Heather Curtis
WMAL.com

WASHINGTON — (WMAL) It’s illegal to hold your phone while you’re driving in Maryland or D.C. but perfectly legal in Virginia. State Sen. Scott Surovell is hoping proposed legislation will pass that would make it illegal to hold a phone and drive.

Police in Virginia can pull drivers over for texting behind the wheel, but offenders get fines, not criminal charges. Surovell proposed a law that would allow police to charge a person caught texting behind the wheel with reckless driving if the person gets into an accident. People just caught texting would be fined $125 the first time and $250 any subsequent time.

“Having a statute that’s actually enforceable, you’ll see a lot more law enforcement officers initiating traffic stops for people that are engaged in this behavior. Right now they don’t do it because they don’t want to waste their time going to court on something they can’t prove,” Surovell said.

Surovell, who is also a lawyer, said he was hired five years ago by then19-year-old Kyle Rowley’s parents after the teenager was hit and killed on Route 7 in Fairfax County by a man believed to be texting and driving. A judge threw out a reckless driving charge because the law wasn’t strong enough to justify it.

That case prompted Surovell to propose legislation that would charge anyone caught using a cellphone behind the wheel with reckless driving. After debate the bill was changed to allow officers to pull people over for texting while driving and fine them.

Surovell said it’s clear the law that passed in 2013 didn’t do enough to deter people from texting behind the wheel.

He’s hopeful the state senate will pass the legislation but concerned it may not make it past the house of delegates because many are concerned about enacting legislation that tells people how to live their lives.

Copyright 2016 by WMAL.com. All Rights Reserved. (PHOTO: reynaldodallin/ Pixabay)