On a straight stretch of road in late autumn, 2006, Jonathan Cutler Keogh was killed by a drunk driver.
David Graham Cashman, who had three previous convictions for drink-driving, had consumed whisky at home before heading out to dinner.
Driving home in poor weather, he lost control of his car while passing another vehicle, and struck Mr Keogh's car head-on.
Mr Keogh (28) died at the scene on Main South Rd, near Templeton.
He was on his way back home after visiting his mother in Dunedin. The date? May 14, 2006. Mother's Day.
In a victim impact statement, presented to the Christchurch District Court in July that year, Mr Keogh's older sister, Megan McPherson, described her brother as the "baby" of the family.
"I clearly remember the day he was born; I was a very happy sister. He was born on a cold winter's Sunday.
"My older sister Kerstin and younger brother Craig could not wait to see him at the hospital. We all hurried into the maternity ward with my Dad; my mother was holding him and we all agreed that he was perfect; and my sister and I wanted to take him home right away.
"We were told that we would need to wait a few days.
"The next day, Monday morning, our Dad dropped us off at school.
"Bursting with excitement, we raced to tell our teachers and schoolmates that we had a beautiful baby brother; and my Mum and Dad told us that he was going to be called Jonathan. To us, this was the best news in the world.
"Twenty-eight years later, Jonathan died on a Sunday.
"Early on Monday morning my destroyed parents stood in the cold hallway of my house and told me that he was dead.
"Half an hour later I had to tell my older sister that he had been killed in a car `accident'. It is the hardest thing I have ever done... To us, this was the worst news in the world."
Cashman had a blood-alcohol reading of 154mg. The legal limit is 80mg.
Jailed for three years, with a minimum non-parole term of two years, he was also ordered to pay reparation totalling $47,845 for costs and emotional harm and was banned from driving until 2016.
In September 2006, his appeal against the three-year jail term was dismissed.
Three years on from that appeal date, Megan McPherson continues to confront the problem of drink-driving.
She describes her efforts in lobbying for law changes as a "moral obligation".
"It is highly unlikely to happen to our family again, but we don't want to see other families go through this. That's what drives me - it is so preventable."
The Dunedin mother of two is a founding member of CrossRoads, a group set up on Boxing Day 2007 by the families of victims of drink drivers.
Last weekend, it officially launched a campaign aimed at introducing alcohol interlocks in the cars of repeat offenders.
The device reads a driver's breath alcohol level and shuts down a car's engine.
"They literally stop a drunk driver in their tracks. I know the question will come back, `what if they drive someone else's car?' "I've always said they are not a silver bullet. However, they are a very effective measure," Mrs McPherson says.
She also regards educational campaigns, such as SADD (Students Against Drink Driving) as vital, as is early intervention for first-time offenders.
"Honestly, if someone is young and gets a conviction for drink-driving, then everyone should go all-out to help that person, because you don't want them going on to be a recidivist."
However, Mrs McPherson believes there are some for whom no amount of education will prompt a change in attitude.
Cashman was 66 at time of the crash that killed Mr Keogh. Presumably exposed to various anti-drink-driving campaigns over the years, he drove past a "If you drink then drive, you're a bloody idiot" sign before slamming into Mr Keogh's car.
Of the 30,000 drunk drivers convicted in New Zealand last year, 26% were on their second conviction and more than 1500 of those had four or more previous convictions.
"These drivers are a real and present peril to the driving public, and New Zealand needs to target these repeat offenders in a far more structured and strong manner.
"There is a man in Northland who has had his licence returned 20 times. In 2007, a Wellington man went to court for his 13th drink-driving conviction. Incredibly, the judge chose to give him 200 hours' community service and decided not to disqualify him for driving."
CrossRoads, a sub-group of the Sensible Sentencing Trust, is lobbying for harsher penalties, including a lifetime driving ban on drivers with three or more convictions and longer sentences for those who kill.
The maximum penalty for excess alcohol causing death [that is, killing someone when drunk behind the wheel] is five years, whereas car conversion carries seven years.
"The legal test for manslaughter with a motor vehicle is so high that most killer drivers receive lesser penalties and serve less than three years in prison," Mrs McPherson says.
"The fella who killed my brother got two years. Honestly, if that is what a 28-year-old's life is worth on the road ... it is too cheap. The laws are not acting as a deterrent. I think these people need to be kept off the roads for much longer.
"We are saying the maximum penalty for excess alcohol causing death should be 14 years, which is in line with manslaughter.
"We are zoning in on repeat offenders. Our ultimate goal is to rid our roads of drunk drivers. The other big thing for us is the three strikes rule; that no-one gets their licence back after three drink-driving offences.
"They've established a pattern that they are unfit to share the road with others."
Dr Kyp Kypri, a research associate at the University of Otago's Injury Prevention Research Unit, suggests there is a wider malaise to consider when addressing the drink-drive problem.
New Zealand has witnessed a 10% increase in drinking over the past decade, an unsteady trend of a 1% rise per year.
That's a litre more ethanol per person per year.
Combine that with the fact New Zealand is a highly motorised country in terms of vehicles per capita and kilometres driven, and there is an overlap between frequency of drinking and frequency of driving.
A key strategy would be to reduce the legal adult blood alcohol limit (BAC) to 50mg of alcohol per 100ml blood (BAC .05).
The current alcohol limit for drivers over 20 is 80mg of alcohol per 100ml of blood (BAC .08).
This allows the average male to consume about six standard drinks within 90 minutes.
Overseas experience shows major improvements can be made to road safety by lowering this to .05, Dr Kypri says.
"Australia has had 0.05 in most states since the mid-'80s. It was earlier than that in NSW," says Dr Kypri, who is based at the University of Newcastle.
"I grew up in NSW and lived quite a while in New Zealand and now live back in Australia ... I remember when 0.05 came in here. People were up in arms, but people got used to it.
"There is good data to argue for a 0.05 limit. The Ministry of Transport is keen, and has been for some time. The LTSA was pushing for this more than a decade ago.
"What people will say is `hang on - that just penalises the people who drink a couple of glasses of wine after work; that they'll get nabbed and that will have serious consequences.' But, the fact is, it reduces the odds."
It might also change social mores.
"People in NSW and New Zealand think differently about drink-driving because of that difference in limit," Dr Kypri says.
"In NSW, you're better off not drinking or drinking low-alcohol beer because the chances of being over the limit are high.
More often, you've got to make alternative arrangements: you don't take your car to a place if you're going to drink; or you just don't drink.
"By lowering the limit to 0.05, you modify the whole population's behaviour ... you'll also reduce the incidence of alcohol-related crashes."
Repeat offenders
• Recidivist drink-drivers drive with a high blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .15 or above (almost twice the legal New Zealand limit).
• They do so repeatedly, as demonstrated by having more than one drunk-driving arrest.
• They are highly resistant to changing their behaviour despite previous sanctions, treatment, or education efforts.
• While hardcore offenders constitute a relatively small number of drivers, they account for a disproportionately large share of drunk-driving problems. For example, it is estimated that while drivers with BACs in excess of .15 comprise only 1% of all drivers on weekend nights, they are involved in nearly 50% of all fatal crashes at that time.
• To reach a BAC of .15, a man weighing 80kg would have to consume about seven standard drinks in one hour.
Safer journeys
Safer Journeys is a discussion document prepared by the Ministry of Transport that presents New Zealand's key road safety challenges and outlines 60 possible initiatives to address them. Public submissions on the document close on October 2. For more information, visit: www.transport.govt.nz/saferjourneys
