...go nationwide
3/16/00

America now knows the tragedy that led to a Lafayette couple's crusade for tougher laws to prevent drinking and driving.

ABC's newsmagazine 20/20 introduced the story of Dan and Margie Towery, Lafayette parents who lost their daughter, Sarah, and her boyfriend, Chip Smith, when a drunken driver crashed into their car in March 1999.

The monument to the young couple is a familiar scene by now to Lafayette and anyone who drives along County Road 350 South. Maybe those simple crosses and the Towerys' grief-inspired efforts can stand as a rallying point for a wider campaign to get impaired drivers off the road.

In Indiana, the first steps were taken this winter in the General Assembly. A new bill, initiated by the Towerys' pleas, goes into effect on July 1 and will require the Indiana Alcoholic Beverage Commission to revoke the license of a bartender or server convicted of serving alcohol to an intoxicated customer.

The bartender accused of serving Jeffery Pedone Trout that Sunday afternoon a year ago at the former Mirage tavern goes on trial on April 11. The tavern's security videotape shows he served 10 drinks to Trout in the course of 21/2 hours. There is some question whether those drinks were doubles or triples. Trout's blood-alcohol content was more than two times the legal limit.

Either way, bartenders across the Lafayette area must be having second thoughts about pouring an extra cocktail or one more draft for the road. Livelihoods are at stake when customers walk out the door too drunk to drive. Honestly, that's the way it should be.

But with the new law, bar and restaurant owners have to be willing to stand up for their people. Bartenders and servers live off their tips. Another beer or cocktail adds more to the tab and makes a 15 percent tip that much fatter. Owners need to let their employees know it's OK to cut off a customer who has had too much, possibly rewarding conscientious bartenders who resist tempting fate because of a potential tip.

As much good that has come from this latest anti-drunken driving campaign, Lafayette doesn't need two more parents like the Towerys. Nothing personal against them. But even they'll admit legislative victories can never replace their daughter or dissolve their grief.

And now the nation knows why they say: Drunken driving simply must end.