Is Life Sentence Too Harsh For Man Convicted of Ninth DWI?

reply to post by kalisdad


I'm glad you feel that your personal experiences apply to everyone. And that your level of alcoholism was identical to everyone else.

Originally posted by mryanbrown
reply to post by kalisdad

 

I'm glad you feel that your personal experiences apply to everyone. And that your level of alcoholism was identical to everyone else.

A
Acanthamoeba Infection
ACE (Adverse Childhood Experiences)
Acinetobacter Infection
Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) — see HIV/AIDS
Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS) — see HIV/AIDS
Adenovirus Infection
ADHD [Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder]
Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE)
African Trypanosomiasis — see Sleeping Sickness
Agricultural Safety — see Farm Worker Injuries
AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome)
AIDS (Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome)
ALS [Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis]
Alveolar Echinococcosis
Alzheimer's Disease
Amebiasis, Intestinal [Entamoeba histolytica infection]
American Indian and Alaska Native Vaccination


www.cdc.gov...


nowhere on this list do I see addiction or alcoholism as a disease.

and it the Center for Disease Control


so I stand behind my original post

reply to post by Sherlock Holmes


And the sentiment that he should be removed is what we have in common. We only differ in where to and what manner. I don't want this guy driving any more than anyone else does. I just think soceity would be better served by hospitalizing this man instead of incarcerating.

If he'd have had one, two, even three DUI's jail would be a logical place for him. But nine? That is a huge red flag to me that there are underlying issues which jail (and surely this man, after nine DUI's and a few crimes has seen the inside of jail) just won't fix.

I have really enjoyed this debate and want to thank you for it! But I am bowing out so that I can get relaxed and to bed soon, it's rather late here.

reply to post by kalisdad


Right you can cite something that's credible saying it isn't.
I can cite something credible that says it is.

In the end you're still applying your experiences and standards to everyone else.

reply to post by mryanbrown


yeah, why wouldn't I think that if I could do it, everyone else can't also?

I've been to AA groups and have known hundreds of other people that have done exactly what I did
I don't feel I am an incredibly strong willed person

its a choice, not a disease

Dependency on alcohol, also known as alcohol addiction and alcoholism, is a chronic disease. The signs and symptoms of alcohol dependence include—

•A strong craving for alcohol.
•Continued use despite repeated physical, psychological, or interpersonal problems.
•The inability to limit drinking.

Source: CDC website

[edit on 8/15/10 by Hefficide]

reply to post by Hefficide


if alcoholism is a disease then so is working, paying bills, sleeping, talking...

I'm not arguing that it doesn't have serious health issues
not arguing that once your body is saturated with alcohol, that it won't crave more or that you wont suffer withdrawl from lack of it

I'm saying that all addiction, wether is substance or some other kind of distraction from reality, is just that.... an attempt to distract oneself from reality... once a person realizes this, and many millions have done just that, its something that you can walk away from...

tell someone with parkinsons DISEASE to just walk away from that disease

Originally posted by kalisdad
tell someone with parkinsons DISEASE to just walk away from that disease

This is exactly what you're advocating for alcoholism DISEASE.

reply to post by kalisdad


I do appreciate your insight and personal experience with this. But as a person who literally watched his father die from septic shock, due to scerosis of the liver back in '96 I've got to assume that different people must suffer differently from this disease.

I myself have drank too much for short spurts and then quit after a few months of having done so. I am able. But I have seen pure terror and pain my own fathers eyes when he drank. I've seen the man crying not because he was drunk, but because he was ashamed that he was drinking at all.

I don't think he had any control over it all. I honestly don't. He was a strong man who saw combat in Korea and Viet Nam both. He was an a career air traffic controller afterwards. None of these things seemed to stress him. But when he looked at Seagrams Seven it was like he was looking at a demon.

I spent a lifetime trying to understand why he drank so much and the only answer I can come up with is that he simply could not do otherwise. I know he fought it and I watched him lose that fight.

Originally posted by mryanbrown

Originally posted by kalisdad
tell someone with parkinsons DISEASE to just walk away from that disease

This is exactly what you're advocating for alcoholism DISEASE.

no,I am saying its not a disease....

and having seen many people walk away from it, I know from personal and nonpersonal experience that it is possible


whereas a real disease cant just be fixed by making a decision to not live with it anymore

reply to post by kalisdad


If you can just walk away from it, you're not an alcoholic. You just have control issues.

reply to post by Hefficide


no dount that there was physical pain involved in the fight with alcoholism

but most of that is due to the saturation levels in his body

when someone drinks beyond reason it casuse severe distress to the body

and at a certain level once that damage is done, the only way to not experience the withdrawl is to continue to drink

I lived with a man that decided to stop taking methadone for severe pain relief... watching him go thru withdrawl was the worst thing I have ever witnessed a person experience. at times I wondered if he would live

but he made the decision to suffer thru the pain, knowing that once he got past his body's NEED for the drug that things would get better

and I am happy to say that months later, he no longer suffers like he did for those first few weeks

alcoholism is treated with counciling by millions of people throughout the world

words that help the people suffering from the need to drink are all it takes for them to stop leading that life

not everyone is strong enough to face the facts and they continue drinking

it took my father many years to give it up, but in the end 40 years of alcohol abuse and smoking are the primary cause of his death, years after he quit them both he suffered a massive heart attack

for him, he was able to make the transition from needing to distract himself with alcohol, dealing with the withdrawl, and facing the reality that he avoided his whole life

not everyone is that strong... sometimes the pains of life are not worth facing and its easier to just continue to avoid them with substances.

[edit on 15-8-2010 by kalisdad]

reply to post by mryanbrown



you are a wrong... alcoholism is just like every addiction out there

I am still an active addict and have no intent on changing that

I have no desire to live with reality on a day to day basis

I just made the decision that my addiction wouldn't be alcohol

Originally posted by UmbraSumus

Originally posted by mryanbrown


Obviously he's an alcoholic, which is both a physical and mental disease. Deserving of empathy.

Empathy evaporates when confronted with such repeated recklessness of other peoples health and safety.

Bradley said that in addition to the multiple DWI convictions , Stovall also had a extensive rap sheet for other crimes, including burglary, credit card abuse and supplying alcohol to a minor.

link

Originally posted by mryanbrown

These judges have power to put him into treatment. They would rather make an example against DUI rather than serve justice.

"This is someone who very deliberately has refused to make changes and continued to get drunk and get in a car and before he kills someone we decided to put him away," said Williamson County District Attorney John Bradley.

"He basically walked through the penal code for the past twenty years without any regard for safety or society," said Bradley. "In every single one of his cases he had an opportunity to change."

link

On the ninth DUI he injuried somebody with a " blood alcohol concentration of .32, four times the legal limit in Texas."

Come on ..... Ryan.

Although I agree with what you're saying, I can't say I commend quoting the District Attorney who is going to be a blatantly biased character. It is his job to secure convictions, after all.