City View students see drunk driving consequences firsthand

Yahoo

27-03-2025

WICHITA FALLS (KFDX/KJTL) — Students at a local high school witnessed the impact of drunk driving up close and personal on Wednesday morning, thanks to the cooperation of multiple Wichita Falls area law enforcement agencies.
Wednesday, March 26, 2025, started like any typical day for City View Junior/Senior High School students until around 10 a.m., when they were led from the main campus to the athletic parking lot, where two cars that appeared to have collided could be seen.
Soon, multiple first responders arrived on the scene, including the Wichita Falls Fire Department and AMR, and began tending to what appeared to be injured students.
LOCAL CRIME: Woman headed to prison for 2022 fatal drunk driving crash
As more and more first responders arrived, students were wheeled into an ambulance and transported from the scene. Ultimately, a sheet was placed over the body of one of the students, with audible sobs coming from an adult woman asking to see her child.
Law enforcement then arrived on the scene. City View students observed the apparent driver of one of the vehicles begin speaking with a trooper with the Texas Department of Public Safety.
After what appeared to be a field sobriety test being conducted in the athletic parking lot, the apparent driver was placed into the trooper's unit, and students were led back into the gymnasium for an assembly.
There, students watched a video, learning that the driver was later found guilty of intoxicated murder and sentenced to prison.
In reality, what transpired in the athletic parking lot was a simulated drunk driving crash, a part of a program called 'Shattered Dreams,' designed to raise students' awareness of the consequences of driving while under the influence.
The program was led by DPS, and Sgt. Juan Gutierrez said the simulation involved a lot of different local agencies and the students and faculty of CVISD.
LOCAL NEWS: Lawsuit seeks over $1 million following alleged drunk driving fatality
'We actually had two vehicles that were involved in a crash previously,' Sgt. Gutierrez said. 'We had our student bodies that volunteered. We dressed them up in makeup to simulate they were injured in a crash. And, we simulated with all of our first responders, one by one, with all of our EMS, Fire, and law enforcement partners.'
Sgt. Gutierrez said that while this crash wasn't real, he sees crashes just like it in the real world all too often.
'I unfortunately have to go to all of our major crashes in our district,' Sgt. Gutierrez said. 'We've seen a lot of crashes here over the last year and a half.'
That's why so many local agencies partnered with DPS to make 'Shattered Dreams' happen on Wednesday morning. Tish Beaver, Traffic Safety Specialist with TxDOT, said the men and women in those agencies feel the weight of the real-world crashes they go to.
'These first responders you saw here today, they see it on a day-in, day-out basis,' Beaver said. 'They experience a different kind of trauma.'
Beaver said the entire point of 'Shattered Dreams' is to stop simulated crashes like the one at City View on Wednesday morning from becoming a reality.
'One life lost to impaired driving is way too much,' Beaver said. 'This is what we do to try to get through to them that it can be you. It can be someone right next to you or someone that you care about or love.'
LOCAL NEWS: Iowa Park man sentenced for 2023 drunk driving wrong-way fatality
According to Beaver, planning ahead before a night of consuming alcohol is the best way to prevent a potentially fatal crash.
'Plan while you can,' Beaver said. 'Have a sober driver, and that doesn't mean the least impaired driver. That means a sober driver.'
Sgt. Gutierrez said if the message of 'Shattered Dreams' gets through to even one student, it's worth all the work that goes into it.
'If we can change the mind and the heart of one of these kids out here from making that bad decision, it means the world to me,' Sgt. Gutierrez said.Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.