A cautionary Tale - DUI
First a little about me - I rarely post here but I do visit often. I would classify myself as a raging alcoholic, although I don't actually drink that much anymore - if that makes any sense.
My story is about my next door neighbor - "David". He is a divorced father of one daughter - about 10 or 11 years old. I've known him for about 3 years. In the 3 years I've known him I've never seen him take a drink and I never saw him drunk - not even a little.
About 18 months ago I noticed that his usually manicured lawn was looking a little shaggy. One day while I was out mowing my grass he came out of his house on a set of crutches and asked if I could help him with his yard as he had been injured on the job. I said of course and mowed his grass for the next couple of months until he literally "got back on his feet". Unfortunately, while he was hurt, his company fired him. Where we live there area no unions and as he found out, there was virtually nothing he could do about it without hiring a lawyer and going through a long legal battle - something he had neither the time nor the money to do.
David moved on and found another job, although it paid much less than his previous one. The financial pressures finally caused him to file chapter 13 bankruptcy to avoid being evicted from his home. In a double-whammy for him, the home market collapsed in our area such that selling was - and remains - virtually impossible.
He seemed to be doing fine for a few months until one day he came over and asked me if he could run an extension cord from my house to his bedroom window for a couple of days as his electricity had been cut off. I was a bit concerned but I said OK. This is a middle class neighborhood - people don't generally get their utilities cut off. A couple of days turned into a couple of months, although the additional cost to me was almost nothing so I ignored it. One day he got his power turned back on and things were looking up. He had gotten a new job and was running a side business selling warehouse supplies that looked like it might take off.
Then one day I came home from work to see a bunch of strange cars parked out in front of his house. I took a look but couldn't see who it was. Then a few days later a bunch more strange cars were out in front again. This time they were obviously emptying the contents of the house. Then nothing - for about a month - just a vacant house next door.
This past weekend I spoke with another neighbor "Chuck" and asked him if he had any idea what had happened to "David". Chuck is president of our homeowners association and also a detective with a neighboring city police force. He told me that David had been picked up on a DUI charge. This was David's 4th offense and as such he was denied bond and was sitting in jail.
Because he was already under court supervision due to his bankruptcy case they apparently evicted him from his house and repossessed it. They gave his family an opportunity to come by and pick up any belonging - by this time there wasn't much left, and animal control took his dog away - after neighbors had been throwing food over the fence for several weeks.
I had no idea David had an alcohol problem and maybe in his mind he didn't but he's lost pretty much everything at this point. He's looking at at least a year and probably two in prison - based on the laws and history in this state - and his daughter has lost her daddy.
I feel sorry for him because I knew him and we talked often and I hope he gets his life together, but when you get your 4th DUI - knowing what happens after the first three and knowing you have a child looking up to you - it's really hard to blame the booze and not the man.