DWI OFFENDERS HEAR TRAGIC TALES OF LOSSES

Nearly 40 people on probation for first or second driving-while-intoxicated offenses were made to sit Thursday night and listen to horror stories of families who have lost loved ones in automobile accidents.

"We're not here to punish you, but rather to give you a second chance," said Christine Rich. A picture of her son, Bobby, rested on a table behind her. Bobby was killed by a motorist 11 years ago.

"We don't want your families to have to go through the pain and suffering we have experienced," said Rich.

Deanna Kessler mother of a 25-year-old man who was killed in an alcohol-related car accident and Rich are the founders of RCR Publications Inc. of Kansas City. The not-for-profit organization was started in May 1990 in memory of Robert Christopher Rich (RCR).

Twelve-year-old Bobby Rich was killed three blocks from his home by a driver racing to beat a yellow light. The driver was not intoxicated, but had been deprived of sleep for an inordinate amount of time.

"They called us to the scene of the accident," Rich said. "I can't describe how it feels to see someone you love so badly injured. You blow up inside. I didn't cry at the scene; I had the rest of my life to cry. I knew there were many things that had to be done and that I must do them."

Rich said that it was extremely difficult to see her child lying in a hospital bed, knowing that there was nothing she could do to make his pain go away. Bobby had sustained severe trauma to his brain stem, which could not be corrected.

"It took Bobby a day and a half to die," Rich said. "We donated some of his organs, so they kept him on life support for 12 hours past the time he died, until a recipient could be located."

Rich said that the driver who struck and killed her son was overwrought with guilt.

"He tried to call us three times," she said. "When he finally did, he cried for an hour and a half on the phone. He came to Bobby's funeral and cried on my husband's shoulder.

"I don't hate the man who killed my son," she said. "But I hate what he did to my son; I hate what he did to my family."

Kessler also told the audience about her son David, who was killed by a drunk driver just three blocks from the family home.

"Three kids who were passing by the scene heard David's name mentioned and came to get us," Kessler said. "When we got there they told us David was dead.

"He was still in the car because they had to wait for the coroner to arrive to pronounce him dead."

Kessler assumed that the police would ask her to which funeral home she wanted her son taken.

"But they never gave me that option," she said. "They took him to have an autopsy performed and there was nothing I could do to stop them."

Then Kessler told the audience in graphic detail what a medical examiner does when he performs an autopsy.

Those who had not been affected by the emotional stories of the women were shaken by a set of graphic slides shown at the end of the program. Several pictures of bloody corpses victims of drunk drivers were shown in mind-numbing succession. Cars that had been so badly twisted that it was difficult to tell which side was up were pictured next to the victims.

In addition, Jeffrey Harms, a victim of his own drunken-driving accident, told the audience about the severe head injuries he suffered and the painful therapy that followed.

Harms had been drinking while playing golf, and rolled his Corvette twice on his way to meet a friend at a bar. He spent several months in the hospital, and many more in therapy.

"Brain cells don't regenerate," Harms said. "I had to relearn everything I ever knew. I'll never have a short-term memory again," he said.

The group was invited to come to Cape Girardeau at the probationers' expense by Joe Sampson, a probation officer at Community Service Management office on Independence.

Community Service Management coordinated the RCR panel with associate circuit courts in Cape Girardeau and Perry counties. All probationers were required to pay $25 for the panel session. If a person did not attend, he would be cited for a parole violation today and remanded to the court system.