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This is in regard to the letter in last week’sMiner“Mammoth not the friendliest place to stop.”
For sure, Mr. Clay Van Deren from Snowflake had a traumatic night on Jan. 4. No one wants to awaken to a bullhorn, a spotlight in their face, not knowing if there was a gun pointed at them! That was a very difficult situation for him.
I have no doubt that the police officer acted within the protocol of the Mammoth Police Department, and was following proper procedure. But what I am questioning is the policy of the department in sending a sleepy, possibly impaired individual back to the road, at night, and told to go somewhere else to sleep.
Why can’t there be an evaluation on the spot to determine a person’s ability to drive safely, and maybe find a suitable spot for them to sleep or rest within the town, maybe in the police parking lot? There has to be a safe place for a person to stop and rest if they feel too tired or impaired in some way.
I, for one, would not feel safe on the road, if I knew that a person was driving tired, on the same road as I was driving.
Please Mammoth, look into your policies, and make some sort of adjustment for cases such as this.
Respectfully,
/s/ La Norma Raaum
San Manuel
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