Opinion ID: 848617
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: PEOPLE v. LARDIE

Text: In People v. Lardie , this Court was presented with a due process challenge to the OUIL causing death statute. [29] The defendants in the two consolidated cases in Lardie alleged that § 625(4) imposed criminal liability without requiring a culpable mental state. In rejecting the defendants' due process arguments, this Court held that OUIL causing death is a general intent crime and that the culpable act that the Legislature wishes to prevent is the one in which a person becomes intoxicated and then decides to drive. [30] We further held that there is no requirement [under § 625(4)] that the people prove gross negligence or negligence because the Legislature essentially has presumed that driving while intoxicated is gross negligence as a matter of law. [31] This Court then proceeded to examine the causation element of the OUIL causing death offense, stating: The Legislature passed [§ 625(4)] in order to reduce the number of alcohol-related traffic fatalities. The Legislature sought to deter drivers who are willing to risk current penalties from drinking and driving. In seeking to reduce fatalities by deterring drunken driving, the statute must have been designed to punish drivers when their drunken driving caused another's death. Otherwise, the statute would impose a penalty on a driver even when his wrongful decision to drive while intoxicated had no bearing on the death that resulted. Such an interpretation of the statute would produce an absurd result by divorcing the defendant's fault from the resulting injury. We seek to avoid such an interpretation. [32] Thus, relying on policy justifications and its belief that a contrary construction would lead to an absurd result, the Lardie Court held that in proving causation, the people must establish that the particular defendant's decision to drive while intoxicated produced a change in that driver's operation of the vehicle that caused the death of the victim. [33] According to the Lardie Court, [i]t is the change that such intoxication produces, and whether it caused the death, which is the focus of [the causation] element of the crime. [34] The Lardie Court summarized the three distinct elements the prosecution must prove in securing a conviction for OUIL causing death: (1) [That] the defendant was operating his motor vehicle while he was intoxicated, (2) that he voluntarily decided to drive knowing that he had consumed alcohol and might be intoxicated, and (3) that the defendant's intoxicated driving was a substantial cause of the victim's death. [35]