(Click on the image for the Nottingham.md report)
- Governor Larry Hogan on Tuesday joined state officials and more than 100 family members and friends of victims of impaired driving crashes for the 16th annual Maryland Remembers ceremony.
- “Too many Maryland families have been shattered and too many lives have been cut short, which is why we will never stop fighting to prevent more needless deaths from drunk or drugged driving,” said Governor Hogan. “On behalf of all the citizens of our state, let me say thank you and God bless you for choosing to speak out about the heartbreak you have endured, thank you for your courage and your bravery, and thank you for channeling your unimaginable grief and pain into such a positive effort to save lives and help keep others from experiencing the same loss.”
- The annual event – held this year at the Miller Senate Office Building in Annapolis – takes place at the beginning of the holiday season, when impaired driving crashes tend to increase. In 2018, of the more than 19,000 people arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs, approximately 2,225 arrests occurred from Thanksgiving to New Year’s Day.
- From 2014 to 2018, nearly 800 people were killed and 16,000 were injured in impaired driving crashes in Maryland. Impairment caused by alcohol and/or drugs is a contributing factor in roughly one-third of highway fatalities and serious injuries each year.