People driving under the influence of drugs, alcohol or both have killed at least 87 people in Lancaster County over the past five years.
At least seven of those drivers — responsible for eight deaths — had one or more previous convictions for driving under the influence.
New bail conditions developed as part of Lancaster County’s Repeat Offender Program, led by District Attorney Craig Stedman, could put a dent in those numbers.
The ankle bracelet is a key reform because preventing impaired drivers from getting behind the wheel is vitally important.
Ankle bracelets signal authorities when the wearer of one of the tamper-proof devices strays from sobriety. The bracelet analyzes the wearer’s perspiration to check for alcohol in his system.
While a charge is not a conviction, the system is more than justified in putting tighter restrictions on those previously convicted of driving under the influence.
Consider the difference an ankle bracelet might have made in recent cases.
Thomas Gallagher Jr. was driving on a suspended license for a previous DUI, prosecutors allege, when, under influence of heroin and vodka, he caused the head-on crash that killed Meredith Demko. Demko, 18, had graduated from Lampeter-Strasburg High School less than a month earlier.
Carlos Rene Garcia was driving on a suspended license on Feb. 22 when his speeding and weaving drive along East King Street ended in a crash that killed 24-year-old Kaitlin Berry and put her mother in a wheelchair.
And Shannon Rae Thurman had been charged with DUI a month before causing the Dec. 28, 2013, crash in East Donegal Township that killed Wagdy Shaheed, a 57-year-old father of two from Marietta.
Stedman was right to seek the tightened restrictions approved this week and set to take effect Jan. 1.
After all, about 20 percent of those charged with DUI in Lancaster County have prior convictions for impaired driving. And arraignment on charges can take as much as a week, currently with no monitoring at all.
Still, it’s not enough.
The General Assembly needs to toughen Pennsylvania’s approach to preventing DUI.
After Meredith Demko’s death in early July, many wondered why a driver whose license had been suspended on a prior DUI had been allowed on the road again.
As her parents said in an open letter soon after Demko’s death, ignition interlocks have been effective in other states and should be made mandatory in Pennsylvania.
Ignition locks are installed in a vehicle and require the driver to breathe into the device, which prevents the car from starting if alcohol is detected.
“We as a community,” Chris and Susan Demko said in July, “cannot continue to assume that individuals with DUI convictions, and in many cases suspended licenses, will obey the law. It is important that we craft effective laws that will focus on preventing those with prior DUI convictions from driving while impaired.”
The ankle bracelets that will become mandatory next year in Lancaster County are a good first step.
The General Assembly should follow Lancaster County’s lead and add mandatory ignition locks to prevent future tragedies.
