TUCSON (KVOA) - The Distracted Driving law went into effect last spring with law enforcement giving drivers warnings if they were on their cell phones talking or texting.
As of Jan. 1, people have started getting tickets. This is a law two mothers hope will save lives.
When people get pulled over for distracted driving, besides the ticket, they also get a brochure that says the law is in effect and reminds the driver to keep their hands off the phone when they are behind the wheel. We never thought it would happen to us, Deborah Garcia said,
But in 2019, it did when Garcia lost her son. Julie Festerling also lost her daughter, Caitlin in the same crash.
The way our justice system usually works, it relies on people talking to other people, in person, sometimes under oath.
For most of a year now, though, itâs been inadvisable at best, dangerous at worst, to get together and hash out our conflicts the normal way.
The police, the jail, the constables, the courts, the attorneys â theyâve all adapted on the fly, sometimes creatively and productively. They use Microsoft Teams, for example, for many court hearings. But the system isnât built for this and is starting to bend under pressure.
The details are as nitty-gritty as this: Pima Countyâs 10 constables, preparing for a possible January onslaught of evictions they have to carry out, say they donât have enough personal protective equipment. They often end up inside peopleâs homes, dealing with them face to face, with just a cloth face covering and maybe gloves.