FAMILY PANEL WARNS OFFENDERS OF DANGERS OF DRUNKEN DRIVING

Cathy A. Wilson had something special she wanted to tell her mother but insisted she wait until the evening of Nov. 5, 1988, to hear the news.

Loretta Wilson never discovered what that something special was. Her daughter was killed in a head-on collision with a drunk driver about four miles from her home that morning. She was on her way to school when her life ended.

On Thursday night, Wilson -- now a member of a local victim impact panel -- told her story to a group of people convicted of driving while intoxicated.

And though Wilson has been telling her story for more than a year on panels like the one convened Thursday, her husband Charlie sitting faithfully by her side, she still cries when she talks about the absence of her daughter.

The forum was started in June 1993 by Sharee Galnore and Bettie Knoll, co-directors of the local Mothers Against Drunk Driving Community Action Team.

The audience is made up of people convicted with their first or second DWI offenses, sentenced by the courts to sit for one hour and listen to the stories of those who have been victimized by drunk drivers.

The first session last year consisted of only 15 offenders. Thursday's panel sat before a group of 25. In the past year, the courts have sent as many as 50 people to a panel in a month's time.

"These panels are not to accuse anyone in the audience, only to make them aware of what could happen," said Galnore. "We just hope that they take something they hear from the panel away with them and remember that something next time they think about drinking and driving."

At least one man at Thursday night's panel will do just that. He was pulled over for failing to use a turn indicator on his way home after Riverfest this year. After failing a field sobriety test, he was arrested for driving while intoxicated. Attending the panel was part of his sentence.

"This was a very positive experience for me," said the man, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "I'm really glad this was required.

"I guess I realized tonight that you could not only hurt yourself when driving drunk, but you could seriously injure or kill someone else," he said. "I'm glad these people told us their stories. I know it wasn't easy for them, and it hasn't been easy."

Toni McLain, who spoke about her son's death at the hands of a drunk driver on Sept. 15, 1990, added, "It never will be."

McLain got choked up Thursday when she talked about seeing her son in the hospital, being kept alive by machines.

"The doctors came to ask us if they could use our son as an organ donor," she said. "My husband said yes, but I couldn't accept it.

"To be an organ donor, you have to be dead," McLain added. "I just wasn't ready for my son to be dead."

As the panelists tell their stories, some pass around pictures of their lost loved ones. Wilson passes around a series of pictures of her daughter taken as she laid in her casket at the funeral home.

"The only thing I can buy for Cathy on Christmas or for her birthday is flowers," said Wilson. "I miss her. I just can't tell you how much I miss her."

Galnore said it takes a special person to be able to talk about the death of a loved one.

"Most of our members who speak on the panel are doing so to prevent people from having that much grief in their lives," said Galnore. "They are doing it because they care. They don't want someone else to have to go through the same kind of pain they have lived with for years.

"We will continue to have these panels as long as we have members who are willing to share their stories," said Galnore. "It's a wonderful thing that the MADD members are doing."