Marijuana
law, a driver could be charged with DUI by registering 5 nanograms of THC — marijuana’s primary active ingredient — per milliliter of blood.
The driver of the scooter, 23-year-old Tyler Cohen of Wellington, tested positive for morphine, a sedative and marijuana, according to the Palm Beach County Sheriffff ’s Offiffice. Naomi Pomerance did not have any drugs in her system, according to a toxicology report.
Cohen, out on bond for a previous arrest when the crash took place, is awaiting trial on charges of DUI homicide, vehicular manslaughter, two counts of driving under the inflfluence causing injury and possession of more than 20 grams of marijuana.
“Naomi was a good kid who made a bad choice,” said Steven Turner, Naomi’s grandfather. “Her mistake was getting on that motor scooter that day.”
Turner and other family members and friends have channeled their grief into support for the Naomi Pomerance bill, which is sponsored by state Rep. Dave Kerner, D-Lake Worth.
Kerner is a former police offifficer and prosecutor in the Palm Beach County State Attorney’s Offiffice and has “intimate” knowledge of the dangers of drugged driving. He’s also a supporter of medical marijuana and foresees more liberal pot laws in the future but added that “we ought to have a system of law that holds people accountable when they hurt or kill somebody.”
Under the bill, only those people causing serious injuries or death could be charged with driving under the inflfluence of marijuana. Police would be allowed to force drivers to submit to a blood test in those cases.
Eighteen states have impaired driving laws for marijuana, according to the Governors Highway Safety Association. Of those, nine are no-tolerance states that make it illegal to drive with any amount of THC in the body. The remaining states have set the impairment level at either 2 or 5 nanograms.
“Personally I don’t care if people smoke marijuana,” Turner said. But if there’s no standard by which to punish people when they kill somebody, that’s wrong.”
There is some debate over how much impact marijuana has on driving. A National Highway Traffific Safety Administration study released last year showed that pot smokers were at much lower risk of being involved in a crash than those drivers using alcohol, and, after adjusting for demographics and other factors, there was no statistically signifificant change in crash risk between marijuana users and sober drivers.
Despite those statistics, fatal crashes involving marijuana in Palm Beach County are not rare.
Jabari Kemp, a Florida City man who police said had high levels of THC in his system, was sentenced to 30 years in prison in August for causing the deaths of fifive young people in a horrifific 2013 two-car crash in Riviera Beach. Adam Daszkal, a Boca Raton teenager who told police he was high on pot when he caused a
debate