Victims of DUI hope to stop one more crash

Kim Smith

Friday, May 24, 2002 | 9:50 a.m.

For the longest time, Nikki Wall didn't know why God let her survive a horrific car crash that left her brain-damaged with a shattered hip and severe internal injuries.

Now the Blue Diamond resident knows.

Whenever Stop DUI Executive Director Sandy Heverly asks her to speak to a roomful of drunken drivers, Wall is more than happy to share what a drunken driver did to her.

"You need to do something and you have anger, a lot of anger," Wall, 47, said. "The last thing I wanted to do is misdirect that anger and turn it into something unproductive. Speaking at the victim impact panel is productive."

Although Wall says she relives her 1989 crash every time she tells her story, she does it in the hopes of preventing just one more crash.

As Memorial Day approaches, Wall and Heverly want to get the word out that drunken drivers not only kill people, they maim people.

More than 2,800 people were injured by drunken drivers in Nevada in 2000, Heverly said. Of those, 2,145 were injured in Clark County.

Last year 106 people died as the result of a drunken driving accident in Nevada, 63 of them killed in Clark County, Heverly said.

The average drunken driving victim incurs roughly $87,000 in medical bills, and catastrophic car accident victims can wrack up millions, Heverly said.

About 37 percent of all accidents over the Memorial Day weekend are alcohol-related, Heverly said.

Chief Deputy District Attorney Gary Booker is one of four lawyers who prosecute defendants charged with vehicular crimes for the Clark County district attorney's office.

He is dreading this weekend.

"Just looking at my caseload in the last few weeks I almost hate to see Memorial Day arrive because I feel like we're building up to something horrendous," Booker said. "I've had just horrendous DUIs happen in the last couple of weeks. Last week Metro's fatal (accident) division responded to seven fatals in seven days."

Booker said most people don't think about drunken drivers unless the media reports on a fatal drunken driving crash.

"Victims tell me all the time that you don't think about drunk driving until it happens to you," Booker said. "When you do think about it happening, you think that you'll die. You never imagine that you could have a husband that can no longer work or a wife that can no longer work."

Many of the victims he encounters end up dealing with huge medical bills because the drunken driver was underinsured or uninsured, but that is only the beginning of their problems, Booker said.

Some victims have lost their homes because they are unable to work and others struggle to pay groceries and utility bills.

Charles Van Buren, 42, was sitting at a bus stop at Owens and Eastern avenues Aug. 27 when a suspected drunken driver plowed into the bus stop and kept on going.

Van Buren's feet were smashed and his ankles crushed. The Goodwill Industries employee spent three weeks in the hospital and months in rehab. He just returned to work in February and is confined to a wheelchair much of the time.

"My new hobby is learning to walk again," Van Buren said. "The day after I had my surgery the doctors told me I would never walk again. I've decided to prove them wrong."

Stop DUI paid his rent and bought his groceries a few times after his vacation pay and accumulated hours dried up, Van Buren said.

Aside from the financial difficulties, what bothers Van Buren and Wall most, however, is the loss of independence since their accidents.

Every day, Van Buren wheels his chair to a bus stop to get to work on the other side of town.

"I'm a little phobic about cars now, whereas before I was oblivious to them," Van Buren said. "Before I could try to get up and run, but now I'm in a wheelchair and I feel really vulnerable. I'm not able to avoid things."

When Wall was hit by her drunken driver, she was a drug and alcohol counselor for teenagers. Her injuries left her unable to defend herself from out-of-control children.

She is still unable to work.

Since the accident 13 years ago, Wall has had 14 surgeries. Her hip replacement surgery four years ago led to a discovery that essentially destroyed any chance of her ever working again.

Free from pain from her hip, Wall discovered she had a constant stomachache. Doctors conducted numerous tests.

"The tests showed that my stomach had a heartbeat," Wall said with a laugh. "Basically, after the accident my stomach ended up on top of my heart and my colon was sitting on my lungs. They had to go up there and pull everything back down."

Because her stomach has been stapled to her diaphragm, anything strenuous is out of the question. She ended up in the hospital once because she tried to plant a garden, Wall said.

"I'm trying to find a business I can do, but I can't sit for too long and I can't stand for too long," Wall said. "I'm not supposed to lift anything over five pounds, either. Plus, sometimes the pain gets so bad I have to break down and take narcotics."

Not content to vegetate, however, Wall said she gladly speaks at the court-ordered victim impact panels.

"I'm certain the guy who did this to me didn't intend to, but if I can stop one person from stepping into a car after drinking and it saves the life of (someone I love) or even a complete stranger, then it's worth a try," Wall said.

Booker said it is easy to avoid killing or maiming someone.

"If you're gonna drink, get someone else to drive. No one has a problem if you drink. You can drink until you're absolutely shnockered, but you need to have somebody else drive," Booker said. "Just be responsible. Be a human being. Be a grown-up. Be a part of the positive things on earth, not the negative."