Legislation, advocates say, helps in the battle against drunk driving

(The Center Square) – Legislators and the group Mothers Against Drunk Driving on Tuesday urged support for House Bill 789 which would allow judges to consider reduced sentences for impaired defendants who use devices that won’t allow cars to start if alcohol is detected on the driver’s breath.

Mitigating Factor/Pretrial Use of IID, known also as House Bill 789, passed the House of Representatives 100-7 last month and is in the Senate’s Rules Committee.

The so-called ignition interlock devices “work and they save lives,” North Carolina MADD Executive Director Emily Ferraro said Tuesday at a news conference.

From 2006 to 2023, ignition interlock devices in North Carolina stopped impaired drivers from starting their vehicle more than 331,000 times, Ferraro said.

“That’s 331,000 potential tragedies that never happened,” she said.

In 2023, 415 people were killed in North Carolina because of impaired driving, Ferraro said.

HB789 gives offenders a second chance, she said. Under the bill, those defendants who volunteer before their trial to install the devices voluntarily for six months could qualify for a reduced sentence.

Under the legislation, the driver would be required to pay the cost of installing and monitoring the interlock device.

“If you screw up, own up,” Rep. Mike Schietzelt, R-Wake, one of the bill’s cosponsors said Tuesday, quoting his father, who was a Marine Corps rifleman in the Vietnam war. “I think that’s what the main intent of this bill is: Give people an avenue to take accountability when they screw up.”

If a driver blows into an interlock device and has an alcohol content of .02, the car would not start, Schietzelt said.

Under the bill, the voluntary use of the interlock device could be considered a mitigating factor by the judge during sentencing.

Rosalyn Reddick, who lost her only child, Elijah, in 2023 in a wreck with an impaired driver, spoke in favor of the legislation Tuesday. Her son was a student at his dream school – the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill – his mother said.

“Elijah was a beacon of light,” she said. “Elijah was a calm to my storm, a joyful, silly Christian and a giver of unbelievable bear hugs. I miss him deeply. I am not trying to instill fear, but to bring awareness to the situation.”