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Saturday, 08/05/06

Focus effort on DUI offense
Tragedy caused by drunken driving, not illegal immigration
Nashville lost a beloved craftsman from the music industry in a highway crash this week, but anger over the accident should focus more on drunken driving than the legal status of the other driver.

Charlie Derrington, 51, was a renowned mandolin maker for Gibson Musical Instruments and general manager of its Original Acoustic Instrument division. He was one of those figures in the music business who often go overlooked and unappreciated. It's a tragic loss.

Police say Derrington, who was on a motorcycle, had a head-on collision with a Ford Explorer driven by Julio Villasana, who is suspected of driving while drunk.

Witnesses said Villasana was headed the wrong way on the southbound side of Briley Parkway. He was also said to have run away on foot before officers arrested him. He showed signs of impairment during a sobriety test, according to the police. Villasana is apparently in the country illegally after being deported.

Metro Police Chief Ronal Serpas said the case points to why the federal government should step up its immigration efforts. If the chief's point is that Villasana should never have been here after being deported, he's absolutely right. But the suspect's legal status wasn't the cause of the crash.

The problem appears to be drinking and driving — that's a problem that occurs every day of the year, in every state of the union, involving born-in-the-USA citizens.

Any suggestion that illegal immigration caused this tragedy diminishes the amount of attention that ought to be put on drunken driving. That's where the public's effort should focus most.

Illegal immigration is an important issue, and it demands to be addressed by Congress. But illegal immigration is not the root cause for all bad events that occur in the United States.

If a citizen is killed by a drunken driver, that person's fate doesn't hinge on whether the driver was legal or illegal. It certainly is related to whether a driver was drunk. •

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http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll ... 50326/1008

This paper obviously has NO clue or any common sense. If the law had been enforced the scumbag wouldn't HAVE BEEN HERE, to get drunk, in the first place.