California enforces stricter ‘No Touch’ phone law to curb distracted driving incidents
It’s easy to be distracted while driving and wanting to look at your phone. Whether entering directions or quickly checking a text, it’s still illegal.
Across 31 states, a new law, including California, is making the rules even stricter. At the beginning of June, the “No Touch” phone law went into effect.
With a stricter emphasis on prohibiting drivers from touching their phones for any reason while behind the wheel.
Eyewitness News spoke with officials who said these laws are in place to help prevent accidents and save lives.
“I hope this new law is in place that we do see a reduction in crashes,” said California Highway Patrol, DC Williams. “I hope we see less tickets coming in from people driving distracted, and that the point gets across that, hey, this just needs to stop.”
With a stricter emphasis on the “No Touch” law, California Highway Patrol said that even with a law in place, it’s continuing to happen too often.
“When you’re looking away, even for that short moment, you’re taking your focus off the traffic in front of you,” said Officer Williams. “Just for that split second that you’re looking down at that point in your hand and then back up, traffic in front of you could be stopped by that time, and you may end up in an unfortunate accident.”
Accident attorneys at Chain Cohn Clark say their clients are victims of a crash that could have been prevented.
“People’s lives are changed within those two seconds, which is what this law is meant to help and protect those individuals,” said Chain Cohn Clark Associate Attorney, Juan Garza. “That could be anything from putting on your makeup, in the car, eating, and the sad part is, these numbers are high, and they’re probably higher.”
Just over the weekend, California Highway Patrol said a crash occurred, sending the driver into a tree. It was determined that the driver was on their phone.
“If they may think it’s a second or two of looking away, but that’s a second or two not paying attention to what’s going on in front of you that could lead to a major injury or even a fatal crash or something really bad,” said Officer Williams. “And I just really hope that we see a big improvement in the reduction of crashes and people driving responsibly.”
How often distracted driving crashes happen here in Kern County, Garza said, this law is in place because things can be much worse.
“It’s important for people to understand that this law is not meant to punish drivers,” explained Garza. “It’s about protecting lives, because we know that distracted driving is still the leading cause. Despite all these technologies that we have, we’re still seeing the same patterns, the same rates of accidents. So, it’s not helping, and part of that is really just that drivers are still now looking at their cell phones when they shouldn’t be.”
CHP and Chain Cohn and Clark acknowledged that having Bluetooth and having your device mounted while driving are helpful, but it’s important to have it connected before you start driving rather than doing it while already driving.
