How a suburban mom helped lead push for vehicles that prevent drunken driving

In the not-so-distant future, one of the best tools for keeping impaired drivers off the road may be their own vehicles, equipped with technology that could save thousands of lives every year.

And when that happens, you can thank the efforts of a suburban woman who knows all too well the consequences of drunken driving.

Sheila Lockwood, whose 23-year-old son Austin was killed by a drunken driver in 2018, was part of a Mothers Against Drunk Driving "war room" that tirelessly lobbied Congress for more than a year to make automakers install anti-impaired driving equipment in all new vehicles as early as 2026.

"I know people are afraid it's going to make the cost of their new vehicle go up. It's not. The technology is already there," Lockwood, of McHenry, told us this week. "It's not anything anyone will ever even know exists in a vehicle. It's just going to be there and save your life."

The HALT Act provisions, included in the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill approved late last year, give the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration three years to decide exactly what technology will be mandated.

The equipment could include:

• Driving performance monitoring systems that detect vehicle movement using cameras and sensors, such as a lane departure warning and attention assist.

• Systems that monitor the driver's head and eyes, typically using a camera or other sensors that are inside the vehicle, to determine whether the driver is alert and focused.

• Alcohol detection systems that use sensors to determine whether a driver is drunk and then prevent the vehicle from moving.

According to a 2020 study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, that kind of technology could prevent more than a quarter of road fatalities in the U.S., saving more than 9,000 lives a year.

MADD has hailed the measure as "the most significant lifesaving legislation in the 41-year history" of the organization.

For Lockwood, it's part of a growing list of successes in her mission to combat drunken driving.

The mission begins

Austin was killed June 10, 2018, while riding in a car driven by Eric Labahn of Mount Prospect in the northern Wisconsin town of Three Lakes. Authorities say Labahn's vehicle went off the road and struck a tree with such force that the dashboard and door caved in.

Labahn would later be sentenced to three years in prison after admitting guilt to a charge of homicide by intoxicated use of a vehicle.

That sentence outraged Austin's family and launched Sheila on a quest to change Wisconsin law. And she did. Working with Wisconsin lawmakers, meeting with the governor and testifying before both the state's House and Senate, Lockwood successfully advocated for a new minimum five-year prison sentence for any DUI that leads to a death, as well as mandatory prison terms for anyone convicted of drunken driving five or more times.

Her work in Wisconsin led to a relationship with MADD, and when the organization was looking for someone from Illinois to help in its push for the HALT Act, Lockwood was an obvious choice. Starting in the fall of 2020, she worked with other survivors - including those of the Abbas family, a Michigan couple and their three children who were killed in a DUI crash in 2019, and for whom the law is named - to advocate for the requirements.

The group met weekly and Lockwood lobbied both of Illinois' senators, along with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York and U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky of Evanston, for passage of the law. They succeeded in November, when Congress included the requirements in the infrastructure bill.

What's next?

Today, Lockwood is working with state Rep. Tom Weber of Lake Villa on a bill that would remove the word "accident" from state statutes and legal filings concerning crashes involving an intoxicated driver.

"I know it seems minor, but an accident means there's nothing anyone could have done to prevent it from happening. And that's not true," Lockwood said. "The person could have been sober and it could have been prevented. They could have stayed home and it could have been prevented."

That bill has passed the state House and now is awaiting expected approval from the Senate and Gov. J.B. Pritzker's signature, she said.

Asked what keeps her going, Lockwood has a simple answer.

"Austin," she said. "He was one the greatest kids you'd ever meet, and he was taken from us. And his two siblings, Morgan and Landon. I don't want anything to ever happen to them. I'm trying to just make it stop."

Supreme Court says 'no'

The U.S. Supreme Court has refused to hear an appeal by Marci Webber, a woman found not guilty by reason of insanity in the 2010 slaying of her 4-year-old daughter in Bloomingdale.

Webber was asking the court to order her released from a state mental health center. A DuPage County judge had agreed with that in late 2019, but she was free for less than two weeks before an appellate court ordered her back into custody.

The Illinois Supreme Court declined to hear the case, leading Webber to ask the nation's highest court to intervene. They, like the Illinois Supremes, took a pass.

Authorities say Webber, a onetime law student from New York, was visiting her mother in Bloomingdale when she fatally stabbed her daughter, later telling investigators she did it to prevent the girl from being kidnapped by Satan and sold into sexual slavery.

Her next DuPage County court date is April 29.

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