Stephenville Teenager Dies of Suspected Alcohol Poisoning While Stephenville, Tx Police Chief Relaxes on MIC Policies

Both the TABC and local parents are very concerned over Stephenville, Tx.'s police chief, Roy Halsell's decision to change the way his department handles both Minor In Consumption and Minor In Posession laws, especially in light of the death of 19 year old Stephen Ables death this past August from suspected alcohol poisoning. Ables died after drinking "trashcan punch" at a party in Erath County, where the town is located. (For those of you that may not know, "trashcan punch" is made primarily of lots of Everclear, some fruit punch, and if you want to get fancy, some real fruit thrown in, in an actual trashcan or a large plastic bucket that held who knows what. Back in 1977, the "trashcan punch" I drank at a party in that same town also contained an unknown 25 tabs of LSD that no one thought to clue anyone in on until the next day, after several of us nearly died. I threw up blood, passed out, and couldn't go to school for about two weeks because I was so sick. It literally took me about a year to fully recover. I drank two 44 oz. glasses of it. It also had several other kinds of hard liquor in it.)

Seems as though Halsell is more concerned over not "violating someone's rights" than the fact that his decision to ease up on citations could easily lead to more deaths and major car accidents. All of this ought to make the MADD Mothers REALLY mad!! Citing a quote from Halsell that appeared in an article in the Hood County News, written by reporter Kathy Swindle, "we believe that odor or smell of alcohol is not adequate to make an in view arrest and therefore we cannot arrest". He went on to explain that "we are not going to violate someones (sic) rights and will err on the side of not violating a person's rights", also stating that research was done on this subject after "someone expressed a concern with MICs". 

Sounds to me like "someones" little baby might have possibly gotten popped with underage drinking, and gotten a little upset over it...I may be wrong, but I am very familiar with that town, and nothing would surprise me. All I know is that if I was Stephen Ables parents, I would be more than "very concerned" over Halsell's decision to back off on citations for underage drinking. I would most likely be trying to get in touch with every citizen, voter, Senator, Council person, State Representative, Madd Mother's organization, and anyone else I could think of to try and get this changed. The Ables family have lost a child! I am not saying that the police chief, Roy Halsell is directly responsible, but he IS putting others at risk by basically allowing teens to "get by" with underage drinking with (in their minds) no fear of consequences. As word spreads in Erath County among the underage drinkers that there is less fear of getting cited or arrested in Stephenville for MIC (Minor In Consumption), teens are going to do what they do the best-push the envelope. And if the people in charge in Stephenville think that "Back Roading" is a NEW drinking game, I have a news bulletin for you-it is at least 35 years old! According to the newspaper article by Swindle, "Back Roading" involves driving on the wrong side of the road at a high speed, on the wrong side of county roads." Well, what they may not know is that it also sometimes involves all of the aforementioned, although turning off the vehicle lights at night is sometimes added, along with attempting to hit stop signs with beer and liquor bottles while the vehicle is moving really fast and the passenger is hanging half-way out of the window, shooting at road signs, drag racing on the road between Stephenville and Lingleville (the 1/4 mile used to be marked off with spray paint...), and a whole sub-culture of drugs that no one seems to want to acknowledge. All of this and much more, in a seemingly sleepy little rural college town. Speaking of the college:

 Seems as though TSU hasn't exactly been completely honest about the crime statistics involving the campus and the college students. According to the Department of Education, and the report by Swindle, Tarleton was "fined $137,500 for allegedly filing inaccurate campus crime statistics in its reports for 2005, 2006 and a revised report for 2007". So, mama's, be careful about where you let your babies go to college unless you look at both the college and the surrounding area very well. Tarleton seems to have adopted the Vegas mentality of "what happens off campus, stays off campus". The "powers that be" at the college say that they are not notified about crimes involving minors that happen off campus. Comforting, huh? I'm sure TSU is not the only college or university that this rule applies to. The TABC's statement about the Stephenville police departments new ease up on the underage drinking citations was that they had "never heard of anybody - anybody taking that kind of position anywhere else". Pretty scary, huh? The TABC also recently did a sting among retailers in the rural town, and discovered that the average of retailers that sold to minors was slightly higher than the national average, which resulted in the offending stores being put on a "priority list" and monitored for an undisclosed time. The county recently went "wet", which saves a lot of driving time. Back in the day, a teen could drive to Proctor, a little spot in the road town to the west of Stephenville, and buy whatever they wanted.

To sum all of this up, other than not being surprised by any of this, except how long it has taken for all of this to finally come out, I have a son and a father who live in Erath County, and I pray every night that they make it home okay and in one piece. I don't want to be in Stephen Ables family's place. No one should have to go through the pain of losing a child. God Bless them and I hope they heal as much as they can as time goes by. Stephen's father has decided to use the message of his son's death to try to change teens lives for the better. I wish him much success and hope my hub helps further his cause. For more information, and to read the full article by Kathy Swindle, contact the Hood County News at www.hcnews.com, and read the front page article, "Under The Influence", in the Saturday, November 14, 2009 issue.