COUNTYWIDE : Display Takes Aim at Drunk Drivers

It was a sobering display of a problem that officials say won’t go away.

Nearly 1,100 signs, each representing someone injured by a drunk driver in Ventura County last year, were erected across the west lawn of the Government Center on Monday to illustrate the severity of what officials call an epidemic.

Thirty-eight mock tombstones also were placed in remembrance of those killed in the county last year by alcohol-impaired drivers.

“It visually shows everyone how many people are injured or killed by drunk drivers,” said Linda Oxenreider, president of the Ventura County chapter of Mothers Against Drunk Driving. “It’s right there in your face so you can see it.”

The dramatic demonstration included the remains of a Ford Mustang. Its driver was paralyzed when it crashed into a busload of teen-agers--injuring a dozen of them--on the Ventura Freeway last summer.

The signs, tombstones and wrecked car were set up in observance of National Crime Victims’ Rights Week, which started Sunday.

“I hope when people see these and they want to go out for a drink, they’ll think about a designated driver or call a cab,” Oxenreider said. “Everything you see here could have been prevented by not picking up the car keys.”

Oxenreider’s 19-year-old son, Joshua, and two others were killed by a drunk driver in 1989.

“I can tell you the pain never goes away,” she told a crowd of about 40 people. “Nor does the anger to think you have to bury someone you love because someone chose to drink and drive.”

Dist. Atty. Michael D. Bradbury pledged to keep up law enforcement programs that make Ventura County one of the strictest for first-time DUI offenders.

“The drinking driver continues to wreak havoc in our society and on our youth,” he said. “The fight against the drinking driver is never won, it merely continues.”

Ventura Police Lt. Steve Bowman said five of the 38 tombstones represented residents of his city, but no one had been killed in Ventura so far this year.

For police, he said, “Their goal is to keep that zero going.”

A walkathon sponsored by the Victim Services Division of the district attorney’s office will start at noon today in the central plaza of the Government Center to raise money for a victims’ emergency fund.