Not Just Dollars and Cents: Some Costs of a DUI Are Not Quantifiable

Interviewer: Is there anything that you would like to mention as far as the costs go?

Steve Tomeo: Well, you know, there are a lot of costs we do not think about and are not quantifiable. The quantifiable costs, dollars and cents, are the easy ones. We can plan, we can save, and we can get people to help us. We can get extra time to pay them. We can ask the court to waive them. We can borrow the money. We can do community service in lieu of some of them. They are the easy things.

Health Costs: Alcoholism and Related Health Issues Must Be Treated

It’s those social costs that people do not think about and can’t come to terms with. There’s the fact that they may be an alcoholic and they do not want to admit it. They are in denial; they can stop any time, and they never do.

There are the health costs. What about the individuals that die of cirrhosis of the liver, the ones that become diabetic or that are diabetic and they are alcoholics and they drink when they are not supposed to?

Emotional Issues Can Harm Relationships and Limit the Social Functioning of the Individual

What about the mental problems, the depression, the anxiety? What about the relationship issues, relationships with their wives and their mothers and fathers, with their children.

What about the debilitating nature of all of these alcohol and drug issues that wind up costing people a decent style of life and cause them to shirk their responsibility to their family and their community and to themselves?

Alcoholism and drinking is a part of our culture. We went through a phase of it in our early history when the sale of alcohol was prohibited. We do not want to go back there because we knew the problems that occurred.

Just Unlucky? There Is No Coincidence Involved in Multiple DUI Charges

People have to be reasonable about these things. They have to see that when you’re picked up two and three times for a DUI, you may not be an alcoholic, but you may be drinking too much. This is not coincidence at that level.

These are the hidden costs that are just catastrophic to individuals. It isn’t the stereotypical, we’re at a college dorm party or something like that, or we’re on the beach and everybody’s drinking beer. Those things are the fun things. Those probably are the rites of passage that most people go through, but the serious things are, is that if you start losing track of all of that, it gets serious and it ruins your life, ruins it.

Limiting the Collateral Damage: It Is Important to Start by Choosing an Experienced Attorney to Defend the DUI Charge

That’s why you need an attorney to help you get you out of it, because the hard economic costs and the social costs are significant. You want to make sure that if there is a chance of being helped out of the problem that you’re in, avoiding the license suspension, avoiding jail, that you have somebody that’s wholly competent to represent you and to help you through the system.

Resolving the situation isn’t just staying out of jail. It’s making sure that when you’re in the criminal justice system you’re not being taken advantage of.