Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

Lawmakers to consider bills that would limit text messaging

When the Legislature meets in February to consider bills, including those prohibiting motorists from texting or otherwise using cell phones while driving, lawmakers will hear about a Las Vegas woman who remains on disability six years after she and her husband were seriously injured in an accident on U.S. 95.

Shortly before midnight on Jan. 18, 2004, Jennifer Watkins and husband Richard stopped in the northbound left-handed median near Tropicana Avenue, where they were helping a friend with car trouble. That’s when a half-ton truck driven by a 17-year-old girl who was talking on her cell phone and fiddling with her radio plowed into them at 75 miles an hour.

The impact was so sudden the truck didn’t even leave skid marks as it sent the other two cars spinning onto the highway. Richard, who temporarily lost consciousness, suffered a lacerate liver and a gash to his head. He’s lost his childhood memories and doesn’t like to talk about the accident to this day.

But Jennifer, 27, is willing to retell her story. Having suffered a brain injury as well as fractures to her pelvis and right arm, she is motivated to tell lawmakers why drivers should be banned from talking on their cell phone or texting.

“It doesn’t matter how much driving experience you have,” she said. “It’s dangerous to use a cell phone while driving. It has been proven that it’s distracting. The girl who hit us will have to spend the rest of her life knowing what she did.”

There should be plenty of opportunity to submit her testimony because two state senators, five Assemblymen and the Nevada Department of Public Safety plan to submit bills banning texting or general cell phone use while driving.

Read the rest of the story in Wednesday’s Las Vegas Sun or at lasvegassun.com.