A road rage bill in the Utah state legislature could authorize police to take away offenders’ vehicles. The bill would do that, as well as actually define “road rage” in statute. But not everyone is supportive of the idea.
Alarming road rage statistics
The root of the matter stems from some disturbing Bee Hive State statistics. According to Utah’s Department of Transportation, over the past four years, there has been an average of 25 aggressive driving deaths annually. In the six years prior, the state averaged fewer than 14 aggressive driving deaths in a year.
Under the bill’s proposal, a “road rage event” would be defined this way: A criminal offense by an operator or passenger of a vehicle, in response to an incident that occurs or escalates upon a roadway. Included is the intent to endanger or intimidate an individual in another vehicle. In effect, the bill would allow any such crime to be categorized as road rage. Additional penalties for violations would be included.
Seize and take possession of vehicle—without a warrant
The bill allows for possible jail time for road rage offenders. It would give police the option to seize and take possession of a vehicle in a road rage case. It would not require a warrant for that when there is probable cause to believe the vehicle was involved in a road rage event. The impound fee for any car, truck, truck tractor, bus or other vehicle would be $400. Further, police would be required to seize and take possession of a vehicle when there is probable cause to believe a driver or passenger used a firearm during the event. A motor vehicle would be classified as a “deadly weapon,” in such cases.
If convicted, offenders could see a judge hand down an optional license suspension. If convicted of similar offenses within a year, a driver license suspension would be mandatory.
Not everyone agrees
But the bill’s sponsor, Representative Paul Cutler, R-Centerville, isn’t seeing smooth sailing for his road rage bill. Representative Jordan Teuscher, R-South Jordan, told committee members pondering the proposal that although he agrees road rage is a very serious problem, he doesn’t think boosting penalties will change driver behavior. “When someone gets into that state, it’s their emotions, it’s their anger, it’s everything else that is driving them,” Teuscher said.
Sponsor Cutler recognized something more was needed. “I think it’s important that we include a campaign to help people think about ahead of time, ‘before I get in that car, before I drive, I’m going to make the decision not to be angry, or not to let someone else make me angry and do something I would regret and ruin my life or the life of someone else,’” Cutler said.
A house committee voted 12-3 to allow the bill to move forward during the regular session that begins January 16.
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It seems their bill lacks an education element. It takes two to rage on the road. Those who are the cause of rage and those who rage. Those who are the cause of rage are only slightly less at fault than those who rage. Whether driving too slowly (non-aggressive) or failing to yield right of way (aggressive) those who incite rage as well as those who rage need to first be educated as confiscating their transportation is not helping pay government taxes when unable to get to their job and work.
Blaming someone for driving too slowly and another person has the right to rage? Yikes. Hope this bill passes for comments like this
This quite an interesting little piece of legislation. Road rage itself is bad behavior. Bad behavior is a form of speech. Not sure this would even pass Constitutional muster. I’m not defending road rage. Pull a gun, get prosecuted but horn honking and a few
F-bombs at a red light is still protected speech.
The problem is that too many of those instances get escalated. I constantly worry about the driving members of my family.
I too worry about my family and friends. Legislating behavior is not a rational response though, it is an emotional one. Be rude AND pull a weapon, GO TO JAIL.
Cut in line at the grocery store, confiscate your groceries?
Fart in church, $200.00 fine into the tray or go to jail?
Don’t put your shopping cart into the cart coral and have your drivers license suspended?
Not using a they/them pronoun when requested to do so is rude, it is not criminal.
If we start down this road, where does it end and who gets to be the hall monitor for manners? This week it’s road rage, next week it’s an off-color joke and the next week it’s wearing white after labor day.
I somewhat agree. Maybe prosecuting bad behavior (Road Rage) should include direct action caused by the incident, not just for speech. Maybe the bill should be worded to explain Road Rage as causing bodily harm or property damage. Then the definition of Road Rage goes beyond the ‘free speech’ issue.
Exactly. Prosecute a crime, not the potential for a crime that has not occurred yet but might happen, possibly happen, could happen, maybe not happen. An action that possibly results in no damage and inflicts no harm but hurts someone’s feelings or just startles them but results in arbitrary confiscation of your car with no due process, because someone’s feelings were hurt….. Yikes, 1984 much.
Speech not matter how vile is protected, and should be. There are some times and locations where speech might be limited but in your vehicle isn’t one of them. Whether or not this legislation, if enacted, would pass constitutional muster is an interesting one. The “slippery slope” you present is interesting, but might be a bit absurd. The behavior that they are trying to change is limited roads not society in general. I think that language (and gestures) wouldn’t meet a reasonable standard for “road rage” as it is the actions not the language that make the threat and danger significant. I suspect that unless the legislation is carefully crafted it won’t see the light of day.
Yes, agreed. The slippery slope will find absurdity sooner or later.
Our friends to the North are working on enacting laws that make not using a person’s preferred pronouns illegal. It is considered harmful/hateful speech in Trudeau’s alternate universe. Forcing 99% of people to deny actual science in name of the 1% sensitivities.
That’s the slipperiest of slopes.
Also, they are considering legalizing Gov’t censorship of peoples climate opinions.
Is it even legal for a Utah judge to take away an out of state drivers license, or impound an out of state vehicle ??
The idea of “blaming the victim” is still with us today and it’s terrible. Blaming the victim in rape- wearing the wrong sort of clothes- or blaming the victim in a burglary and theft- you left your door unlocked-is so, so wrong. You still were assaulted, you still had someone enter without your permission and steal from you. There’s been no problem in setting speed traps and fining out of state people who violated the law-The towns of Ludovici and Jesup in GA were notorious for this. And free speech is subject to censure- how about censorship in war or as Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes once stated “Freedom of speech doesn’t mean you have the right to falsely cry Fire! in a crowded theatre.”
The lawyer I’ve slept with for 53 years also wants to point out the penalties aren’t near as serious as the Driving Under Intoxication in our state, it starts with an $11 HUNDRED fine, second offense is 1 year license suspension, third is 5 year suspension. Also we both agree that it should be included on the driver licensing exam. I looked up our minimum speed laws and found the only minimums are on the 4 lane divided highways from the national highways, where the speed limit is 60 to 70 mph.
When my kids driver’s ed, the last one about 15 years ago, they did include the DUI penalties in the class. However, there was a lot missing. While I don’t recall all of them, the one that stands out is when driving in the left lane on a freeway. It’s not meant to set your cruise to 55 (or whatever the speed is) while a line of people are behind you. I also see people entering/exiting freeways that seem to think a yield sign is a stop sign. I could go on but maybe we should start with better education in driving.
Personally I think the time has come for Utah’s idea. Far too many lives have been ruined by careless and aggressive drivers who can’t put a cap on their emotions.
I AM NOT PRO-ROAD RAGE. However, does the lawyer you’ve been sleeping with for 53 years disagree with any other of our constitutional protections/ammendments or is it just the 1st, 4th, 5th and 6th ammendments that this law would potentially violate that they potentially disagree with? Does the lawyer you sleep with believe the disputed “comma” in the 2nd might just be an accidental ink drop from a shaky quill and it should be ignored too?
Again, I am not in favor of road rage. I am even less in favor of shredding our constitution tho. Speech is not violence. Violence is violence. If a demonstrable threat has been made, prosecute. Prosecute crimes, not rude behavior.
What a great piece of legislation. We should all be friendlier to each other. Need to stop the unnecessary acts of rage on the road and higher penalties will eventually make some changes. Same could be said about a lot of things. Good law and order is required.
How about this? It takes two to escalate any situation. When you have a momentary lapse and do something “silly” that upsets somebody, take credit for it by waving or shaking your head at your own actions, in effect, tacitly apologizing for the incident. We all get there. It won’t keep a hothead from going off the deep end, but it gives any reasonable individual an obvious opportunity to let it go, rather than take aggressive action. It won’t always work, but it’ll most likely get a better response than a single-digit salute and a string of f-bombs.
Thank you, Russ and Tina! Lots of interesting comments preceded mine. Serious problems require thought and discussion. Looks like we got a lot of that below. 🙂 Safe travels!
As a male I understand the innate feeling of needing to respond if I “feel” I’ve been disrespected while driving. However, it’s hard to imagine that an aggressive driver will simply go off on someone without first having them respond to an action in the first place. Let it go.
A Policy of ‘Life’s short and getting shorter’.
I don’t engage with raging A-holes. I also don’t try and put them in jail or have their automobile confiscated without due process. It’s bad behavior, it’s rudeness and putting down the cell phones when driving could be a good first step.
Congrats to Utah for introducing this common sense bill! It should be a national bill. Representative Teuscher forgets that we are humans. We have the ability to rationalize – not act out our emotions.
I currently reside in Utah. I think the legislators would be better off with requiring driver education for everyone. It’s easy to get a license here and the driver’s are really bad. The written test is open book. All traffic control is merely a suggestion. I constantly see people texting while driving. I’ve seen more crashes and wrecks here in 7 years than I’ve seen in 56 years living elsewhere. I witnessed a fatal accident where the driver ran a stop sign and t-boned another car. He wasn’t wearing a seatbelt and was ejected from his car. There was nothing we could do for him and he died before our eyes. I don’t think road rage is a big problem here, but lousy drivers sure are.
Any time you empower a government employee to make the decision to take property without any defense or neutral party input, you create system ripe for abuse. Witness the current state of civil asset forfeiture. Originally used against organized criminals, it is now routinely used even when no unlawful behavior is seen, just a government employee’s suspicion that there may be something wrong, even in the face of evidence to the contrary. Taking anything should only be done by a court of law, after a trial where a proper defense is allowed.
Spot on. Unequivocally logical, not emotional.
Statistics show that 4 out of 10 drivers admit to flipping somebody off while driving.
Statistics also show that the other 6 drivers are lying.
Hi, Rick. That reminds me of something my sister told me decades ago. First, we’re not “flippers” in our family (I have never flipped anyone off). But someone flipped her off for something when she was driving and she was going to reciprocate, just to show him. However, her “reply” ended up to be with two fingers, in a peace sign.✌️ I thought that was a good way to deal with the situation, even though she didn’t realize that was how she was going to unconsciously respond. Have a great day. 😀 –Diane at RVtravel.com
I know someone (he’s currently in prison, road rage related) who could be the reason for this type of legislation. Showing someone the finger isn’t road rage. Driving on someone’s bumper, flashing brights into mirror, cutting off other drivers who p*ss you off are dangerous and frightening to those of us who see it. Part of me would like to see these buttbrains lose their license and their vehicles, but I don’t think giving the government an opportunity to just take without concrete proof is ridiculous. Didn’t you just have an article about cops arresting someone without cause or evidence?