Why A Repeat DUI Offender Was Able To Drive, Hit Cyclist

RENTON, WA — Taylor Goehring was on her bike, waiting in the center turn lane of Rainier Avenue for her boyfriend to catch up when the car plowed into her.

The driver was too intoxicated to notice. He continued driving, Goehring lodged in his windshield, according to court documents. When the driver stopped, she flew off into the street. She survived, barely. She's in an induced coma, has multiple broken bones, liver damage and possible brain damage.

"We don’t know if she will survive or be able to have normal brain function," Goehring's sister, Cristal Rose Turner, said in on a GoFundMe page.

The man accused of hitting her is Vern A. Henderson, 44, a man with more than two dozen arrests dating back to the early 1990s, including four DUI convictions (he's in the process of being prosecuted for a fifth, not including Friday's incident).

In the wake of the Friday's collision, many have asked a reasonable question: How was Henderson allowed to get into a car and drive with so many DUI convictions?

The answer to that question has a frustrating, hopeless answer. There's almost nothing a judge, prosecutor, or police department, can do about offenders like Henderson. Holding them in jail indefinitely would be a violation of the state Constitution. And judges only have the power to order an offender to obey the law. Even if a judge tells someone to install, say, an ignition interlock device, the person can just ignore the judge.

In Henderson's case, he was under just about every restriction possible under the law.

In December 2017, Henderson was arrested in Seattle along Seward Park Avenue for allegedly driving drunk. A Seattle police officer watched Henderson speed down the road, blowing through stop signs as he went, according to a police report. When the officer pulled him over, the report said, Henderson allowed his car to keep rolling, intermittently steering the vehicle into the roadway.

"The vehicle did this several times. Each time I had to use my PA to order the vehicle to pull back to the right," Officer McKenzie Ray wrote in the police report.

Henderson was so intoxicated, the officers reported, he couldn't find the gearshift to put his car in park. He later refused a breathalyzer test, but a blood draw revealed his blood-alcohol content was about 0.096, and he tested positive for Phencyclidine — also known as PCP.

Henderson was supposed to show up for a court date in June, but never did. A warrant was issued for his arrest, and he was brought for an in-custody court hearing in July. Prosecutors with the city of Seattle asked the judge to set Henderson's bail at $25,000, and his defense attorney argued for no bail.

The judge settled on $7,500 bail, plus other requirements: no drugs or alcohol; install an ignition interlock device on any vehicle he uses; and don't drive without a license. He as also ordered to wear a device called SCRAMx, an ankle bracelet that constantly monitors blood-alcohol content.

If a person drinks while wearing a SCRAMx, the bracelet transmits the data to a company called Sentinel. That company then must report the information to the court. But it might be days between when a violation is discovered and when the offender appears in front of a judge.

On top of that, Henderson was allegedly using PCP and pain killers, not alcohol, when he allegedly hit Goehring. SCRAMx doesn't detect those substances.

In 2017, state lawmakers toughened the state's DUI law. The change made a fourth DUI a felony punishable by substantial jail time. But the law requires that fourth DUI to occur within 10 years of the last ones. So for example, a person who gets a DUI in 2018 would only get charged with a felony if their last three DUIs happened after 2008.

In 2010, Henderson was convicted of his third DUI in seven years (the others happened in 2004, 1999, and a second time in 2010), according to court records. In that case, he drove into a fence over while on drugs. His kids were the car. He was seriously punished for that incident: 150 days in jail, 60 months of probation, a four-year suspension of his license, an ignition-interlock device in his car for five years — plus thousands in fines, court fees and lawyer fees.

All that and Henderson was still able to allegedly drive intoxicated in Seattle last December.

And all the punishments handed down for that offense weren't enough to stop him from allegedly hitting Goehring on Dec. 7.

This time might be different. On Wednesday, Henderson was charged with vehicular assault and reckless driving. His bail was raised to $350,000, almost guaranteeing that he won't be released from jail anytime soon.

CAPTION: Taylor Goehring, 24, with her mother, Sheree Maricle Warner.

Image courtesy Sheree Maricle Warner