There’s probably a 0.001% chance that having a “talk” with her will make her see the error of her ways.
This is not something the OP should be screwing around with. If she is drunk and tries to leave, attempt to take her keys. If that fails, immediately call the cops on her as soon as she starts her car.
Getting a DUI conviction isn’t just about going to jail. She may well be given the opportunity to get some real help for herself, such as rehab and counseling to help her get sober and stay sober and work through her other problems.
From my own personal experience, talking to a drunk that it’s wrong to drive drunk is useless. People do not have good judgment when they’re drunk, period. They need to be stopped, and it’s the police’s job to do that.
Feyrat, call the cops. You’re really doing her a favor by doing that.
I’m not understanding the reluctance based on her not “needing” a DWI in her life. Is there some unspoken rule that people who have had bad things happen to them get a pass on criminal behavior?
Do you know any alcoholics or serious drunks? I’m not being snarky. A “talk” with drunk (even when they are sober) has very little chance of stopping them from repeating the behavior. She is not the woman’s caretaker. Should she wait until the woman injures or kills herself or someone else? She needs to be off the road.
I had a neighbor years ago who did similar things. I had similar feelings of angst, but my concern over the ‘what ifs’ were far greater than any feeling about the neighbor. So I called the police.
Mind you, I called the police not when he was heading out on the road, just when I decided that I needed to call. Once I called 911 and it was determined that it was not a realtime emergency, I was passed on to the local precinct’s duty officer who chatted with me a good 20 minutes about the situation. I passed on all the information I knew and he drew up a preliminary report.
More importantly, he got enough information so that a community services officer could drop by the guy’s house for a visit. What this did was he caught the neighbor at a moment when he wasn’t actually breaking the law, and he wasn’t at that time drunk. He was able to tell the man he was now on the police’s radar and he needed to reconsider his drunk driving habit. He brought information of county services that might help him. He talked to him for awhile and made it a point to tell him he would be back to check up on him.
All of this was done without mentioning I was the one who called.
End result: He still went driving on occasion and I would call it in when I spotted it but the frequency dropped dramatically. I don’t know if they ever actually caught him since I moved away. I was never identified as the bad guy who called on him so I could still wave, smile and chitchat with the guy and keep my life uncomplicated.
Try this.
Since nobody likes my idea, I could go along with this. How about it, OP? Call the police station, explain the situation anonymously, and have an officer go talk to her. Then, if she does it, she was fairly warned.
Sounds like a good way to go if you don’t want to confront her directly, and at least she would have been given a fair warning.
And yes this fair warning can be very helpful in recovery it gives her a point where in her life to look at where her problem was observed out of hand, and a point when she decided not to act (or perhaps she will, get cleaned up, which is to everyone’s benefit).
That sort of suggestion was actually part of the reason I posted. My instinct was to call the police and ask if they had anything like this, but again, my anxiety is something that is an issue. If I know this is a possible path that can be taken, it surely seems like a decent one to me.
I will try it and let you know how it goes.
There’s an important distinction to be made here. Someone drinking to the extent they endanger themselves is their own business, and whilst a quiet word may be appropriate nothing more is.
Someone drinking and driving is a danger to everyone, and needs to be stopped as soon as possible. Call the police.
If you don’t call and something happens, you’ll never forgive yourself. Call ASAP.
Most people with a drinking problem are in denial. She needs a good, hard wake-up call.
Getting a DUI rarely helps. Giving the woman a gentle little talk about drunk driving won’t help. Telling her to her face that she is a nasty smelly drunk and everyone has noticed, may help. You’d be surprised how many drunks think they’re playing it off.
I love this idea. Speaking as a former stone alkie and current occasional tippler, you need to shut this woman down with this driving shit, and if you like her enough to worry about her as well, maybe this.
But, speaking as someone who doesn’t know this woman or particularly care about her well-being, she must be stopped ASAP. I’m sure this idea could work – unfortunately, it probably won’t. What with people not always thinking so clearly when drinking and all.
Where is she going when she drives, anyway? Get her some walking shoes and slip them through the cell bars on visiting day. Or buy her some heroin and give her the card of a dealer – she probably won’t be drinking so much, then.
2x to telling her off, as well. I know plenty who think they’re “sneaking one in” when they reek of booze.
Don’t forget to plant the illegal contraband in her car before she drives away and you call the police.
No its not a dick move! Fer crying out loud! She’s driving around drunk…THAT’S the dick move.
Enough with the touchy feely bullshit. She’s a drunk. A drunk who is not your best friend, or your own great aunt. You’re not obligated to do anything other than call the cops on her. It would be an unrequired and extremely generous decision if you were to let her know ahead of time that you will be calling the cops the next time she drives drunk.
Don’t feel bad for the drunk. Her life has sucked to this point - that’s clear. However there are lots of people whose lives have sucked, and they went on to do horrible things, both intentionally and unintentionally. It’s an easy decision to see which is the worse scenario.
Scenario one: Let her know all kindly and warmly that she’s being a bad girl and needs to stop her bad behavior and if she doesn’t then you’ll be notifying the police. Then she gets drunk again, forgets what you said, and drives away into a crowd of disabled children. Perhaps while you are not at home or otherwise unable to notify the police.
Scenario two: You call the police now, let them know of her previous behavior, and inform them that the next time you see her pull out of her driveway drunk that you will call them with all the pertinent information about her vehicle. At least the cops in this case will have a heads up, and might be able to stop her before she messes up somebody else’s life.
So in scenario one, maybe she gets hurt feelings, maybe not, but the chance is extremely high that she will hurt someone.
Scenario two, maybe she gets hurt feelings, maybe not, but the chance is greatly lessened that she will hurt someone.
:smack: Quit coddling the old people! They can be bad people too! Even the ones who have been hurt themselves by abusers! That doesn’t excuse their propensity to injure other people!!! A drunk is a drunk is a drunk.
After reading back, I am little confused. Do the posters who want the OP to call the cops want her to do so proactively, for example right now, so that the cops can nip it, or are you advocating waiting until the next time you see her driving drunk and pulling a gotcha on her?
If it’s the second, I’m with the lone cashew: coat in the inside of her car with cocaine and animal blood. Really teach that nasty old bitch a lesson…