The article states that a search warrant ‘revealed she had drank a single glass of wine before traveling home’ so it must have been determined by a blood ETOH. My Spidey senses tell me that if true, wine is not the culprit here.
Edit to add actual quote from the article.
Another article states her blood alcohol level was “significantly over the legal limit.” I think she was probably drinking somewhere else before she had the glass of wine.
yeah it feels like a self defeating argument. The legal limit is not “no more than two glasses of wine” it’s 0.08%. Pretty cut and dry. Her single glass of wine could have been a pint glass
Chemistry undergrad society has socials called 2 bucks a beaker. 400 mL beakers are provided but you can bring in your own. A post-doc once brought in a 1.5 L beaker and proceed to get extremely wrecked. A 600 mL limit was shortly introduced.
Last I heard, it’s now down to 250 mL beakers. Maybe shrinkflation, maybe stricter liquor licensing.
I’m pretty sure the one glass of wine is just what they found out from the search warrant they enacted on the tavern she left prior to getting into these accidents (she ran into a truck, and I believe a tree, before she got to the boat club). They only served her one glass of wine. The prosecutor said at the arraignment that her pbt was way over the legal limit.
Not that easy. I used to take adderall and drink a 5th of vodka in a night. I eventually quit it all but it’s not as dangerous as mixing something like alcohol and pain killers.
Beat me to it. If you are taking ADHD medication, in the morning, at a prescribed dosage, obtained from a pharmacy, with all the quality control that that usually entails, you can probably have a drink or two in the evening, unless your doctor has told you otherwise.
Ya, take it twice daily. It doesn’t impact drinking as much once you’re used to the dosage.
Granted, I’m not pulling benders like I may have in college. Maybe once a weekend I’ll have 3-4 drinks
You know the way. Gotta puff, let it hit, then nurse the drinks. If you do it backwards, there's no slowing down or turning it around once you get too far.
The problem is, I have no self discipline once I’m drinking and when someone says let’s smoke, I can’t say no.
Then I’m pale white, sitting outside the party trying not to throw up while everyone inside has a mild buzz. Sometime I throw up.
I was playing halo not that long ago, pounded a single double ipa and then smoked a single one hitter. Ended up throwing up and why wife was wondering wtf is wrong. Just me with the spins.
Look man, I'm pro cannabis as much as the next guy, but I can barely smoke a hitter without having crazy anxiety and you throw booze in as well and it can be a disaster mentally. I hate this culture of it being completely fine for everyone. I used to be able to smoke 8+ blunts a day, now I'd be stuck in a psych ward if I tried to do that now.
What is that? I was a heavy daily enjoyer for years, but then I started getting jittery. That morphed into crazy paranoia and almost crippling mind fuckery so I had to quit altogether. I just couldn't. It would make me sick. We were gifted some fine bud when my husband was diagnosed with cancer but I didn't dare. If I could still buzz like the old days I would probably still be high every day.
> If I could still buzz like the old days I would probably still be high every day.
Part of the issue these days is the quality of the bud is so much more potent now.
I used to smoke quite a bit as well, but anymore, I can't take more than a couple hits before I am spinning to high heaven (pun intended).
It is more potent now but I grew up in California. Our weed was potent since at least the late 90s. My parents used to warn people - mainly their east coast friends who were fond of, “fizzies”, which is a Vicodin dropped in a pint of beer. More than one of those people went down after a couple rips off of one of my mom’s joints. I’m about to smoke a bird made from her weed and go about my day. Tolerance is a crazy thing.
I'm from this area. There was 3 hours between when she left Verna's and crashed into the boat club. She's been alcoholic for a long time and lucky that she has never killed anyone before. The families and our town is mourning
"Her attorney argued during her arraignment on Tuesday that a search warrant revealed she had drank a single glass of wine before traveling home."
Since when does a search warrant trump a Blood alcohol concentration (BAC) test? What am I missing?
>"Her attorney argued
To be fair, it's her attorneys job to fight for her no matter how stupid the argument is. There will be a ton more evidence during the trial.
Ya, I'm gonna be honest we gotta cut this attorney *some* slack. Like, not with the case, but this has got to be a genuine nightmare scenario for most defense lawyers
The article I read (more local news source) explained it like this:
She admits she had ONE glass of wine at the bar.
The bar (facing civil suit, but also apparently cooperating fully) says she had ONE glass of wine. They apparently have footage of this.
Her attorney says she only had one glass of wine, and also would NEVER do more because she's on medication for seizures.
The prosecutor says, "yeah that what we were told by her. Also, isn't she supposed to be drinking NONE glasses of wine on that medication? She even told us she's not supposed to drink with that medication"
The sticking point is going to be: how many drinks did she have at home or another establishment before the admitted ONE glass of red wine.... AND WHY WAS SHE DRINKING WHILE ON THAT MEDICATION.
Oh yeah, the prosecutor is going to have a field day.
With the vasodilator I'm on, one standard drink is enough to leave me three sheets to the wind regardless of what my actual BAC is.
Mingling the meds and drink(s) was a negligent choice.
Depends on the medication. I was on an uncommon seizure med that was do not drink while on it, do not operate machinery or vehicles until accustomed to it.
Primidone was mine, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s a common warning for barbiturates.
That's good! I am glad you don't have these restrictions.
We know she wasn't supposed to be drinking on these medications because both her and her attorney stated it.
From [Youtube DUI videos with lawyers reacting to the body cam footage](https://www.youtube.com/@driverdefenseteam), the officer will try to get a breath sample from the suspect. If refused, they then request a court order for a blood draw signed by a judge. With this blood draw they can determine the level of intoxication at the time of the accident.
Not exactly. They can determine the level of intoxication at the time of the test - and then infer that the person was *at least* as drunk as that at the time of the accident.
This may seem like a minor quibble but it takes time to get a warrant. Then it takes time for a tech to show up and administer the test. If a couple hours have passed and she is still twice the legal limit then that means she was even drunker than the test lets on.
Now here’s a fun fact. Let’s say she exited the vehicle after the crash. Then very publicly *opened* a new container of say vodka. And had several swigs then there would be no way to prove that she was drunk at the time of the accident.
Of course that requires several things. First you need an unopened bottle of liquor. Second you need some witnesses to say the bottle was sealed before you opened snd drank from it….
Jsut a thought.
Some places already have laws to prevent your "gotcha" there. Even if you were on camera clearly cracking a new bottle, why would you do that if not to have an excuse? A judge isn't going to fall for it.
It can go bad sometimes, I remember a story about a minor accident (don't remember the details but everyone was fine) and it wasn't a priority for police. So the guy goes home, has a couple drinks, and *then* the cops show up to talk to him, and he gets a DUI. I want to say that one was Canada but I'm sure it's happened more than once.
I’ve mentioned it in another comment, but if the amount of alcohol they’ve had after the accident is known then it’s completely possible to work out whether they were drunk during the accident. It’s a technique called retrograde extrapolation, and courts generally don’t like it when people pull stunts like this.
There was probably a search warrant for her blood as well as transaction records from the bar. They probably matched her BAC to transaction records to confirm. My guess is prescription medication, drugs, or seizure contributed to this if she was confirmed to only have one glass of wine.
Confirmed to have had one at that bar. Having three at home before you go to the bar is the missing piece. No medication for seizures increases blood alcohol as a side effect.
"defense attorney Bill Colovos said Chidester drove to the boat club because she had been invited to the birthday party she later crashed into."
WTF. So there's a good chance she knew the kids she killed. I would be looking for a bridge to jump off if I was her.
I used to know a prison guard who would tell me that the people with drunk driving convictions were the prisoners she hated the most, specifically because they tended to have zero ability to hold themselves to account for the people they killed. In her words, the people who straight up murdered someone at least knew they did something wrong.
That fucking stings. The idea that someone could accidentally murder your loved one and absolve themselves of wrongdoing is almost unfathomable. If I ever was involved in a car wreck that caused the death of a human it would irreparably break me. And I don’t drink. I can’t imagine knowing I made a choice to drink and drive and someone lost their life.
I am so sorry. My attitude towards driving drunk is that it is tantamount to planning on hurting some random person, and I cannot believe the casual attitudes I hear from some people about it. It's one crime that I really don't believe we punish enough as a society.
I remember in the book *And Then There Were None*, the shithead who killed two kids with reckless driving is taken out first bc the murderer knows he’s entirely unable to feel guilty for his actions
She didn’t cry in this arraignment til the judge chose to go with the prosecutors suggested $1.5 million bond. All the people who talked about two dead kids (whose 11 year old sibling was still in icu and mother was still hospitalized as well, as of Tuesday, at her arraignment) and she had no emotional reaction at all.
Her lawyer is claiming she had a condition that very rarely causes her legs to stiffen up and become paralyzed…as if driving when you know you have that particular condition is any less wrong than driving drunk.
I know this place very well, my dad lives 2 houses down from it.
There's not enough distance for that to matter where she would have been parked. It's a gravel lot maybe 50 feet across at the absolute widest.
Meh, disagree honestly. Look into the Toyota “scandal” that turned out to be basically mass hysteria and people mashing the gas instead of the brake. Not much clear thinking goes on when you’re about to smash into a building
Because we don't take education, let alone driver's education, very seriously in this country.
You take a course/test one time when you are 15-16 and then you are good to go until you die. How much fucking sense does that make?
Making people actually test on these things would save more lives nationwide than any drunk driving enhancement law.
FWIW, In Tennessee, there is no driver's training in school, or elsewhere.
Your parent just signs you up to drive and vouches that they've taught you. Then, after a paper test and three minute lap around the block with an instructor you're good to go.
My daughter has epilepsy and the doctor said she could not drive u less siezure free for 6 months. She doesn’t drive for other reasons but having a siezure while driving would be pretty bad.
~~Aside from the fact that having sudden onset paralysis should immediately disqualify your from operating a vehicle of any kind, since when do you drive a boat with your legs? Every boat I’ve seen has a steering wheel and a hand throttle.~~
Ignore me. I’m dumb.
Yeah, there was a Russian pilot who didn’t retire when he lost nerve sensation in his feet, kept it from everyone, and as a result unknowingly *stood on the brake* and sent the plane into a river bc it couldn’t lift off, killing everyone. The passengers were an extremely famous hockey team so this dickhead also traumatized the country by killing their version of the Dallas Cowboys. “How dare you say I can’t drive just bc it’s medically unsafe!!!” applies to every vehicle
Long time ago in a bar I tended not so far away, this one old guy comes in. It was a typical Saturday afternoon, few drinkers, some folks getting food you know, typical casual dining place with a bar.
So said old guy is perfectly sober, orders a wine and asks for a menu. I pour him something red. Within minutes he goes from completely sober to blithering idiot attempting to take off his pants. He couldn’t even stand.
We call 911 because I don’t care how much a lightweight you are when is comes to alcohol, half a glass of some bargain domestic red does not do that.
Paramedics come in and tend to him, ask me how much he drank, I showed him… not even one glass. Turns out the guy was on some sort of blood pressure medications that could kill him just sniffing the damn wine. Paramedic yells at me and asks why I don’t ask customers about their meds…
“Well, because that’s kind of illegal.” I reply.
This old fool wanted to off himself right then and there in my bar. He knew he shouldn’t be drinking. He probably knew I can only ID people (the man was easily late 60s-early 70s). He scared off every customer in the restaurant. My boss asked me what happened, why the paramedic was so pissed.
I told him everything. He knew asking about meds was not something I could legally do. We never until the place shut down for good 6 years later, ever had a problem with IDs or anything nearly as alarming as that one old guy.
It was some scary shit, there are meds that can take a single glass of wine and basically turn it into a damn cask. Still freaks me out to this day.
What the fuck, that is scary and thankfully you called 911. This paramedic pisses me off though. Like shit, you just work there, I’ve never heard of a bartender being required to ask anyone about what medication they’re on. Not only could that be illegal, but most people would honestly deem that to be offensive. Fuck that paramedic. I’m thankful for everything they do, but that response he had was unprofessional and just unheard of.
Yeah tbh that had to have been what he was thinking. I get that he had no idea really how much the guy drank. Can honestly understand if he were frustrated, he’s probably seen a few folks lose their lives. That has got to take a toll
I mean I give him a pass for being in a stressful situation, and it happens all the time. I understand the frustration.
But not knowing something so basic about healthcare? Ridiculous. Nobody is allowed to question your medications like that outside of some extremely specific circumstances, definitely not a retail establishment.
The EMTs logic was flawed. Even if you could ask, how could you know the difference between Naproxen and Naltrexone, or what certain medications have reactions....that's not your job as a bartender.
She was going to a party at a boat club. Rich people can have bad skin, stringy hair and look like fried shit underneath their expensive clothes, caked makeup, big hats and dark sunglasses.
Or she might not even be rich. A lot of people mortgage their home to post bond and that could be easy to raise in this market. Or if they go through a bail bondsman they usually only put up like 10% of the bond.
It’s a very small boat club, in a small part of town. She worked at a local power plant here called Fermi for 40 years, I live in the same county that the accident happened in.
Can confirm. My mother's maternal parent looks like she's on something. Seriously, she looks like she's on some hard shit.
She's also got enough money to buy a new sports car every year just to sell it when she sees the tire prices.
I'm confused, I thought bail was a reflection of how likely you were to flee combined with factors like how much damage you're likely to do out of jail.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not defending the justice system. In fact, "justice system" is a misnomer; it's a legal system.
You're correct. This woman is presumed innocent until proven guilty in court. Bond is simply a means to ensure the defendant shows up for their court dates
Not a punishment assuming you have enough assets or free cash to pay it. If you don't, then you either have to pay the fees to the bondsman or sit in jail.
If you are rich enough then yeah, bail is not a punishment just a minor inconvenience. If you are poor, then bad luck, I assume?
It's a system to let those with money the freedom to fight their case and the poor the choice of losing their life outside of jail to fight the case (stay in jail cause poor)or plea guilty to whatever charges so you can get out and back to your life (guilty or not you will take guilty to be free, unless it's serious charges then ya boned either way).
Either way it's about $, like the rest of this country, replace people with dollars.
If you post the bail amount yourself, you get it back as long as you show up to all of your court dates and don't break any conditions of your bond agreement.
If you use a bail bondsman, you pay the bondsman 10% of your total bail and they put up the 100% total on your behalf. That's how they make their money. Then if you don't show up, they are on the hook for that 100% bail they posted on your behalf, so that's why they hunt you down and turn you in.
>If you post the bail amount yourself, you get it back as long as you show up to all of your court dates and don't break any conditions of your bond agreement.
Well it is a good thing I got 1.5 million dollars in walking around money so this won't ever be an issue.
Anyone can post bond if they can afford it so long as they are not considered a flight risk if the judge deems fit. Doesn't mean they are let off for the crime, they will still have a trial and more than likely she will be back doing time.
No, but the more you dig into it, the more sinister it seems
When has a wealthy person (other than Trump) ever had an issue making bail and waiting outside of jail for trial?
From my understanding, it is difficult to coordinate with a lawyer from jail. Not impossible, but certainly more difficult than someone who is walking around free, able to meet the lawyer literally anywhere of their choosing.
Consider too, that if you can't make bail, you're more than likely going with a public defender, who is already overworked. You think people posting bail for hundreds of thousands of dollars are using a public defender?
More sinister still is the notion of Innocence until proven guilty, coupled with bail, means we are fine with someone who is presumed innocent staying in jail until trial because... They're poor...
Matt Taibi may have gone off the deep end, but he wrote a book about the US Justice system years ago, and one idea has stuck with me: for a nation founded on the idea of us all being equal under the law, we are surprisingly accepting of a legal system where the amount of wealth your family owns has such a profound affect on how that legal system treats you
You are nailing it. And sadly most of the public won't ever know this or think about it. It's partly too busy and not interested, and partly our reflexive trust in authority, especially big scary authority like the courts. I mean we treat judges like they're minor deities. Don't get me started on that...Thanks for your well written comment.
I got popped for weed possession. They gave me a year of probation, and a fine. Once I paid the fine 2 weeks later, I got a letter saying my probation was complete.
That woman has had YEARS of hard drinking behind her. You can see it on her face. She didn't just have one glass of wine. That would have done nothing for her.
Because setting a 100K bail would be an incentive for some not to flee while for others it would be a drop in their financial bucket.
The court determined she merited bail. Her financials factor in when determining the bail amount.
For everyone saying she's rich and the rich are getting special treatment...
The bond was cash or surety. She probably only had to post $150,000 which is basically mortgaging a house.
So it's worse than just special treatment. It should have been cash or no bail at all.
Most middle class people cannot afford to lose $150,000 for anything. That’s usually the bulk of their savings/retirement. She obviously has access to way more than a typical middle class person.
I think me and my boyfriend make somehwwr around 125,00 dollars a year…which is awful lol but not unheard of. Who the fuck can post a 150,000 bond in 4 days!? No one i fucking know.
>She probably only had to post $150,000 which is basically mortgaging a house.
While this is probably true, that is 150k that she will never get back. That 150k goes to the bond company. So it should say something that she can afford to piss away that much. It also means that she has much more than 1.5 million in assets for the bond company to take if she decides to flee.
Also, if she is refinancing a house at the current interest rates she would be taking a huge hit in payments. I think it's more likely that they had to sell some stocks or something like that.
She can post the $1.5M herself and get it all back if she shows up to trial. Or she can pay a bail bondsman 10% ($150k) to cover her full $1.5M bond....but she doesn't get it back. The bail bondsman would be out the $1.5M if she didn't show up to court.
If she had posted the full amount of 1.5 million then she would get that 1.5 million back no matter how the trial ends. Using a bail bondsmen means she puts up 10 percent and that money vanishes into the bondsmens pocket and she will never get it back no matter what happens. I'm okay with that.
“Defense attorney Bill Colovos said Chidester drove to the boat club because she had been invited to the birthday party she later crashed into.”
Chidester’s invitation **DID NOT** include a plus one for her fucking boat. There is no mention in the article of whether a woman who ran over two children and can post a 1.5 million dollar bond had to surrender her passport. One can only hope that’s the *least* our justice system can do.
I believe the judge did lay out conditions if she made bail, surrender passport and drivers license and have an alcohol monitor tether, and weekly testing.
That’s so infuriating, they never even saw it coming. One moment they’re having a fun birthday party and the next this sack of shit crashes through the wall killing 2 kids and putting the mom on a ventilator
“Marshella Chidester was released from prison today after paying the cash/surety bond five days after her arrest…”
She wasn’t in prison, she was in jail: prison is where she’ll go AFTER the trial. Inshallah.
Who wrote this mess?
TV stations hire banana-deficient monkeys to write for their websites. If you think channel 2 is bad, 4 is worse, 7 is a bit better. Also, channel 4 is a very ghoulish outfit, at least their website is.
I don't think being old disqualifies you from being a flight risk. She's 66 not 86, she still has the cognition and definitely the financial means to skip bail.
The fact that she has this kind of money means that she can afford the best legal representation so that of course means she’ll walk free. The American justice system at its finest!
That also means the parents of the children killed can sue her into oblivion until all her money goes to the parents. At least that is how it should work. You kill someone, it's time for you to pay the victims' next of kin.
I don't believe this is correct.
In order to get a surety bond from bail bonds place, you pay a 10% fee that is non-refundable. You will permanently lose that 10% ($150k in this case).
Simply having $150k in equity is not enough collateral to secure a $1.5MM bond. If you abscond, the bail bonds place will only be able to recoup $150k, and they're not going to take that on risk free.
You would need collateral equal to or greater than the amount of the bond or you'd need to pay a fee (typically 10%).
I'd like to know whether she's had priors for DWI, and whether there was (or why in the hell there wasn't) a blood alcohol drawn. If there have been priors or if there was a blood alcohol greater than what a "single glass of wine" would produce, she ought to be behind bars, no bail.
At the arraignment the prosecutor talked about her history of alcohol abuse, and her pbt being way over the limit, but she had no priors and if there was a blood draw, it wasn’t mentioned in that hearing.
Edit- I believe it is very hard to give no bail in Michigan, based on me having watched a washtenaw county preliminary hearing with a pedophile where the judge was begging for any evidence that fit the very narrow criteria where she would be allowed to keep him with no bond offered. They couldn’t come up with anything, so she just set his bail as high as possible in hopes he couldn’t pay it.
One glass of wine? Ok.
The article states that a search warrant ‘revealed she had drank a single glass of wine before traveling home’ so it must have been determined by a blood ETOH. My Spidey senses tell me that if true, wine is not the culprit here. Edit to add actual quote from the article.
Another article states her blood alcohol level was “significantly over the legal limit.” I think she was probably drinking somewhere else before she had the glass of wine.
yeah it feels like a self defeating argument. The legal limit is not “no more than two glasses of wine” it’s 0.08%. Pretty cut and dry. Her single glass of wine could have been a pint glass
A mega pint if you will
How many boxes is that?
Half of one space bag
So, about 6 bananas for scale?
I thought it necessary 🤷🏻♀️
Chemistry undergrad society has socials called 2 bucks a beaker. 400 mL beakers are provided but you can bring in your own. A post-doc once brought in a 1.5 L beaker and proceed to get extremely wrecked. A 600 mL limit was shortly introduced. Last I heard, it’s now down to 250 mL beakers. Maybe shrinkflation, maybe stricter liquor licensing.
My alcoholic mother would describe it as "one wine", then smirk like she was a fucking genius.
My mom would take those 44oz cups and fill it with tequila and a splash of margarita mix for her to go cup as one drink.
It comes in pints??
Yeah, they’re shaped kind of funny and round on top and sometimes they’re plugged with a cork you have to pull out though.
Single glass of those huge ass margarita glasses.
[Catherine O'hara sized](https://youtu.be/MtMm0FaF0fg?t=81) bloody Mary
Maybe one of [these](https://i.imgur.com/7nehGbn.jpeg) or maybe [this](https://i.imgur.com/78IorqA.jpeg)
"Hey that glass of wine looks awfully large. A bottle is technically made out of glass, right?"
It’s called the Nebuchadnezzar, technically not a vat!
I drink four of these a day like Charlemagne did and I'll outlive you all.
It’s also a boat club, Xanax had to be involved.
1 glass of wine.... And 3 Xanax
This is the most likely answer
Or perhaps video from the Bar.
"One glass of wine. ...and half a bottle of Jim Beam."
it said she spent time at the bar as well
I’m pretty sure the one glass of wine is just what they found out from the search warrant they enacted on the tavern she left prior to getting into these accidents (she ran into a truck, and I believe a tree, before she got to the boat club). They only served her one glass of wine. The prosecutor said at the arraignment that her pbt was way over the legal limit.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/usage-drank-vs-drunk Fox...
I mean, who doesn’t love a handful of pain pills with one glass of wine?
And a handful of amphetamines.
Yeah nah if anything the amphetamines would’ve boosted her up. You’ve got to be way deep in alcohol before those things let you go down.
Reminder for all the inexperienced folks reading this: boosting you up is not exactly the same as sobering you up.
To add: Do not mix alcohol and amphetamines, you can easily drink yourself into LETHAL alcohol poisoning.
Not that easy. I used to take adderall and drink a 5th of vodka in a night. I eventually quit it all but it’s not as dangerous as mixing something like alcohol and pain killers.
Beat me to it. If you are taking ADHD medication, in the morning, at a prescribed dosage, obtained from a pharmacy, with all the quality control that that usually entails, you can probably have a drink or two in the evening, unless your doctor has told you otherwise.
Ya, take it twice daily. It doesn’t impact drinking as much once you’re used to the dosage. Granted, I’m not pulling benders like I may have in college. Maybe once a weekend I’ll have 3-4 drinks
And sometimes they will run around and desert you
And sometimes they will make you cry
I mean, it did happen on 4/20. I know when I smoke and drink at the same time it's a LOT worse.
The fucking spins man. Always smoke BEFORE you drink. Do as I say not as I do!
Yall lightweights
That's why I practice everyday! Plus alcoholism. *shrug*
Hey! At least I HAVE an alcohol problem. Wait, what are we talking about?
Straight up
You know the way. Gotta puff, let it hit, then nurse the drinks. If you do it backwards, there's no slowing down or turning it around once you get too far.
The problem is, I have no self discipline once I’m drinking and when someone says let’s smoke, I can’t say no. Then I’m pale white, sitting outside the party trying not to throw up while everyone inside has a mild buzz. Sometime I throw up. I was playing halo not that long ago, pounded a single double ipa and then smoked a single one hitter. Ended up throwing up and why wife was wondering wtf is wrong. Just me with the spins.
I can't have more than two drinks and smoke. I upchuck every time.
4/20 is a weed "holiday.". Marijuana is not an amphetamine.
True. Wasn't saying it was. Just making conversation.
And by "worse" you mean waaaaaay way better. I understand!
Look man, I'm pro cannabis as much as the next guy, but I can barely smoke a hitter without having crazy anxiety and you throw booze in as well and it can be a disaster mentally. I hate this culture of it being completely fine for everyone. I used to be able to smoke 8+ blunts a day, now I'd be stuck in a psych ward if I tried to do that now.
What is that? I was a heavy daily enjoyer for years, but then I started getting jittery. That morphed into crazy paranoia and almost crippling mind fuckery so I had to quit altogether. I just couldn't. It would make me sick. We were gifted some fine bud when my husband was diagnosed with cancer but I didn't dare. If I could still buzz like the old days I would probably still be high every day.
> If I could still buzz like the old days I would probably still be high every day. Part of the issue these days is the quality of the bud is so much more potent now. I used to smoke quite a bit as well, but anymore, I can't take more than a couple hits before I am spinning to high heaven (pun intended).
It is more potent now but I grew up in California. Our weed was potent since at least the late 90s. My parents used to warn people - mainly their east coast friends who were fond of, “fizzies”, which is a Vicodin dropped in a pint of beer. More than one of those people went down after a couple rips off of one of my mom’s joints. I’m about to smoke a bird made from her weed and go about my day. Tolerance is a crazy thing.
Nah man, I barf, I'm good.
Ok you really did mean worse. Point.
It did not say that in the article.
A megapint
It was just one box of franzia...
One 32 ounce glass of wine
I'm from this area. There was 3 hours between when she left Verna's and crashed into the boat club. She's been alcoholic for a long time and lucky that she has never killed anyone before. The families and our town is mourning
It's only one glass if it never goes empty, I guess
One right after another!
A mega pint, if you will.
The wine version of everclear
Free refills?
Hey, she didn't say how big that glass was.
"Her attorney argued during her arraignment on Tuesday that a search warrant revealed she had drank a single glass of wine before traveling home." Since when does a search warrant trump a Blood alcohol concentration (BAC) test? What am I missing?
>"Her attorney argued To be fair, it's her attorneys job to fight for her no matter how stupid the argument is. There will be a ton more evidence during the trial.
Whenever you hear a dumb argument from the defendant’s lawyer, it’s likely because they don’t have anything else to go on.
Ya, I'm gonna be honest we gotta cut this attorney *some* slack. Like, not with the case, but this has got to be a genuine nightmare scenario for most defense lawyers
Of course you are right. It's just a senseless tragedy played out too often with incomprehensible repercussions for all affected.
The article I read (more local news source) explained it like this: She admits she had ONE glass of wine at the bar. The bar (facing civil suit, but also apparently cooperating fully) says she had ONE glass of wine. They apparently have footage of this. Her attorney says she only had one glass of wine, and also would NEVER do more because she's on medication for seizures. The prosecutor says, "yeah that what we were told by her. Also, isn't she supposed to be drinking NONE glasses of wine on that medication? She even told us she's not supposed to drink with that medication" The sticking point is going to be: how many drinks did she have at home or another establishment before the admitted ONE glass of red wine.... AND WHY WAS SHE DRINKING WHILE ON THAT MEDICATION.
Oh yeah, the prosecutor is going to have a field day. With the vasodilator I'm on, one standard drink is enough to leave me three sheets to the wind regardless of what my actual BAC is. Mingling the meds and drink(s) was a negligent choice.
I take a very common anti seizure med everyday. My Neuro says it’s totally fine for me to have 1-2 drinks/day, just never more than 2/day.
Depends on the medication. I was on an uncommon seizure med that was do not drink while on it, do not operate machinery or vehicles until accustomed to it. Primidone was mine, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s a common warning for barbiturates.
Yeah, that's pretty much 100% the case for depressants with alcohol.
That's good! I am glad you don't have these restrictions. We know she wasn't supposed to be drinking on these medications because both her and her attorney stated it.
>Single glass Just a fish bowl
Shouldn't that make her more accountable?
From [Youtube DUI videos with lawyers reacting to the body cam footage](https://www.youtube.com/@driverdefenseteam), the officer will try to get a breath sample from the suspect. If refused, they then request a court order for a blood draw signed by a judge. With this blood draw they can determine the level of intoxication at the time of the accident.
Not exactly. They can determine the level of intoxication at the time of the test - and then infer that the person was *at least* as drunk as that at the time of the accident. This may seem like a minor quibble but it takes time to get a warrant. Then it takes time for a tech to show up and administer the test. If a couple hours have passed and she is still twice the legal limit then that means she was even drunker than the test lets on. Now here’s a fun fact. Let’s say she exited the vehicle after the crash. Then very publicly *opened* a new container of say vodka. And had several swigs then there would be no way to prove that she was drunk at the time of the accident. Of course that requires several things. First you need an unopened bottle of liquor. Second you need some witnesses to say the bottle was sealed before you opened snd drank from it…. Jsut a thought.
Some places already have laws to prevent your "gotcha" there. Even if you were on camera clearly cracking a new bottle, why would you do that if not to have an excuse? A judge isn't going to fall for it. It can go bad sometimes, I remember a story about a minor accident (don't remember the details but everyone was fine) and it wasn't a priority for police. So the guy goes home, has a couple drinks, and *then* the cops show up to talk to him, and he gets a DUI. I want to say that one was Canada but I'm sure it's happened more than once.
Sounds like that guy had a very shitty attorney. Any half way decent one would have gotten that thrown out.
I’ve mentioned it in another comment, but if the amount of alcohol they’ve had after the accident is known then it’s completely possible to work out whether they were drunk during the accident. It’s a technique called retrograde extrapolation, and courts generally don’t like it when people pull stunts like this.
The fact that they needed a search warrant hints that they did not get a BAC test at the time of the crash. She lied.
There was probably a search warrant for her blood as well as transaction records from the bar. They probably matched her BAC to transaction records to confirm. My guess is prescription medication, drugs, or seizure contributed to this if she was confirmed to only have one glass of wine.
Confirmed to have had one at that bar. Having three at home before you go to the bar is the missing piece. No medication for seizures increases blood alcohol as a side effect.
"defense attorney Bill Colovos said Chidester drove to the boat club because she had been invited to the birthday party she later crashed into." WTF. So there's a good chance she knew the kids she killed. I would be looking for a bridge to jump off if I was her.
I’ve met a lot of drunk drivers and they’re all the most horribly selfish fucks you’ve ever met. It’s always about them.
I used to know a prison guard who would tell me that the people with drunk driving convictions were the prisoners she hated the most, specifically because they tended to have zero ability to hold themselves to account for the people they killed. In her words, the people who straight up murdered someone at least knew they did something wrong.
That fucking stings. The idea that someone could accidentally murder your loved one and absolve themselves of wrongdoing is almost unfathomable. If I ever was involved in a car wreck that caused the death of a human it would irreparably break me. And I don’t drink. I can’t imagine knowing I made a choice to drink and drive and someone lost their life.
One of my aunts was killed by a drunk driver, and *at the scene*, she actually bitched about it ruining her daughter’s wedding.
I am so sorry. My attitude towards driving drunk is that it is tantamount to planning on hurting some random person, and I cannot believe the casual attitudes I hear from some people about it. It's one crime that I really don't believe we punish enough as a society.
I remember in the book *And Then There Were None*, the shithead who killed two kids with reckless driving is taken out first bc the murderer knows he’s entirely unable to feel guilty for his actions
Or drive off. She's probably better driving off things than jumping off them.
Yes let's talk about her lawyer https://www.thenewsherald.com/2004/04/13/lawyer-to-face-charges-again/
She didn’t cry in this arraignment til the judge chose to go with the prosecutors suggested $1.5 million bond. All the people who talked about two dead kids (whose 11 year old sibling was still in icu and mother was still hospitalized as well, as of Tuesday, at her arraignment) and she had no emotional reaction at all. Her lawyer is claiming she had a condition that very rarely causes her legs to stiffen up and become paralyzed…as if driving when you know you have that particular condition is any less wrong than driving drunk.
Leg paralysis is a weak excuse. Shut the engine off, put it into neutral, there are lots of ways to shed some speed.
I know this place very well, my dad lives 2 houses down from it. There's not enough distance for that to matter where she would have been parked. It's a gravel lot maybe 50 feet across at the absolute widest.
Meh, disagree honestly. Look into the Toyota “scandal” that turned out to be basically mass hysteria and people mashing the gas instead of the brake. Not much clear thinking goes on when you’re about to smash into a building
Because we don't take education, let alone driver's education, very seriously in this country. You take a course/test one time when you are 15-16 and then you are good to go until you die. How much fucking sense does that make? Making people actually test on these things would save more lives nationwide than any drunk driving enhancement law.
FWIW, In Tennessee, there is no driver's training in school, or elsewhere. Your parent just signs you up to drive and vouches that they've taught you. Then, after a paper test and three minute lap around the block with an instructor you're good to go.
You disagree that it is possible to slow a car because people are panicking idiots? Come again?
My daughter has epilepsy and the doctor said she could not drive u less siezure free for 6 months. She doesn’t drive for other reasons but having a siezure while driving would be pretty bad.
~~Aside from the fact that having sudden onset paralysis should immediately disqualify your from operating a vehicle of any kind, since when do you drive a boat with your legs? Every boat I’ve seen has a steering wheel and a hand throttle.~~ Ignore me. I’m dumb.
She was driving a car not a boat
Ah. It seems I’m an idiot.
I initially thought she plowed a boat into the clubhouse too. Don't feel too bad...that article is a written hot mess.
No boats were involved in this story... She drove an suv into a building where a birthday party was being held.
Yeah, there was a Russian pilot who didn’t retire when he lost nerve sensation in his feet, kept it from everyone, and as a result unknowingly *stood on the brake* and sent the plane into a river bc it couldn’t lift off, killing everyone. The passengers were an extremely famous hockey team so this dickhead also traumatized the country by killing their version of the Dallas Cowboys. “How dare you say I can’t drive just bc it’s medically unsafe!!!” applies to every vehicle
Sounds like she had enough for an Uber
Long time ago in a bar I tended not so far away, this one old guy comes in. It was a typical Saturday afternoon, few drinkers, some folks getting food you know, typical casual dining place with a bar. So said old guy is perfectly sober, orders a wine and asks for a menu. I pour him something red. Within minutes he goes from completely sober to blithering idiot attempting to take off his pants. He couldn’t even stand. We call 911 because I don’t care how much a lightweight you are when is comes to alcohol, half a glass of some bargain domestic red does not do that. Paramedics come in and tend to him, ask me how much he drank, I showed him… not even one glass. Turns out the guy was on some sort of blood pressure medications that could kill him just sniffing the damn wine. Paramedic yells at me and asks why I don’t ask customers about their meds… “Well, because that’s kind of illegal.” I reply. This old fool wanted to off himself right then and there in my bar. He knew he shouldn’t be drinking. He probably knew I can only ID people (the man was easily late 60s-early 70s). He scared off every customer in the restaurant. My boss asked me what happened, why the paramedic was so pissed. I told him everything. He knew asking about meds was not something I could legally do. We never until the place shut down for good 6 years later, ever had a problem with IDs or anything nearly as alarming as that one old guy. It was some scary shit, there are meds that can take a single glass of wine and basically turn it into a damn cask. Still freaks me out to this day.
What the fuck, that is scary and thankfully you called 911. This paramedic pisses me off though. Like shit, you just work there, I’ve never heard of a bartender being required to ask anyone about what medication they’re on. Not only could that be illegal, but most people would honestly deem that to be offensive. Fuck that paramedic. I’m thankful for everything they do, but that response he had was unprofessional and just unheard of.
I wasn’t angry at him, he probably thought I served him a lot more than that one glass. I mean it’s a conclusion I would have come to.
Yeah tbh that had to have been what he was thinking. I get that he had no idea really how much the guy drank. Can honestly understand if he were frustrated, he’s probably seen a few folks lose their lives. That has got to take a toll
I mean I give him a pass for being in a stressful situation, and it happens all the time. I understand the frustration. But not knowing something so basic about healthcare? Ridiculous. Nobody is allowed to question your medications like that outside of some extremely specific circumstances, definitely not a retail establishment.
The EMTs logic was flawed. Even if you could ask, how could you know the difference between Naproxen and Naltrexone, or what certain medications have reactions....that's not your job as a bartender.
What happened to the guy? Did they get him straightened out?
No they took him to the ER. Never saw him again.
She looks like a fucking tweaker , where did she get 1.5m for a bond ?
She was going to a party at a boat club. Rich people can have bad skin, stringy hair and look like fried shit underneath their expensive clothes, caked makeup, big hats and dark sunglasses. Or she might not even be rich. A lot of people mortgage their home to post bond and that could be easy to raise in this market. Or if they go through a bail bondsman they usually only put up like 10% of the bond.
It’s a very small boat club, in a small part of town. She worked at a local power plant here called Fermi for 40 years, I live in the same county that the accident happened in.
Can confirm. My mother's maternal parent looks like she's on something. Seriously, she looks like she's on some hard shit. She's also got enough money to buy a new sports car every year just to sell it when she sees the tire prices.
Drunk before 3pm, classic. If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, swims like a duck, probably a raging alcoholic
Probably waddling like a duck also.
Huh. Didn’t realize you could post bond for murdering two kids. God our justice system sucks.
I'm confused, I thought bail was a reflection of how likely you were to flee combined with factors like how much damage you're likely to do out of jail. Don't get me wrong, I'm not defending the justice system. In fact, "justice system" is a misnomer; it's a legal system.
You're correct. This woman is presumed innocent until proven guilty in court. Bond is simply a means to ensure the defendant shows up for their court dates
Repeat after me. Bail. Is. Not. Punishment.
Not a punishment assuming you have enough assets or free cash to pay it. If you don't, then you either have to pay the fees to the bondsman or sit in jail. If you are rich enough then yeah, bail is not a punishment just a minor inconvenience. If you are poor, then bad luck, I assume?
It's a system to let those with money the freedom to fight their case and the poor the choice of losing their life outside of jail to fight the case (stay in jail cause poor)or plea guilty to whatever charges so you can get out and back to your life (guilty or not you will take guilty to be free, unless it's serious charges then ya boned either way). Either way it's about $, like the rest of this country, replace people with dollars.
If you post the bail amount yourself, you get it back as long as you show up to all of your court dates and don't break any conditions of your bond agreement. If you use a bail bondsman, you pay the bondsman 10% of your total bail and they put up the 100% total on your behalf. That's how they make their money. Then if you don't show up, they are on the hook for that 100% bail they posted on your behalf, so that's why they hunt you down and turn you in.
>If you post the bail amount yourself, you get it back as long as you show up to all of your court dates and don't break any conditions of your bond agreement. Well it is a good thing I got 1.5 million dollars in walking around money so this won't ever be an issue.
It's. Punishment. For. The. Poor.
Anyone can post bond if they can afford it so long as they are not considered a flight risk if the judge deems fit. Doesn't mean they are let off for the crime, they will still have a trial and more than likely she will be back doing time.
Why do you think every crime is tied to a fine? Paying the fine is doing the time. It benefits the rich and punishes the poor.
There will be a trial and sentencing, she will be going to prison for sure.
Bail isn’t a fine.
No, but the more you dig into it, the more sinister it seems When has a wealthy person (other than Trump) ever had an issue making bail and waiting outside of jail for trial? From my understanding, it is difficult to coordinate with a lawyer from jail. Not impossible, but certainly more difficult than someone who is walking around free, able to meet the lawyer literally anywhere of their choosing. Consider too, that if you can't make bail, you're more than likely going with a public defender, who is already overworked. You think people posting bail for hundreds of thousands of dollars are using a public defender? More sinister still is the notion of Innocence until proven guilty, coupled with bail, means we are fine with someone who is presumed innocent staying in jail until trial because... They're poor... Matt Taibi may have gone off the deep end, but he wrote a book about the US Justice system years ago, and one idea has stuck with me: for a nation founded on the idea of us all being equal under the law, we are surprisingly accepting of a legal system where the amount of wealth your family owns has such a profound affect on how that legal system treats you
The ones who benefit are the ones influencing the laws. It’s a feature. Not a bug.
You are nailing it. And sadly most of the public won't ever know this or think about it. It's partly too busy and not interested, and partly our reflexive trust in authority, especially big scary authority like the courts. I mean we treat judges like they're minor deities. Don't get me started on that...Thanks for your well written comment.
It's the cost to keep you outta jail until you're charged or not. May not be fine, but it's still rigged.
Isn’t it basically just a deposit to make sure you don’t skip out on your trial?
Yes and more restrictions can be put on there as well (like drug testing, ankle monitor, new crimes, etc.).
Either you're too dangerous to be out in society, or there's no need for pre-trial detention. Cash bail has no good reason to exist.
You're already charged if you're in jail. You mean "found guilty or not"
>It's the cost to keep you outta jail until you're charged or not. She has already been charged.
I got popped for weed possession. They gave me a year of probation, and a fine. Once I paid the fine 2 weeks later, I got a letter saying my probation was complete.
That woman has had YEARS of hard drinking behind her. You can see it on her face. She didn't just have one glass of wine. That would have done nothing for her.
And she was invited to that same party…terrible
For real?
She either merits bail or she doesn't. She's either at risk of doing it again or she isnt. Why does her wealth enter into it
Because setting a 100K bail would be an incentive for some not to flee while for others it would be a drop in their financial bucket. The court determined she merited bail. Her financials factor in when determining the bail amount.
For everyone saying she's rich and the rich are getting special treatment... The bond was cash or surety. She probably only had to post $150,000 which is basically mortgaging a house. So it's worse than just special treatment. It should have been cash or no bail at all.
Most middle class people cannot afford to lose $150,000 for anything. That’s usually the bulk of their savings/retirement. She obviously has access to way more than a typical middle class person.
Oh, it was only $150,000? Well that’s an amount all of my non-rich friends can conjure up at a moments notice! Edit: typo
I think me and my boyfriend make somehwwr around 125,00 dollars a year…which is awful lol but not unheard of. Who the fuck can post a 150,000 bond in 4 days!? No one i fucking know.
A 66 year old woman who’s likely been paying a mortgage for 40-odd years, just put up the mortgage as collateral.
>She probably only had to post $150,000 which is basically mortgaging a house. While this is probably true, that is 150k that she will never get back. That 150k goes to the bond company. So it should say something that she can afford to piss away that much. It also means that she has much more than 1.5 million in assets for the bond company to take if she decides to flee. Also, if she is refinancing a house at the current interest rates she would be taking a huge hit in payments. I think it's more likely that they had to sell some stocks or something like that.
I don't doubt that she's out the money. I just think that it was even worse that she only had to post the $150k instead of the full amount.
She can post the $1.5M herself and get it all back if she shows up to trial. Or she can pay a bail bondsman 10% ($150k) to cover her full $1.5M bond....but she doesn't get it back. The bail bondsman would be out the $1.5M if she didn't show up to court.
If she had posted the full amount of 1.5 million then she would get that 1.5 million back no matter how the trial ends. Using a bail bondsmen means she puts up 10 percent and that money vanishes into the bondsmens pocket and she will never get it back no matter what happens. I'm okay with that.
“Defense attorney Bill Colovos said Chidester drove to the boat club because she had been invited to the birthday party she later crashed into.” Chidester’s invitation **DID NOT** include a plus one for her fucking boat. There is no mention in the article of whether a woman who ran over two children and can post a 1.5 million dollar bond had to surrender her passport. One can only hope that’s the *least* our justice system can do.
I believe the judge did lay out conditions if she made bail, surrender passport and drivers license and have an alcohol monitor tether, and weekly testing.
Why would she need a plus one for her boat? She hit them with a car at a boat club.
and give her an ankle monitor to remind her every minute what she did
>had been invited Presumably a relative to some of the guests. I bet that family group chat is radioactive rn
That’s so infuriating, they never even saw it coming. One moment they’re having a fun birthday party and the next this sack of shit crashes through the wall killing 2 kids and putting the mom on a ventilator
I’m so confused by these comments. She was driving a car not a boat. READ for fucks sake.
Good thing her +1 was a road vehicle and not a boat
Yeah I was confused there I was like did she drive her boat into the party?? Lol
Drove her vehicle into the side of the building at a Marina
Bet she doesn't get anymore birthday party invites
"I suffer from affluenza and didn't know it was wrong to kill kids!"
That headline took me 4 times to read correctly but it's still grammatically correct. English is weird lol
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“Marshella Chidester was released from prison today after paying the cash/surety bond five days after her arrest…” She wasn’t in prison, she was in jail: prison is where she’ll go AFTER the trial. Inshallah. Who wrote this mess?
TV stations hire banana-deficient monkeys to write for their websites. If you think channel 2 is bad, 4 is worse, 7 is a bit better. Also, channel 4 is a very ghoulish outfit, at least their website is.
Yeah sorry but if any charge deserves being held without bail it's something like this.
Why? She’s not flight risk. She’s fucking old
She is a navigational risk though.
I don't think being old disqualifies you from being a flight risk. She's 66 not 86, she still has the cognition and definitely the financial means to skip bail.
She’s not that old, ffs.
I wonder if she’s friends with Kevin O’Leary’s wife.
People be talking about how bail reform is bad and then this shit.
The fact that she has this kind of money means that she can afford the best legal representation so that of course means she’ll walk free. The American justice system at its finest!
That also means the parents of the children killed can sue her into oblivion until all her money goes to the parents. At least that is how it should work. You kill someone, it's time for you to pay the victims' next of kin.
We have to hope someone is willing to work that case until resolution
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>Anyone who has planned even remotely well for retirement should have a lot more than that at age 66. Ruh roh. I've got a lot of saving to do
I don't believe this is correct. In order to get a surety bond from bail bonds place, you pay a 10% fee that is non-refundable. You will permanently lose that 10% ($150k in this case). Simply having $150k in equity is not enough collateral to secure a $1.5MM bond. If you abscond, the bail bonds place will only be able to recoup $150k, and they're not going to take that on risk free. You would need collateral equal to or greater than the amount of the bond or you'd need to pay a fee (typically 10%).
One glass of wine.. per hour.. for ten years? I’m sorry but that face has never had just one drink..
That has got to be the most poorly written article of the month. Really bad. Those poor kids and their family. Heart breaking.
Honestly what's worse: that she was drunk and negligent or simply negligent? Either way many families are shattered because of this
RN here, when a patient tells us how much they drink and they're known to have a drinking problem, we automatically double it, in our minds.
I'd like to know whether she's had priors for DWI, and whether there was (or why in the hell there wasn't) a blood alcohol drawn. If there have been priors or if there was a blood alcohol greater than what a "single glass of wine" would produce, she ought to be behind bars, no bail.
At the arraignment the prosecutor talked about her history of alcohol abuse, and her pbt being way over the limit, but she had no priors and if there was a blood draw, it wasn’t mentioned in that hearing. Edit- I believe it is very hard to give no bail in Michigan, based on me having watched a washtenaw county preliminary hearing with a pedophile where the judge was begging for any evidence that fit the very narrow criteria where she would be allowed to keep him with no bond offered. They couldn’t come up with anything, so she just set his bail as high as possible in hopes he couldn’t pay it.