HYBRID: History of Drunk Driving Laws

Thursday, April 3, 2025 - 5:30pm to 6:30pm

Under pressure, Violet, one of the three main characters in How to Read a Book, drives under the influence and causes a crash that kills another driver. Convicted of manslaughter, Violet is sentenced to two years in prison but is released six months early on good behavior.

What would Violet’s story have been if her DUII crash had occurred in Portland, Oregon, rather than Portland, Maine? Two presenters, Lake Oswego attorney Peter Glazer and Clackamas County District Attorney John Wentworth, will cover the history of drunk driving laws in Oregon and how prosecutions are handled these days.

Peter served on chair of the Governor’s Advisory Committee on DUII under four governors and helped form Clackamas County’s chapter of Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) in the 1980s. John Wentworth is our elected District Attorney, a career prosecutor who began in Coos County in 1995, became a deputy district attorney in Clackamas County in 1999, and was elected Clackamas County District Attorney in 2020 and re-elected in 2024.

A livestream will also be available at https://www.youtube.com/@LakeOLib/streams(link is external).

For more information contact Nancy Niland at nniland@lakeowego.city or (503) 675-2538