{"id":68090,"date":"2025-12-11T23:53:13","date_gmt":"2025-12-11T23:53:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/68090\/"},"modified":"2025-12-11T23:53:13","modified_gmt":"2025-12-11T23:53:13","slug":"hope-grows-that-new-york-state-will-soon-close-the-loophole-in-the-drugged-driving-law-heres-why","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/68090\/","title":{"rendered":"Hope grows that New York state will soon close the loophole in the drugged-driving law. Here’s why."},"content":{"rendered":"

For more than a year, CBS News New York Investigates has shared stories of families torn apart by alleged drug-impaired drivers begging Albany to act<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Law enforcement says a loophole in New York’s law<\/a> keeps some drivers from ever facing charges.<\/p>\n

Investigative reporter Mahsa Saeidi has been with these families every step of the way and has new information on their push to close that gap.<\/p>\n

The loophole in New York’s law<\/p>\n

Police say to charge an impaired driver, they must name the exact drug ingested, and confirm it’s on a pre-existing list. If they can’t, their case collapses, and alleged impaired drivers are off the hook<\/a>.<\/p>\n

New York is one of a handful of states that focuses on a list, instead of impairment. Lawmakers won’t say why.<\/p>\n

Back in March, Saeidi tracked down State Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, who said expanding the law would give police more discretion to judge impairment.<\/p>\n

“That’s the thing. You have a Breathalyzer if someone has been drinking alcohol,” Heastie said. “I’m also concerned that particularly communities of color get overpoliced.”<\/p>\n

Advocates say leadership blocked the bill last session<\/a>. With lawmakers returning in January, they believe it’ll pass this time — if leadership allows a vote.<\/p>\n

“This is a no-brainer for me”\u00a0<\/p>\n

As for family members of victims, they say they feel compelled to come to drugged-driving conferences year after year, like one held in Manhattan on Wednesday, to share their stories again, hoping this time state leaders will close the loophole in the law.<\/p>\n

“Dec. 5, 2014, I kissed my husband goodbye,” Jawana Richardson said. “We were going to a party that night. They told me my husband had been killed on the Southern State Parkway.”<\/p>\n

“A repeat offender drugged driver crashed into my brother,” Steven McDermott said. “He was a teacher. He was the perfect role model for me and and my other brothers as well.”<\/p>\n

“It don’t matter what kind of alcohol is in your system. You’re a DWI. Why should it matter [which] drugs? If you can’t drive, you can’t drive,” added Tim Carpenter, whose son was killed.<\/p>\n

“These are lives that have been taken by irresponsibility. This is a no-brainer for me,” added Empress Henderson, who also lost a son to an alleged drugged driver.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For more than a year, CBS News New York Investigates has shared stories of families torn apart by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":68091,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[8077,9,11,10,49,51,35337,50],"class_list":{"0":"post-68090","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-drunk-driving","9":"tag-new-york","10":"tag-new-york-headlines","11":"tag-new-york-news","12":"tag-new-york-state","13":"tag-new-york-state-headlines","14":"tag-new-york-state-legislature","15":"tag-new-york-state-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68090","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68090"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68090\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68091"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68090"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68090"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68090"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}