U hav got 2 b kidding me! A survey of 1,000 driver’s texting habits by the legal eagles at FindLaw.com finds the incidence of texting while driving (maybe that should be driving while texting) increases as age decreases. No big surprise there, but what’s stunning is 48% of 18- to 24-year-olds confess to speeding through traffic while letting a friend know theyre runN L8.
What we find more interesting — particularly those of us who are occasionally guilty of the aforementioned naughty habit — is just how much legal trouble you can get into whether you cause an accident while messaging behind the wheel.
“The potential legal implications of texting while driving go far beyond the opportunity of a mere traffic violation,” says FindLaw.com attorney Stephanie Rahlfs, presumably from the safety of her own desk. Since every text knowledge is time-stamped and normally saved on the handset, police have no problem proving a driver was texting at the moment of an accident.
And that can aftermath in a suspended license and prob8n. OMG.
Even whether you’re in one of four states that ban texting while driving (or one of the 33 trying to), drivers who were distracted by phone messaging
when they plowed into the back of the car in front of them can be nailed
for negligent or reckless conduct, and that can be ample to get your
The demographic breakdown of the survey isn’t particularly surprising, considering it mirrors the adoption of texting in general and a study final year by the Automobile organization of America that found 46 percent of kids aged 16 and 17 text behind the wheel. Combine those stats with the invincibility complex every kid has it’s a wonder more states haven’t taken action. Luckily, texting while driving in the AARP crowd is nearly nonexistent: We’d be terrified to get a text from grandma asking, “whch 1 iz D br8k?”
Findlaw’s stats are probably understate the scope of the problem considering any survey that tracks socially undesirable behavior will suffer from some bias. We can’t suppose a teenager answering a telephone survey with his mom in the next room is going to say, “Yeah, I text all the duration when I’m driving — particularly when I’ve got a Bud Light in the cupholder and I’m watching a DVD on my hacked AVIC-N3.” Let’s just hope that Barack Obama isn’t behind the wheel when he texts supporters the name of his running m8.
Photo by flickr user Tim Caynes. SMS translations by transl8tit.com.
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