Drink-driving: what had the passer-by done wrong? Harm to others and to oneself deserves severe punishment

According to the Guilin municipal public security bureau, at about 1 a.m. on 20 June 2019 a vehicle overturned on the Ring Expressway in Guilin, on the stretch running from Lingchuan towards Yangshuo. The officers on duty from the Ring Expressway brigade of the Guilin traffic police detachment, together with the auxiliary officers He Jinglun and Zhong Fei, went to the scene and were handling the accident when a white car bearing the number plate Gui C60A75 drove at high speed into the scene, knocked down the auxiliary officers He Jinglun and Zhong Fei, and killed both of them on the spot.

Preliminary investigation shows that the driver of the offending vehicle, Tang, is suspected of driving after drinking. Tang is now in police custody, traffic on the affected stretch has returned to normal, and the investigation of the accident and the consequential work are being pressed ahead with.

Legal analysis

Article 133 of the Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China, the offence of causing a traffic accident, provides that a person who violates the regulations on the management of traffic and transport and thereby causes a major accident, causing serious injury or death to another person or heavy losses to public or private property, is sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment of not more than three years or to criminal detention; a person who escapes after causing a traffic accident or whose case involves other especially flagrant circumstances is sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment of not less than three and not more than seven years; and a person whose escape causes death is sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment of not less than seven years.

Article 2 of the Interpretation of the Supreme People's Court on Several Issues concerning the Specific Application of Law in the Trial of Criminal Cases of Causing Traffic Accidents provides that a person who causes a traffic accident in any of the following circumstances is sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment of not more than three years or to criminal detention:

(1) one person dies, or three or more persons are seriously injured, and the person bears all or the main responsibility for the accident;

(2) three or more persons die and the person bears equal responsibility for the accident;

(3) direct loss is caused to public property or to the property of another person, the person bears all or the main responsibility for the accident, and the amount he is unable to compensate is 300,000 yuan or more.

Where a traffic accident causes serious injury to one or more persons and the person bears all or the main responsibility for the accident, he is convicted and punished for the offence of causing a traffic accident if any of the following circumstances is also present:

(1) he was driving a motor vehicle after drinking alcohol or taking drugs;

(2) he was driving a motor vehicle without a driving qualification;

(3) he drove a motor vehicle knowing that its safety devices were incomplete or that its safety mechanisms were not functioning;

(4) he drove a motor vehicle knowing that it had no plates or certificate or had been scrapped;

(5) he was driving seriously overloaded;

(6) he fled the scene of the accident in order to escape legal investigation.

Article 4 of the same Interpretation provides that a case of causing a traffic accident in any of the following circumstances falls within "other especially flagrant circumstances" and is punished by fixed-term imprisonment of not less than three and not more than seven years:

(1) two or more persons die, or five or more persons are seriously injured, and the person bears all or the main responsibility for the accident;

(2) six or more persons die and the person bears equal responsibility for the accident;

(3) direct loss is caused to public property or to the property of another person, the person bears all or the main responsibility for the accident, and the amount he is unable to compensate is 600,000 yuan or more.

In this case the driver, Tang, is suspected of driving after drinking and caused an accident in which two people died, and he is therefore suspected of the offence of causing a traffic accident. Under the judicial interpretation, where a traffic accident causes the death of two or more persons or serious injury to five or more persons and the driver bears all or the main responsibility, the case falls within "other especially flagrant circumstances" under Article 133 of the Criminal Law. Tang may therefore be sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment of not less than three and not more than seven years, and he is also liable to compensate in civil law.

Cherish life, refuse drink-driving

What was expected to be an ordinary call-out turned into a disaster of this kind. The sudden loss is hard for the officers who attended with them to accept, and harder still for their families to believe. The auxiliary officer He Jinglun's wife was seven months pregnant, and his child will never see its father.

Do not drive after drinking, and do not drink if you are going to drive. Everyone knows the saying, which has been repeated so often, and yet some still take their chances. Driving after drinking shows indifference to oneself and, more than that, a failure of responsibility towards others.

Police work is hard, exhausting, selfless and extremely dangerous, yet those who do it take up the mission of protecting the public without complaint or regret. What happened is both tragic and infuriating. For these two auxiliary officers, an ordinary day's work cost them their lives because a drink-driver did not care, and they became the greatest victims of the accident.

After drinking, the anaesthetic effect of alcohol usually slows the body's reactions; the sense of touch declines, so that the accelerator and the brake cannot be properly controlled; and vision is impaired, with a longer reaction time to light stimuli and a corresponding delay in instinctive responses, all of which greatly increase the likelihood of an accident. Data show that a person driving in a slightly intoxicated state is sixteen times more likely to have an accident than one who has drunk nothing. Driving after drinking is therefore very dangerous, gravely harmful to road safety and highly likely to cause accidents. Cherish life, then, and refuse drink-driving.