Friday October 8 2004 was a night that changed my life . My girlfriend was preparing for a community yard sale that evening , so I decided to go out drinking with a couple of friends from work . We used to do this fairly regularly . The irony here is that we would call these outings " Safety Meetings " . We are construction workers , and are periodically required to attend Safety Meetings on the job in an attempt to lower jobsite injuries . Jokingly , we coined our trips to the bar as Safety Meetings . I am no longer joking around .
So , it was a typical night out . One of my companions , Will , already has a DUI & can`t drive . I , myself , refused to drive that evening because I didn`t want to get a DUI . Our third partner , Bill , had no problem with being the " Designated DUI " . I was more concerned with not going to jail , & had no thoughts about possibly killing someone in a car wreck . So , here we go . After a couple of hours , several beers , and a few shots , we decide to go back to Will's house & continue the party there . After a couple more hours , several more beers , and several more shots , it`s time to go home . The time was aprox 11:15 pm . With Bill behind the wheel , I climbed into the passenger seat of his S-10 Blazer with no clue what was about to happen . Neither of us were wearing seat belts that evening . What happened next , changed my life .
The trip from Will's house was uneventful . Bill seemed to have total control over his driving . When we got back to our neighborhood , Bill decides that he needs more beer , so we proceed to the nearby convenience store . I don`t know what happened inside that store , but he came out a different person . All I can guess , is that the last few beers kicked in & sent him over the edge . He pulls out of the parking lot & turns away from the direction of my house . So , I ask him where he`s going & he begins to laugh and starts saying " It`s all about control " , & begins to increase speed . I`m like " Bill , cut it out man , slow down " . He only laughs louder & punches the gas pedal to the floor & repeats over & over " It`s all about control " . I`m really afraid for my life now . I`m begging him to stop , but he wont . He just keeps on laughing .
Ahead of us is a busy 4 lane intersection & we have the red light !! We`re still 3 or 4 blocks away , but I can clearly see a fair amount of traffic moving in both directions ! At this point , I`m scared like never before . I just know that we are getting ready to die . I never had a chance to say goodbye to my family or my girlfriend . Who is going to take care of my dog ? I look over at the speedometer , and it says that we`re doing like 95 MPH . We`re about to blow this red light , crash into another vehicle , & kill everyone , I can feel it about to happen . Meanwhile , Bill is still laughing & repeating himself " It`s all about control " . Instinctively , I brace myself for impact , shut my eyes , & prepare to die . It is truly a miracle that there was a break in traffic in both directions at that particular moment . Bill blows the red light doing 95 MPH , goes airborne , comes down in the street ( and not into a telephone pole or tree !! ) , and somehow regains steering & control of the vehicle . Maybe that`s what he was talking about " control " . I don`t know . I`m just thankful to be alive !!! He rockets around the block at full throttle , blows another red light , and somehow manages to deliver me to my house . Needless to say , I was never happier to be home & alive as I was at that moment .
The next day , I call Bill & proceed to give him a thorough piece of my mind . You know what ? He doesn`t remember a thing . Yep , evidently he had a black out & can`t remember a single bit about what he did the night before . I just can`t fathom this concept . Bill was also out the next day drinking beer again . Even after I told him the whole story , he was drinking again . He obviously has no clue to the reality of what occurred . For me , it`s been 3 days now & reality is sinking in more & more each day . I awoke this morning at 3:30 am from a nightmare that I was having about that event , only this time , there was a car in our path .
I am sending you this testimonial because all of the pictures & stories I have read on your website seem to be from outside witnesses , family members , & Emergency Response Personnel . My story comes from inside the vehicle being driven by an " OUT OF CONTROL " DUI . I truly thank God that nobody got hurt or killed that night . You read stories all the time about innocent people that were killed by a drunk driver . From now on , I will read those stories in a whole new light . My life has been changed forever . I haven`t yet made any sense out of that event , or figured out why it happened . All I know is , thankfully I`m still alive to tell my story ...........
Girl, 7, walking to NE city school dies in hit-run
Mother, 2 children hurt; Judge denies bail to woman held as drunken driver
By Del Quentin Wilber and Erika Niedowski
Sun Staff
Originally published December 21, 2001, 4:05 PM EST
A 7-year-old girl was killed and her mother, baby brother and another child were injured yesterday as they walked to school and were struck by a car operated by a drunken driver who ran a red light and ignored a crossing guard in Northeast Baltimore, police said.
Debra A. Chafin, 45, was arrested at her home and faces 10 charges, including negligent homicide, driving while under the influence of alcohol and fleeing the scene of an accident.
A breath test revealed that Chafin had a blood alcohol level of 0.27 percent, well above the legal limit of 0.08, police said. She is being held at the city jail after a judge denied bail this afternoon.
District Court Judge Tim Murphy ordered an evaluation of Chafin to determine whether she's at risk of killing herself.
Chafin's next court date is set for Jan. 24.
Investigators recovered physical evidence, including bits of fabric, from the maroon 1990 Lincoln Continental. A child's winter cap was found in one of Chafin's trash cans, police said.
Chafin had been charged before with drunken driving, in April in Baltimore County, and has a January court date.
The accident took the life of a second-grader at Furley Elementary School who enjoyed school and playing with Barbie dolls, according to friends and neighbors.
Brijae D. Harris was walking to school with her mother, Monique Glover, 27, who was holding her infant son, Jae. Monique Sandy-Bell, 6, a first-grader at Furley and a neighbor, joined them for the trip.
It was 8:14 a.m. A red light had just stopped traffic on Moravia Road at Sipple Avenue, and a crossing guard waved at the group to cross Moravia, police said.
The driver was heading into the bright sun, police said, and went through the red light and past the crossing guard. Glover tried to push the girls out of the way.
The car slammed into the group. Brijae died almost instantly, becoming the city's 52nd traffic fatality of the year. The mother suffered minor injuries and her son sustained facial injuries, police said. Monique Sandy-Bell's leg was broken.
Sam Hicks, 53, lives a few hundred yards from the accident scene. He was just getting ready to leave the house to go for a walk when he heard "unbearable screaming" from the street.
He said he raced down Sipple Avenue and found Monique lying on the ground in shock, so he wrapped her in his fleece jacket.
"I talked to her until she came around," Hicks said.
Ambulances took the three injured to Johns Hopkins Hospital; they were treated and released.
After the accident, a witness in another car followed the Lincoln and jotted down its tag number before losing sight of it on a side street, police said.
Three people were in the Lincoln, including Chafin's neighbor, Rose Newsome, 40, and one of Newsome's friends, Sarah R. Goods, 41, police said.
Goods said she was sitting in the back seat of the Lincoln when the accident happened and saw Glover walk into the street with a baby in her arms. Goods saw and heard the collision.
"I'm like, oh, my goodness, you just hit a lady and a child and a baby," Goods said in an interview. "I told her to stop the car. Go back and see."
But Chafin refused, Goods said: "She told us that we had to take this to our grave. I said something to make her feel good, 'All right, we're not going to say anything.'"
Chafin drove the three back to her house in the 4300 block of Seidel Ave., about a half-mile from the accident scene, Goods said.
There, Chafin took a child's hat wedged in the car's grille "and threw it in the trash," Goods said.
"She was hysterical," she said.
A few minutes later, Goods said, she and the other passenger, Newsome, left. They visited their mothers and asked for advice, then called police. "I have grandkids of my own," she said. "I couldn't deal with that."
About 10 a.m., investigators found Chafin lying in her bed at home, the back door of the house open, police said. As they led her out in handcuffs, she said she had not struck anybody with her car.
"They woke me up out of bed and I'm really tired of this," Chafin said.
Chafin told police that she had stopped drinking at 9 p.m. Wednesday and went to sleep, police said. She did not awaken until police showed up at her house, she told investigators.
Goods and Newsome identified Chafin as the driver of the Lincoln, police said.
Earlier traffic arrest
On April 7, Chafin was pulled over by a state trooper on the eastbound ramp from Interstate 70 onto Interstate 695, court records show.
She had been "weaving," the trooper wrote in his report. After Chafin was pulled over, she began speaking in a "slurring mushmouth manner," the trooper wrote.
Chafin told the trooper she was "trying to drive home," the trooper wrote. She failed a sobriety test and has a January trial date, records show.
In 1999, Chafin pleaded guilty to driving under the influence in Anne Arundel County. Court records show Chafin has been found guilty twice of driving under the influence of alcohol in North Carolina, in 1993 and 1996, the Associated Press reported.
Yesterday's accident occurred during what had become a routine half-mile walk for Glover and her children.
"The three of them were always together - mother, daughter, son," said Dan Blevins, a maintenance worker at Glover's apartment complex in the 4400 block of Chalet Court.
Nesha Myers, 24, a neighbor, said Glover loved and cared for her children and was raising them on her own.
Brijae often came over to her house to play with dolls with her 4-year-old daughter. "They are always just going, like Energizers," Myers said.
Counselors at school
After the accident, school officials dispatched a team of 10 counselors, psychologists and social workers to Furley Elementary - and will again today - to talk with the children.
The counselors are paying special attention to about eight pupils who witnessed the accident, said Vanessa Pyatt, a school system spokeswoman.
Some parents were clearly worried about how their children would take news about the death of their classmate.
Sheila Watkins, 44, picked up her son, a fourth-grader, and grandson, who's in kindergarten, about noon yesterday. "I just feel better about them being at home," Watkins said.
"It's devastating," she said. "How can you hit someone and leave?"
Shirl Cheeseboro picked up her 6-year-old son, Kevin Brown, at Furley yesterday afternoon. She said her first-grader witnessed the accident. He was in tears yesterday afternoon after safely crossing Moravia and landing in her arms for the trip home.
"I thought it was safe, because of the crossing guard and because they are in the crosswalk," said Cheeseboro, who usually lets Kevin's sister pick him up because she has to work. "Now, it does worry me because it doesn't make a difference if they're doing everything right. Someone still hit them."
Worries about speed
Some parents and neighbors complained that cars speed down Moravia and Sipple.
Talibah Saboor and Candie Ingram, both 12, cross Moravia every day going to and from nearby Northeast Middle School, where they are in sixth grade. After school yesterday, a crossing guard directed them back onto the sidewalk when they took a step into the road to wait for the light to change.
"Some cars be zooming when it's a yellow light," said Candie. "They don't slow down or nothing. Doesn't yellow mean slow down?"
Several children crossed Moravia against the light anyway yesterday afternoon.
Justin bought his car from a guy in New York who posted his car for sale on e-Bay. This Acura Integra was the car he had wanted for so long, and he finally got it. It had been raced on a track in NY and was meant to be a race car, not a street car. Justin had the car for only a few months when he and his friends decided to go out drinking and bowling one night. When they got ready to leave, Justin decided to have his friend, Jason drive, because Jason had less to drink. Jason knew how much power the car had, and how to handle it. He drove the car many times. They pulled up to a newer Toyota Celica. They recognized the car. It was a car that they raced before. Jason decided that he would race them again, while Justin was in the passenger seat, half asleep. They had the car up to speeds of about 100 miles per hour in a 35 mph zone in town. Many stories were passed around about what happened but the police believe that Jason lost control, went into the median of the street, where the car hit the bottom of the median. Justin absorbed most of the impact in his legs. Then the car came out of the median, flew over the other two lanes of oncoming traffic. Justin flew out of the car, and hit the guardrail. The car proceeded to clear the guardrail, and go down the hill about 30 feet (I believe). Jason stayed with the car, he only suffered from a few broken ribs and a few missing teeth. Justin, however, was a different story. He was bleeding from his head and from his legs. The driver of the Celica stopped, looked at Justin, and the accident and fled the scene. Justin's two friends were following them saw the whole accident and pulled over to help Justin. They both used their shirts to try to stop the serious bleeding from his head and his leg. The two friends called 911 and emergency vehicles were on the scene within 15 minutes of the accident. Justins bone in his right leg was broke and sticking out of his skin. They got him to the hospital, but had to life flight him to another hospital.
They recussitated him 3 times during the flight. Upon arriving at the hospital, everyone learned that Justin had broke both legs, his right ankle, right hip, 4 ribs, he had a punctured lung, bruised spleen and kidney, serious head trauma, and a blood clot on the brain. They did 9 hour surgery to stable his legs. Justin remained in a coma for 17 days. The doctors did not know how serious the brain injuries were or how much it would affect him later. They were also unsure if he would be a vegetable the rest of his life. Justin was transferred from that hospital to a Navy hospital close by, in Washington DC. He was in the Navy going to school in Virginia. He was doing very well in school. He was in the top of his class. When he was stable, they decided to move Justin to the best VA hospital on the west coast.
It was in Palo Alto, California (the same hospital that Christopher Reeves was in for his injuries). While in the hospital, he was recovering faster than the drs ever thought he would. Many of the guys in the hospital there had been in for at least a year. Justin was only there for just over a month. He came home and is still amazing his drs. He got medically retired from the military at 20 years old. The police and drs both believe if Justin was not drunk, he wouldnt have made it. Justin is very thankful that God has a plan for him and saved him. I know he will do many special things before his time is up and impact many people. He would not want anyone to have to go through what he went through and is still going through.
Jason was also in the Navy. He was discharged unhonorably and sent to prison. He has not had his trial yet but is facing 5-20 years. He was driving on a suspended license from 3 weeks before for DUI. He is also being tried for something like intent to cause bodily harm or something like that. I am not too sure about that.
Justin holds no hard feelings towards Jason. He is upset Jason wrecked his new car but is glad he is ok. Justin also is very thankful he didnt die, becuase he would not want his best friend to sit in prison with that weight on his shoulders of killing his friend. He hopes that he and Jason can still be friends. I believe Justin is being forced by his attorney or the Navy or something to sue Jason, and both insurance companies. There again, im not sure exactly.
I can't drive past 10pm in the state of Wisconsin (where i live) due to a restricted driving lisence (too many tickets), so I asked a neighbor to take me to the gas station to get cigaretts and some junk food. She couldn't take me, but this other girl at her house said she would. She grabbed my friend's keys, and said let's go. I said ok and thought nothing of it.
Little did I know, she'd been using cocaine and had smoked pot ealier, as well as had a few shots of jaegermeister beforehand. I didn't know this girl, and I didn't know she'd done that. I have better common sense than that to get in a car with a wasted driver. We went to a gas station outside of town, and I told the girl I thought her driving was too fast for the conditions, I'd rather risk driving past the 10pm curfew I had than let her continue. She got mad at me and told me to get in the car or she was gonna leave so I got in, I wasn't gonna walk 7 miles home in the snow. She was all over the road and I told her to slow down, and last thing I remember was looking at the speedometer as she reached for her ringing cell phone and we were going 70mph. it was 10:45 when I looked at the clock, when I opened my eyes it was 11:02pm and people were yelling at us to see if we were ok. I don't remember much, but I remember bleeing and intense pain.
We flipped 2 1/2 times and landed on the drivers side of the explorer. I broke the windshield with my head (and I had a seatbelt on), my ribs were shattered and my pelvis cracked as well as my skull....My sneakers were blown off my feet and my purse was 31 feet from the car in the snow. no one died, but my injuries were the worst.
The EMT's and police told my husband had I not had my belt on, I'd be "bagged and tagged" as they put it. I don't remember a lot of things now, sometimes I forget my phone number or what I was doing,I can't really take care of my 3 year old without help or how to do something thanks to this.
The girl driving, as it turned out was 16, with no license, had a .11 BAC and was impaired by drugs, yet she got a ticket for driving without a lisence, and assault with a motor vehicle. I am fighting in court to make her lose her license until she is 21 ( a security lean, it's called here in Wisconsin). It's been a terrible battle. I can't sleep, I still hear the accident in my head when I close my eyes, I feel the car rolling when I lie in bed, yet I was spared. I am so lucky to be alive. I only wish most of the people I've read about on your site were as lucky as me. Sorry this is so long, I can't really make things short from my head to the email. I am impaired like that I think
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