About the DUI Memorial Fund
The next of kin to victims of vehicular homicide caused by someone driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol may request that the Department of Transportation place a memorial sign at the crash site. The next of kin must submit an application to the Georgia Crime Victims Compensation Program. If the claim is deemed eligible, the Department of Transportation will produce and erect the sign. To be eligible, the vehicular homicide must have occurred in Georgia on a state highway. There must be a charge of vehicular homicide caused by a violation of O.C.G.A. 40-6-391 (DUI statute). And the crime must have occurred on or after May 13, 2004.
A woman whose son, daughter and infant grandson were killed in a tragic limousine accident five years ago says she has finally notched a small victory.
Last week, Falleen Randle learned that state officials have approved an application to have a DUI Memorial road sign erected in honor of her deceased loved ones. The sign will be posted near the site of the wreck on I-85 North near Indian Trail Lilburn Road and will list the name of the victims and date of the crash. The application was initially rejected because of a technicality, but Randle appealed and won.
There’s no word yet on when the aluminum sign will go up, but Randle said the decision has given her a measure of closure that even the conviction of Carmen Cody Rhoden, the 25-year-old driver who caused the wreck, could not.
“It’s really kind of the one and only win that we got,” Randle said. “We didn’t get a trial, we got a plea-out. There’s a lot that’s not gone like we thought. I’m just really pleased, and I think my kids are pleased that we fought for their memorial.”
Rhoden was sentenced to 40 years in prison in 2010 after he pleaded guilty to serious injury by vehicle, leaving the scene of an accident and four counts of vehicular homicide. Witnesses said Rhoden had been drinking beer at the Braves home opener on March 31, 2008. He was speeding and weaving between lanes when his vehicle clipped the limousine the Randles were riding in.
Killed in the crash were 14-year-old Alexander, 21-year-old Whitney, and her 13-month-old son, Kayden. The same wreck also claimed the life of the limo driver, Mark Gay, 44, of Lawrenceville, who was ferrying the family home from the airport after they returned from a relative’s wedding in Utah.
Falleen Randle’s husband, Demetrius, also suffered a debilitating brain injury because of the crash.
Randle — who relocated from Lawrenceville to California with Demetrius and their sole surviving child, Chris, 25 — applied for the $150 sign to the Criminal Justice Coordinating Council in September. The state approved five of 10 applications received last year, denying four that did not meet eligibility requirements and putting on hold one application that was incomplete.
Randle’s was among the applications that were denied because the case did not meet a key eligibility requirement.
The requirement is that the driver who caused the wreck must have violated the state’s drunken driving law. But Rhoden was not convicted of DUI because he fled the scene and waited a day to turn himself in, according to Gwinnett County prosecutor Tracie Cason.
Cason and the MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving) Georgia both contacted the CJCC and urged them to reconsider the application. Randle had hoped to see the sign erected in time for the five-year anniversary of the wreck, when they made a return trip to Georgia to gather for a candlelight vigil near the crash site.
However, any exception to the law had to be approved by an appeal board that did not meet again until June 25. CJCC’s executive director, Braxton Cotton, confirmed that the board met and approved the sign.
Randle said she would like to return to see the sign when it goes up, and hopes to raise enough money to cover the family’s airfare.
“What’s really important to us is that our fight is over,” Randle said. “We’ll get there, some way, some how.”
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