Parents of students killed or injured in school-zone crosswalks are backing a measure in the Ohio General Assembly to increase the penalty from a misdemeanor to a felony.

The bill, entitled "Aspen Runnel's Law," was introduced after 15-year-old Aspen Runnels was struck and killed in a crosswalk outside Lakota East Freshman School in Butler County last year.

Aspen's mother, Christina Alcorn, said the 30-day sentence given to the driver is not enough of a deterrent for speeding in a school zone.

"We're hoping that people will start paying a little bit more attention," said Alcorn, "because we all have children in our lives - whether it's our own children, grandchildren, godchildren, nieces, nephews, whatever it may be. Almost everybody has a child in their life that they want to see come home safely."

The driver pleaded guilty to vehicular homicide in Aspen's death and was sentenced to 30 days in jail, 60 days of house arrest, probation, and community service.

The new law would make vehicular homicide in a school zone a felony, with six to 18 months in prison and fines of up to $5,000.

Alcorn is working to pass the bill with another Ohio mother, Trisha Parnell, whose daughter Maddy was struck and seriously injured in 2018 in a collision in a school zone in the same district.

Alcorn said she was shocked by how lenient the school zone penalties were compared to other types of collisions.

"We were a little baffled," said Alcorn. "Most people that we've spoken to about this have been, first of all, surprised that this wasn't already a law on the book, but also that the children in the school zone were not considered protected like a construction zone would be."

House Bill 203 awaits a hearing before the Ohio House Judiciary Committee. Alcorn said she wants tougher consequences so drivers think twice before speeding in a school zone.

"The main thing is that the charges are elevated," said Alcorn, "and that people feel a deterrent for speeding or distracted driving in school zones."

April is Distracted Driving Awareness Month. According to the National Highway Safety Administration, more than 3,200 people were killed in 2023 by distracted drivers.

This story was produced in association with Media in the Public Interest and funded in part by the George Gund Foundation.



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Some 7,000 people are expected to attend this week's Psychedelic Science conference in Denver and public health activists are spotlighting the potential for mind-altering medicines to help address the nation's overdose crisis.

They also said the medications could help end decades of mass incarceration.

Amanda Hall, senior director of national campaigns for the advocacy group Dream.org, said Colorado is on the front lines of psychedelic drug therapies, which she said can improve mental health, treat post-traumatic stress disorder and help people overcome addiction to opioids and other harmful substances.

"Psychedelics can help with substance use disorder, help people really get on that road to recovery and get their life back," Hall explained. "We've seen studies that it can reduce alcohol consumption by over 80% for heavy drinkers."

In 2022, Colorado voters decriminalized the use of psychedelics, including psilocybin mushrooms, mescaline and DMT for people 21 and older. The state has started licensing healing centers, expected to open as early as this summer.

Psychedelics are still illegal under federal law, but U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has supported decriminalization.

Hall believes psychedelic therapies forged in Colorado could work hand in hand with efforts to reverse the punishment-based approach in what she called the nation's "failed war on drugs." In addition to addressing addiction, Hall emphasized it is important to make sure people arrested for drug offenses have access to resources which could improve their chances to reenter and remain in communities.

"To recovery resources, to housing, to employment," Hall outlined. "Things that research show actually makes us safer as well, as opposed to just continuing to incarcerate people."

Drug offenses are a leading cause of arrests in Colorado and across the U.S., and people of all ethnicities and backgrounds use illicit drugs. Those who are prosecuted are disproportionately people of color. The U.S. has the world's highest incarceration rate, with more than 2 million behind bars at any given time. Nearly two million are Black, up from 360,000 during the 1970s.


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A Kent State University shooting survivor is warning Ohioans and others to take note of the U.S. military's involvement in immigration-related protests. She says it echoes a dark chapter in Ohio history - when four students were shot by the National Guard at Kent State in 1970.

Chic Canfora, then a student protester and now a journalism professor at Kent State, said this weekend's deployment of National Guard troops and U.S. Marines to Los Angeles to contain protests feels chillingly familiar.

"It's just unconscionable that now the U.S. Marines, and not just the National Guard, are being deployed to an American city - not to respond to some foreign threat, but to stand in opposition to peaceful protests in Los Angeles," she said. "That does not belong in a democracy."

More than 350 protest-related arrests have been made across the country. California officials are suing for military withdrawal, while federal leaders defend the move as essential for public safety.

Canfora said protesters today - in Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, Seattle, Austin, Las Vegas, Washington, D.C. and elsewhere - are part of a long American tradition of speaking truth to power. She said they deserve protection, not repression.

"All of you who are doing this important work are part of a long line of Americans who have refused to be silenced," she said, "and you are what democracy looks like."

She also cautioned activists to stay vigilant, saying infiltrators may try to incite violence and discredit peaceful protests.

"It's very, very important for activists today and for all the protesters out there to be aware of people among them that don't belong," she said, "to isolate and expose those who are trying to make them look violent when they're not."

Canfora said history is watching. She believes the use of military force against civilian protestors anywhere in the United States threatens democracy everywhere, and urged Ohioans not to look away.


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A new study highlights the high price of incarceration, and says the annual total cost to families of Americans behind bars is nearly $350 billion.

The study from the nonprofit FWD.us says one in two American adults has seen incarceration in their immediate family, with higher rates among Black Americans.

Families with a member in jail or prison spend about $4,000 a year, and the report says for Black families, the cost is more than double due to longer sentencing.

Zoë Towns - executive director of FWD.us - said expenses like phone calls, care packages, long-distance travel, and new costs at home all contribute to the exorbitant price.

"It also includes depressed wages over the lifetime of the person who's incarcerated, who's no longer able to contribute," said Towns. "But also to all the other members of the family who oftentimes are also now experiencing lower pay, just because of all of the shock of incarceration and the disruption that comes with that."

She added that the children of people behind bars usually see their own wages depressed throughout their lifetime, even after a parent is released.

Wisconsin's incarceration rate is among the highest in the nation. Black Wisconsinites are locked up at a rate nearly 12 times higher than whites, despite making up just 6% of the state's population.

The report shows incarceration rates are also higher for people in poverty, with subsequent expenses eating up more than a quarter of the family income.

Towns said the stigma around incarceration often means it's overlooked in discussions about household budgets.

"This report comes at a time when lawmakers and the American public are really thinking seriously about spending, about the price of everyday costs, they're thinking about affordability," said Towns. "And this is just one of those key drivers of affordability that is pretty significant and also under-discussed."

Towns noted that after 15 years of bipartisan criminal justice reforms to reduce incarceration, some political leaders are pushing to re-embrace it.

But she pointed out that states that have reduced incarceration have seen faster declines in their crime rates.

"And this is just another reminder of the harms of going backwards," said Towns. "It's not just that we don't need it, that it can't be defended on public safety grounds, it's also that it's coming at an extraordinarily high cost - not just to taxpayers, but directly out of the pockets of family members who are impacted by it, which is a great many people in America."

Towns said she hopes the research lifts up the stories of these families so policymakers can begin to address the issue more fully.



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