, Sher questioned the need for the new proposal. She also said the proposal could adversely affect family members of drunken drivers who use the same vehicle.

But Haynes said family members of drunken drivers would have to live with that. The measure is designed to help other motorists identify potential road hazards and should not be construed as anything more, he said.

“If they’re not driving erratically, then they never have to worry,” Haynes said.

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