How much is a life worth?

By Dan Drewry

It will be interesting next week to see if Judge Kim Christopher changes the value of human life in Sanders County.

As the Dan Resler case stands right now, your life is worth six months in jail.

Resler is accused of driving drunk last spring and killing two young men who were walking along Highway 200 just east of Plains. Under the proposed plea bargain, he'll do a year in prison for killing the kids.

That's a bit of a simplification. Resler will also spend six months in Warm Springs telling the shrinks what they want to hear. And he'll have to pick up some trash along the roadside every now and again. But the bottom line of the proposed plea bargain is a year in prison for killing two men.

Allegedly killing two men, of course. Allegedly. Until Judge Christopher taps her gavel and accepts the plea bargain, Resler isn't guilty of the killings.

There's no 'allegedly' in Resler's record. Court documents show that on March 12, 2002, he pleaded guilty to a charge of DUI per se. Also on the court record is a 2001 charge of DUI that was reduced to reckless driving.

Is six months per dead man a reasonable penalty for an allegedly drunk driver with at least one prior offense? Look in a mirror. Is your life worth six months in jail? Is six months the value of the life of your kid?

The life of the person in line with you at the grocery checkout? The Resler plea bargain says so.

I'm just a small-town newspaper publisher. I'm not a learned maven of the law.

But it seems to me that criminal justice has two purposes: to punish the guilty and to warn other would-be criminals that there are serious consequences for breaking society's rules.

The Resler plea bargain fails on both counts. Six months in prison for taking a life? Is that a reasonable punishment for a repeat offender? And what kind of message does it send to those who might think of getting behind the wheel at 2 a.m. when they are reelin' drunk? The plea bargain says it's OK to take the chance. Wiping out a couple of kids is no big deal. A year in jail, a little time at Warm Springs, and it's all good. That's the loud-and-clear message of the Resler plea bargain. And it's coming out just in time for the high school kegger season.

If six months in prison is the penalty for a repeat offender, what happens to a first offender? If you're drunk and kill someone on the road in Sanders County and your driving record's clean, do they plea-bargain it down to double-parking in front of the saloon? Drink, drive, kill, and in six months it's all good?

It's all good except for the families of those two dead lads. It's all good except for those of us who choose not to drink and drive, who are revolted by alcohol-based highway carnage, and who feel that the safety of our families is jeopardized by a legal system that values our lives at six months in jail.

It will be very interesting next week to watch Judge Christopher tap her gavel. And it will be very interesting to watch the next election for Sanders County prosecuting attorney.