Regulations, road designs that could have stopped Rebecca Grossman

Good morning. My name is Paul Thornton and it is Saturday, June 15, 2024. Here’s what we’ve been doing recently at Opinia.

Rebecca Grossman – convicted last February of second-degree murder for crashing into and killing two children in Westlake Village and then trying to flee – was sentenced this week to 15 years in prison. Her trial has drawn widespread attention because of who she is (the wealthy co-founder of the Grossman Burn Center in Sherman Oaks), as well as the painfully young ages of the victims, the grieving parents and the callousness of leaving children to die.

Your mileage may vary depending on the appropriateness of Grossman’s judgment. However, if you experience our streets as a pedestrian, cyclist or anyone other than a driver, you may see aggravating factors in addition to Grossman’s willful recklessness: the type of unsafe road construction and the lack of vehicle regulations that mean many more children crossing the streets will die. . Putting Grossman in prison until she’s in her mid-70s won’t change that.

The facts of the case have been recounted ad nauseam: In September 2020, Grossman and her friend Scott Erickson, a former Major League Baseball pitcher, left a local restaurant and raced their SUVs around the suburban streets of upscale Westlake Village. Evidence from the trial showed that Grossman was driving at speeds of up to 81 miles per hour in areas where the posted speed limit was 45, and she was driving at 73 miles per hour when she struck and killed Mark and Jacob Iskander (ages 11 and 8 ), who were at a marked pedestrian crossing with their mother and youngest brother. Grossman’s car stopped half a mile away only because of a safety feature that prevents the engine from running when the airbag deploys.

Aside from the hit-and-run, most people focus on Grossman’s intentionally insane speed. But that’s not the street where the Iskander brothers were hit, Triunfo Canyon Road, which allows vehicles to travel at speeds safe for a residential area. Many roads in this area and other suburbs are wide and have large gaps between stop signs and traffic lights, encouraging drivers to exceed the already high speed limits. It must be admitted that Westlake Village is a city installed traffic lights at the pedestrian crossing where children were killed – but recently one of the readers – emphasized in a letter to the editor that no action has been taken to actually slow down traffic on this road.

And if a better-designed road could have made it harder for Grossman to reach 81 miles per hour, commercially available technology could have made it impossible for her to reach that speed. Speed ​​governors are already common in most of the world and many new cars sold here in the US come with them – that’s exactly what they’re designed to do deadly high limits like 130 miles per hour. Bill passed by the California Senate last month would require all new cars sold here to be fitted with “passive” speed limiters by 2024, meaning they would emit audible warnings if they exceed the posted limit by 10 miles per hour. With this technology, Grossman could still drive at a suicidal speed, but she would be annoyed by the beep that started at 55 miles per hour.

There’s also Grossman’s car, a Mercedes-Benz 430 GLE sports utility vehicle. This approximately 5,000-pound vehicle with a 350-horsepower engine would have been considered decadently large and overpowered 30 years ago. You’d probably call it a “small” SUV for getting around town. As the editor of The Times. recorded last yearSUVs and trucks, which are heavier and taller than sedans and have larger blind spots, account for about 80% of U.S. car sales, and an increasing number of pedestrians and cyclists are paying for it with their lives.

The federal government could regulate vehicle sizes to increase pedestrian safety. For example, look at the European Unionwhere Tesla’s chief engineer said that design regulations aimed at protecting pedestrians would make the cartoonishly tattered Cybertruck hard to sell. Last year, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration presented a proposal include pedestrian protection in its vehicle safety ratings – but, strangely, it won’t use this information in its “five-star” car rating system. I suppose that counts as progress in a country that only regulates the safety of people in cars and not those that can be hit from the outside.

We put people in large, powerful vehicles on wide open roads and hope that respect for the law and human life will encourage them to drive safely in all circumstances. Judging by the current deepening crisis surrounding pedestrian and cyclist deaths on our roads, this approach is having disastrous consequences.

The Supreme Court maintains that drug abortion is safe – for now. In dismissing a lawsuit challenging the FDA’s approval of mifepristone, the Supreme Court did not protect abortion access (gutted by the 2022 Dobbs decision) or rule on the drug’s safety; it only stated that the plaintiffs did not have locus standi. “Abortion drugs will go to court again,” warns the editorial team. “Other plaintiffs will argue that they can fight to limit abortion procedures.”

What a relief. The Supreme Court got it right in the mifepristone caseto me. UC Berkeley Law School Dean Erwin Chemerinsky echoes the editorial board’s sentiment: “The court’s decision comes as a relief to those who support abortion rights, but it does not change the reality that the overturning of Roe v. Wade has led to laws that severely limit abortion care. reproductive health care, including medically induced abortions in twenty states. And there is no doubt that anti-abortion forces will continue to seek ways to restrict the availability of mifepristone, including through ongoing lawsuits brought by state governments.”

LAUSD should ban smartphones in schools. Board of Education member Nick Melvoin introduced a resolution banning the use of cell phones by students during school hours. In an article for The Times, he explains his reasoning: “Just as we ban the use of harmful substances like tobacco and alcohol in schools, we must also implement a district-wide protocol to address the adverse effects of smartphones and social media on children. By going phone-free, LAUSD can help restore a learning environment that fosters focus, social connection and healthy development.”

Donald Trump’s advice on drinking and drugs is: “Don’t start.” So what’s wrong with that? Sean Daniels, a long-time substance abuse survivor, says the former president is right: If you’re worried about substance abuse, don’t start using substances. However, in a culture where drug and alcohol use is common, such advice can be dangerous. He writes: “I spent 12 years in various recovery rooms and heard hundreds of thousands of widely varying narratives about addiction and sobriety. I’ve never heard anyone say, “Nancy Reagan said, ‘Just say no,’ and that was the day I left forever.”

More from this week in opinion

From our columnists

From the Op-Ed desk

From the Editorial Team

Letters to the editor