Chicago DUI lawyer comments on car perks and DUI legislation

This Chicago DUI lawyer has postedhere and here about professional courtesies. Today, it looks like the word “perks” is in greater use as a description of what the Illinois Senate President receives.

April 19, Chicago, IL

The latest drunken driving arrest for Illinois Senate President John Cullerton's son has exposed a little-known perk of taxpayer-funded vehicles for top state lawmakers, a benefit to those in charge of fixing a government that is billions of dollars in the red.

Garritt Cullerton, 26, who has a nine-year trail of traffic citations from Chicago to Springfield, was driving a state-owned Ford Escape SUV when he was pulled over by Chicago police early Sunday. He had a blood-alcohol level of 0.188, more than twice the legal limit, according to police.

The 2009 SUV was used by John Cullerton and kept primarily at his Chicago home, where Garritt Cullerton lives. The Senate president said Monday that as a result of his son's "unauthorized" use of the vehicle; he would now keep it parked at his downtown state office in the Thompson Center.

Garritt Cullerton has been pulled over eight times on Illinois roads since July 2001 for citations that included following too closely, speeding 115 mph in a 65 mph zone and twice previously for driving under the influence of alcohol, according to court records. In some of those cases, according to court records and interviews, he was driving his father's car displaying the official Senate license plate "6" that denotes John Cullerton's North Side legislative district.

The legislator's son was not convicted in the previous DUI cases, in 2004 and 2008, but was fined for lesser traffic offenses in both instances. John Cullerton, an attorney, said he "never, ever intervened in any court cases affecting any of my children. And nor would I."

The Senate leader has long been a transportation safety advocate and sponsored legislation requiring motorists convicted of drunken driving to blow into an ignition-locking device to prove their sobriety.

I’m curious to see what is going to happen to lots of pending DUI legislation during the waning days of the session.