Meanwhile, a new report by US Mobile Data Market, Update Q3 2012, suggests that there has been a drop in the number of texts sent each month by users via cell phone, from an average of 699 texts sent during the second quarter of 2012, to just 678 in the third quarter. While some safe driving advocates lauded the drop as a potential indicator that texting-while-driving laws were influencing behavior, the information in the US Mobile report does not drill down enough to indicate which texts were sent via a potentially distracted driver and which were sent in other situations.

According to NHTSA data, there were more than 416,000 car crash injuries and more than 3,000 car crash fatalities in 2010 due to distracted drivers. The NHTSA report also notes an increase from 2009 to 211 by 50 percent in the number of sent text messages.

Texting only seems to be picking up. A survey by the International Association for the Wireless Telecommunications Industry states that text messaging is only growing: 2.206 trillion texts were sent in 2011 and 2.273 trillion (and counting) texts have been sent by late 2012.

The issue with texting during driving is one of distraction. Texting takes enough attention away from the road – researchers believe texting while driving reduces brain activity by some 37 percent and reduces attention by as much as 50 percent, according to the NHTSA. Studies by the federal government show that human error such as distracted driving, is now the leading cause of car accidents nationwide. In 2010, more than 3,000 people in the U.S. were killed in distracted driver car accidents.

The U.S. Department of Transportation has been pushing for more public education on the dangers of texting behind the wheel, from pushing for a ban, now enforced, which forbids commercial drivers to text or use their cell phone while driving, to advocating for tougher laws and penalties for distracted drivers, to launching http://www.distraction.gov, a website devoted to getting the public to “commit to distraction-free driving.”

Nathan Williams is a Brunswick personal injury lawyer, Brunswick divorce attorney, criminal defense and Brunswick DUI lawyer in Southeast Georgia. Visit http://www.thewilliamslitigationgroup.com or call 1.912.264.0848.

The dram shop law states that victims of alcohol-related car crashes or other injury incidents can sue the bar, the restaurant and/or the staff if it is found that they have served alcohol to a noticeably intoxicated patron who they could have reasonably assumed would soon be behind the wheel of a motor vehicle. In Georgia, the statute has led to several lawsuits against restaurants and bars in Atlanta. A dram shop claim typically is in the name of a third-party who has been killed or injured in a drunken driving accident, when there is likelihood that the driver was overserved. The civil lawsuit claim is filed against the business or person that served alcohol to someone, with a resulting injury or death.

Georgia statutes substantially limit dram shop liability in drunk driving injuries; servers may be held financially responsible only if they served alcohol to someone noticeably intoxicated (which can be subjective), or to someone they knew would be driving a motor vehicle relatively soon after, or to a minor.

The dram shop law has successfully been applied outside of the bar and restaurants service; party hosts have also been known to face dram shop claims, as has, in one case, an employer who served his employees after hours, one of whom later was killed in a drunken driving accident. In 2011, the Georgia Supreme Court overturned a lower court ruling and stated that a convenience store was accountable for selling beers to a noticeably intoxicated man who then caused a fatal highway accident in 2004. Though the argument was made that the beer was not consumed on premises, the Court found that it was possible for the shop clerk who sold the alcohol to note the man’s level of intoxication and means of transportation.

There currently are thirteen states that do not have some form of the dram shop law on the books: California, Delaware, Hawaii, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Nebraska, Nevada, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin.

Nathan Williams is a Brunswick personal injury lawyer, Brunswick divorce attorney, criminal defense and Brunswick DUI lawyer in Southeast Georgia. Visit Thewilliamslitigationgroup.com or call 1.912.264.0848.