Author Archives: Jay Butchko
Trucks Are the Deadliest Ingredient in Multi-Vehicle Pileups
If you have ever driven in New Jersey, then there was probably a time when you were stuck in traffic because, somewhere up the road, there was an accident that involved three or more cars. Most of the time, these accidents are not catastrophic. Some lanes of traffic are blocked until tow trucks can… Read More »
Wrong Way Collisions Involving Drugs
Some controlled substances, no matter how dangerous, have a glamorous image. In the 90s, the media referred to rail thin models with stringy hair and dark eye makeup as “heroin chic,” despite that heroin had been the world’s most feared drug until crack cocaine gripped the public’s consciousness. Before the crack cocaine epidemic that… Read More »
Snow and Overpasses Are a Bad Combination
The winter in New Jersey is always a bummer in New Jersey, except for those first few fleeting moments when the snow is so fresh that it has not yet realized where it landed, before it takes on the grayish hue that characterizes the Garbage State for most of the year. This winter has… Read More »
Car Accidents in Whiteout Conditions
Everyone who went to driver’s ed in New Jersey knows the litany of admonitions about driving safely during or after a snowfall. Don’t drive unless you really need to. Clean your car thoroughly before you start driving, so that snow sliding down your front or back windshield does not distract you or obscure your… Read More »
Unfair Police Reports About Car Accidents
Police reports seem boring, but if you read them thoughtfully enough, they are as full of detail as a police procedural drama or action movie. The officer’s handwriting is approximately the midpoint between the illegible scrawl of a physician and the elegant pen strokes of a professional calligrapher. Ernest Hemingway would undoubtedly approve of… Read More »
Valentine’s Day Crash Injures Pedestrian
Florida might be the only state in the Union with a native population of crocodiles, and Alaska might be the only one that issues every long-time resident of the state a check for his or her share of revenues from Alaska’s petroleum resources, but New Jersey is the only place where you can drive… Read More »
Bus Crashes Into Bridge in Mahwah
If you live in New Jersey, you have every reason to brag about how we have more public transportation options than most parts of the United States. It is easier to travel by bus and train in New Jersey than it is anywhere else in the U.S., except perhaps the most cosmopolitan cities like… Read More »
Who Is at Fault for an Ambulance Accident
In your mind, the usual sequence of events goes like this. After a car accident, an ambulance comes to attend to the injured people, and if anyone is injured seriously enough to go to the hospital, the ambulance transports them there. The ambulance flashes its lights and runs its sirens so that people will… Read More »
Injured by a Possibly Drunk Driver
New Jersey’s drunk driving laws are notoriously confusing, especially for people who are new to the Garden State or who get pulled over on suspicion of DUI while visiting here. New Jersey law does not treat drunk driving as a crime when the drunk driver does not cause an accident. Instead, the case goes… Read More »
A Car With a Built In Breathalyzer?
Some of the safety features in cars today would have seemed futuristic ten years ago. When you had to postpone your driving test because you could not park straight in a parking space to the satisfaction of your driver’s ed teacher, you would not have guessed that, in 2026, cars would display yellow and… Read More »