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Fentanyl bill, Take 2

If you’re like me, and you’re the lesser spouse at home, you might’ve signed a few tags on wrapped Christmas gifts while having absolutely no idea what was inside. And in your haste you might’ve even signed the wrong gift.

With that in mind, you may recall the state bill this year that would’ve extended manslaughter charges to those who sell or give drugs containing fentanyl to people who die from using them.

It passed the state Legislature.

And then the governor signed the wrong version of the bill.The bill switcheroo was blamed on a software glitch. What Gov. Kay Ivey signed applied that manslaughter charge much more broadly to cover many more controlled substances.

AL.com’s Mike Cason reports that State Rep. Chris Pringle, a Mobile Republican and House speaker pro tem, has pre-filed another legislative effort. He compares charging a drug supplier to a drunk driver that gets passengers killed.”If you and your friend go out and you get falling down drunk, and you’re driving your car at 100 miles an hour down the road and you wreck and kill your friend, you’re charged with manslaughter, you’re acting recklessly,” Pringle said. “If you’re distributing drugs laced with fentanyl, you’re acting recklessly. You should be charged with manslaughter, too.”

Attention, boaters

Crimes that will come with increased penalties in the coming year include a number of boating infractions, reports AL.com’s Amy Yurkanin.

Signed into law was a measure that’ll change infractions such as reckless boating, boating without a safety certification and having children younger than 8 on a boat without a life jacket will be elevated from misdemeanors to boating violations. Boating violations can bring $200 in fines and up to 30 days in jail.

The changes are part of the efforts that’ve been made 2019, when 25 people died in boating accidents to set a two-decade high.

The flu bug

The CDC has classified Alabama’s current flu level as “very high,” reports AL.com’s Amy Yurkanin.

For the week ending Dec. 16 we had the highest rates in the nation along with South Carolina, Louisiana, New Mexico and New York City.

The portion of emergency-room visits related to flu-like respiratory illnesses had jumped from 3 to 6.52 percent since the beginning of the month.

COVID-19 cases represented 1.68 percent of ER visits, and RSV cases represented just over 1 percent.

By the numbers

47%

That’s the portion of Democrat voters in Alabama’s redrawn Second Congressional District that, according to a recent poll, remains undecided for next year’s House of Representatives election. The other 53 percent is split among 11 Democratic candidates running for the party’s nomination.

More Alabama news

Born on this date

In 1958, Shenandoah drummer Mike McGuire of Hamilton.

Picture that

A sign at Tony’s Hot Dogs in Birmingham takes off on an image familiar to Interstate 65 travelers. Read more about Tony’s here.

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