Former Raiders WR Ruggs charged in fatal crash, released from Las Vegas Raiders
- Thread starter RedOctober3829
- Start date
Everyone keeps saying “city street” which can mean a lot of things. I am familiar with that area as we stayed in an AirBnB right there two years ago. It is 3 lanes and pretty wide open. Not trying to diminish the ridiculousness of doing 156 on it and only trying to add context but it’s common to comfortably do 60-65 on that road iirc.
Honestly, who cares? The dude was doing 3X the speed limit while twice the legal limit for alcohol. What difference does it make if it's three lanes or 1? Glad you stayed at a Holiday Inn Express near there though.
This is such a weird take.
First off, going 60 on a street that has a 45mph limit is over the speed limit but not completely uncommon. At 60mph, you can adjust and break fast. Going 156mph on any street that isn't a designated race track is dangerous.
Doing it on a 3 lane road that is not a highway is absurd. Dare I say going 156 is faster than going 60? And as you go faster, your force increases? That's why the NFL likes players who are fast. Speed matters.
This is exactly correct. Jesus, some of you people are losing it. It's pretty crazy that he had an official shirt that said that, and the NFL is obviously trying to remove any reference to it with mixed sucess.
I don’t know what’s weird as I said how ridiculous it still was. I was only informing those who didn’t know but kept hearing “city street” that this was a 3-lane Highway and not Boylston, that’s all.
Okay, then in that case we agree here. What I was saying in that deleted comment was that - assuming it's an official product - there's no way that it was released subsequent to the accident. and it's obviously just a curious coincidence. Come on, people. Let's use our heads and save the outrage for when the absurd is proven to be true.
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Yes, but he went 90-100 MPH above the normal speed. That is absurd. Similar to john, I tested 100 for like 4 seconds when I was on I35 between Austin and Dallas and it was downright scary. It is crazy that he and his GF survived the impact.
I know it’s nuts that he would push the limits like that but he’s 22. I pushed a ‘76 Cutlass to 110 when I was 17. Young people do stupid things without realizing how stupid they really are until it’s often too late.
Regarding the defense…..could it be possible that they claim that the girl would have survived the crash if her vehicle didn’t engulf in flames, since both Ruggs and his passenger survice and point toward the car manufacturer? Would the medical people be able to determine if she did indeed survive the crash and perished due to being trapped inside the burning vehicle?
I believe it was popularized by Al Davis, too. So not surprising they were using that tag line on a Henry Ruggs T-shirt.
Why would that help his defense? The only reason it burst into flames was because he hit it going over 3 times the speed limit while drunk.
I abhor drunk drivers and hope they get the book thrown at them every time, because it is nothing but a purely selfish decision. I wish that drink driving was a socially unacceptable in the US as it has become in other countries.
It came over from boxing I’d imagine. We had it as a sign on our gym wall and I’ve seen it in old articles and fight commentary.
I am not a medical people, and I slept at home last night, but I would guess that the lungs of a person who dies from the impact look quite different than those of a person who dies from the fire, assuming the lungs are intact enough to analyze.
Two things:
1. I’m not sold Ruggs doesn’t play in the NFL again. Leonard Little killed a woman and then played in the Superbowl afterwards, and he was a repeat DUI offender. I know that was 20+ years ago, but this is the NFL and Ruggs will likely still be 25-28 when he gets out of jail.
2. I have a performance Tesla that drives incredibly well and on long stretches of flat freeway I’ve gotten to 120 mph and it is an in incredibly uncomfortable and stressful experience. As others have mentioned, I cannot fathom someone driving 156 mph — nevermind on a city street. Insane.
1. I’m not sold Ruggs doesn’t play in the NFL again. Leonard Little killed a woman and then played in the Superbowl afterwards, and he was a repeat DUI offender. I know that was 20+ years ago, but this is the NFL and Ruggs will likely still be 25-28 when he gets out of jail.
2. I have a performance Tesla that drives incredibly well and on long stretches of flat freeway I’ve gotten to 120 mph and it is an in incredibly uncomfortable and stressful experience. As others have mentioned, I cannot fathom someone driving 156 mph — nevermind on a city street. Insane.
It wouldn't matter, he caused the crash would be all that mattered, you're not gonna win an argument on the basis of "this car should have been less damaged by contact with a 2 ton piece of metal traveling 150+MPH.
And this is the key point. The NFL, and society in general, have changed a great deal in those two decades. There would be far more scrutiny to a Ruggs return than there was when Little came back.
Now who’s being naive.
Tyreke Hill, Watson almost traded, that Giants kicker a couple years ago. I haven’t seen much evolution on criminal or social issues.
Oh, I've always been naive ... but I'll buy you a beverage if Ruggs plays again in the NFL
Nice try ... but I'll pick out the bottled water for you
I am a pathologist, and this could actually be tricky - it is likely that there would be inhalation injury (soot etc) from the fire, and also extensive traumatic injury due to the forces involved. Which exactly caused the death (including a combination of these factors) would be hard to say, unless the autopsy showed something highly suggestive.
But, it seems like he’s clearly responsible either way, right?
No caveat for if he gets 10-20 years in jail? You're a brave man.
This guy wasn’t 17, and to characterize this as a case of "pushing limits" feels bizarrely inappropriate. This is a drunk driver who killed an innocent person.
Again, I have to stress how offensive it is to see you putting forth a "defense" (your word) for driving drunk and plowing into a car at 156 mph. We really don’t need to search for the cause of death here. The fact that the victim may have survived the initial impact doesn't in any way lesson his responsibility.
More to the point: why is your first instinct to search for mitigating factors?
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And this motherfucker's own brother died from a drunk driving accident to the point where acknowledging him after every TD he scored.
Fuck this guy now and forever. I hope he never sees the light of day again. I don't give a fuck how young he is: he was old enough to make the decision to drive like a lunatic while impaired, with a loaded gun, with his own girlfriend in the car. Tell me you're a selfish narcissistic prick without telling me you're a selfish narcissistic prick.
The reports are saying the first responders could hear screams coming from the burning car but couldn't get her out because she was pinned inside and the heat and smoke overcame them and they had to depart the immediate area.
So... yes, she burned to death and the dog might have too.
So... yes, she burned to death and the dog might have too.
And this motherfucker's own brother died from a drunk driving accident to the point where acknowledging him after every TD he scored.
Fuck this guy now and forever. I hope he never sees the light of day again. I don't give a fuck how young he is: he was old enough to make the decision to drive like a lunatic while impaired, with a loaded gun, with his own girlfriend in the car. Tell me you're a selfish narcissistic prick without telling me you're a selfish narcissistic prick.
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I don’t think it matters, at least not for the criminal case. I was addressing only the quoted portion of the post.
As an aside, I am confident that it would affect apportionment of liability in the civil case. I never practiced in California [edit: Nevada], and I don’t know their laws about joint and several liability, so I can’t say for sure. Where I practiced, we followed what’s called modified joint and several, meaning that if a defendant is even 1% at fault, they’re on the hook for 100% of the economic damages (such as medical bills) but they’re only responsible for noneconomic damages (such as pain and suffering) according to their percentage of fault.
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Sloppy wording on my part; I should have said dies ON impact. I assume that someone who dies on impact would not inhale anything in the fire that followed?
And yes, he’d be criminally responsible either way. Civilly also, but not 100% if a negligent design also contributed to the death or resulting damages.
Ha! Not there either. Freudian slip or something. I blame my dad for singing “San Diego Superchargers” on the way to Sunday’s game.
How the fuck is Ruggs even alive? That article says he wasn’t wearing a seatbelt. I would’ve thought crashing at 156 with no seatbelt would kill pretty much anyone
Given the new details about her death, I can’t imagine a light plea for Ruggs. What an awful thing for that young woman, her family and the dog.
They’ve made a ton of improvement in safety in cars over the years.
Plus some good ole fashioned luck. Never underestimate how much luck is involved in your day to day life.
I had a friend in graduate school who died under similar circumstances. Rear-ended by a guy going extremely fast on a boulevard. Car burst in flames, she and her boyfriend died instantly, the other guy was unharmed. Main difference was the other guy wasn’t drunk. He also had a prior record of killing another person in nearly the exact same circumstances.
The guy did less time than you’d expect, maybe a couple of years. He also received an unenforceable ban on driving. I don’t know about this case, I hope Riggs serves serious time, but I’m prepared to be disappointed.
The guy did less time than you’d expect, maybe a couple of years. He also received an unenforceable ban on driving. I don’t know about this case, I hope Riggs serves serious time, but I’m prepared to be disappointed.
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Not that I have much of a point, but when I was in college I once reached 124 mph on the Mass Pike in a Lexus and didn't really feel stressed out at all, except insofar as I was worried about being caught. (This was on my way back from a road trip covering my college hockey team, well after midnight when there was no traffic to speak of, and I was fully alert.) I'll never drive anywhere near that fast again, but I can certainly understand how a young and overconfident man in a high-performance car can get to ridiculous speeds. On the highway, at least.
The bottom line is that 99.99% of people behind the wheel of 99.99% of cars that are capable of going that fast are no more physically capable of driving* that fast than they are of flying a plane or performing surgery.
*"Driving" = controlling the vehicle while going that fast.
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The fact that the dog looks a lot like our own adds to my already seething anger.
A few hours ago, wife and I decided to go to our favorite beach spot about 40 minutes away. It's a huge & straight 12-lane highway with almost no traffic. I went as fast as 140kph (~87mph) and it was unnerving. I soon slowed down.
Going 156mph is equivalent to around 250kph. That is BATSH*T F*CKING INSANE. Sometimes there are local idiots who get on the news by causing accidents speeding. I have never heard of anyone doing over 180kph, nevermind 2-5-0kph.
This is when I wish something like a plea deal did not exist.
That's the thing. 80-100 is fast but you can manage it. 156 is so much faster, relatively speaking. At that speed, your reflexes don't remotely matter.
And he was drunk.
Yeah, even if he was an American in Canada and read the signs wrong, he still would have been speeding by a lot. 150kph is 93 mph.
Normally, I'd think someone driving that fast has a death wish. Any reasonable person knows the outcome of driving 156. I wonder if his GF was yelling at him to slow down or what.
Just to put it in context, 150mph is when JETLINERS can start to takeoff. Not a small airplane but passenger jets:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takeoff
Driving drunk is reckless and stupid. Driving 156mph under any circumstances is reckless and stupid. So we're in agreement up to there. Now, driving 87, sober, on the highway...
Victim apparently was returning from walking her dog at a nearby park, according to friend who was there with her
https://www.fox5vegas.com/news/woman-killed-in-crash-involving-ex-raiders-player-remembered-as-smart-charismatic/article_5636e6ca-3d32-11ec-8516-4be4187ab360.html?block_id=994400
https://www.fox5vegas.com/news/woman-killed-in-crash-involving-ex-raiders-player-remembered-as-smart-charismatic/article_5636e6ca-3d32-11ec-8516-4be4187ab360.html?block_id=994400