DWI proposals employ technology, common sense

Gov. Susana Martinez is continuing the good fight against the state’s chronically high DWI rate with a package of common-sense proposals the Legislature should seriously consider.

To the state’s credit, we are making progress after years as among the nation’s worst. In 2015, for example, New Mexico had 122 alcohol-related fatalities, the lowest tally in 36 years.

Still, the state has a significantly higher rate of drunken-driving deaths per capita than the nation as a whole. And instances of DWI offenders being arrested for the sixth, eighth, even 11th time still occur with shocking regularity.

Every time we read of a drunken driver killing multiple victims, we’re reminded that we need to do more to address this persistent scourge.

Martinez is proposing to further toughen penalties for all DWIs — an effort that too often has died in Democrat-run Senate committees before ever making it to a vote. But these proposals go beyond the penalty phase and propose some ways to improve the system.

Among her proposals is a bill that would allow police officers to testify at DWI hearings via video conference. That’s a sensible proposal. Remember, that as recently as 2014, 1,920 of 3,853 DWI cases in Albuquerque, or about 50 percent, were dismissed, often because officers were unavailable to attend a hearing in person, according to a report by the Administrative Office of the Courts.

When recently retired APD officer Lou Golson was recuperating after being shot four times during a traffic stop in January 2015, he had 180 pending DWI cases in Metropolitan Court. Because he was physically unable to appear in court, more than 140 of those cases were dismissed. Using new technologies, like video-conferencing, can help curtail such dismissals. It’s one thing to be acquitted on the merits of a case. It is quite another to simply beat the “process.”

Other Martinez proposals worthy of consideration are using felony DWI convictions to enhance the prison sentences of habitual offenders, and prosecuting people who knowingly lend their vehicles to people whose licenses are revoked because of a DWI conviction.

It’s changes like these, along with aggressive public education campaigns, that have contributed to our improved DWI statistics. They deserve fair hearings and floor votes in the upcoming session.