One Person Hospitalized in Accident Involving Drunk Driver
One person was hospitalized after an accident involving a driver under the influence last Saturday in West Palm Beach. On March 16, police reported that a white Chevrolet Silverado was traveling northbound on Broadway approaching 49th Street around 5:15 p.m. At the same time, a white Acura RSX was traveling east on 49th Street approaching the same intersection. Witnesses reported that the driver of the Acura ran the stop sign and traveled into the path of the Silverado, causing the Silverado to collide with the Acura’s passenger side. After the accident, three of the four occupants of the Acura fled the scene of the accident on foot. The driver and one passenger were apprehended by police.
The passenger in the front seat of the Acura was transported to St. Mary’s Medical Center with life-threatening injuries, and his conditioned stabilized by the next day. Thankfully, no one was seriously injured in the Silverado. According to police, alcohol was a factor in the accident, and the investigation is ongoing.
Traffic Accidents Involving Driving Under the Influence
As a passenger in a vehicle driven by someone under the influence of alcohol or drugs or as a victim injured in another vehicle, you have a claim against the person responsible for getting behind the wheel of car while drunk or high. Driving under the influence (DUI) causes more than 10,000 fatalities across the United States every year, nearly one person every 48 minutes in 2017. Alcohol consumption causes a person’s thinking, reasoning, reflexes, and reaction time to become impaired, leading to accidents that would never happen if the same driver was sober.
Even lower levels of blood alcohol content (BAC) can still impair a driver’s ability to properly operate a vehicle. At 0.02% BAC, a driver loses some sense of judgment, has declined visual function, and has a decline in their ability to perform two tasks at the same time. At 0.05% BAC, there can be a loss of small muscle control, such as focusing your eyes, impaired judgment, lowered alertness, and a release of inhibition. This can translate to reduced coordination behind the wheel, reduced ability to track moving objects, difficulty steering, and reduced response time.
At the actual legal limit in Florida at 0.08% BAC, muscle coordination becomes poor that affects balance, speech, vision, reaction time, and hearing, it becomes harder to detect danger, judgment is impaired, and self-control, reasoning, and memory are all affected. This causes problems with concentration behind the wheel, short term memory loss, reduced information processing, and impaired perception. Even if the driver that caused an accident is not over the legal limit of alcohol, their diminished capacity makes them liable for any injuries caused by their impairment, and you deserve compensation for any harm caused by a drunk driver on the road in Florida.
Talk to Our Office Now
If you have been hurt in an accident by a drunk driver, do not hesitate to call or contact our West Palm Beach auto accident lawyers at Gary Roberts & Associates today.
Resource:
wptv.com/news/region-c-palm-beach-county/west-palm-beach/1-person-hospitalized-in-alcohol-related-crash-in-west-palm-beach
https://www.westpalmbeach-injurylawyers.com/tesla-driver-killed-in-accident-with-semi-truck/
