Parked on a trailer in the Decatur High School parking lot was the mangled and twisted metal that was once a 2006 Chevrolet Cobalt.

The car belonged to Heather Lerch, a 19-year-old Tumwater High School graduate who crashed while driving home from work on Feb. 23.

She was killed instantly, crashing her car because she was texting while driving.

“Think about your parents, your friends,” said State Sen. Tracey Eide (D-District 30). “How do you think they would feel if this was you?”

Decatur students got to see firsthand the wreckage caused by texting while driving. Eide, who championed the cell phone while driving ban, spoke to students May 20 on the dangers of cell phone use — especially texting — while driving.

Starting June 10, any Washington state drivers seen talking on a handheld phone or texting can be pulled over and issued a $124 ticket. In the past, this has been a secondary offense, meaning officers must see the driver doing something else illegal to pull them over.

However, with the new law, drivers can be pulled over for using the phone without a hands-free device.

“You all think this is just another law,” Eide said to the students. “When you’re on the road, you’re everybody’s case.”

Eide said she spent 10 years pushing this piece of legislation. She has heard all the arguments against the law, including that it’s no more distracting to have a friend in the car or to eat food while driving.

“Ladies and gentlemen, a hamburger does not talk back to you,” Eide said. “Cell phone (use) is the equivalent of driving drunk.”

After her speech, Eide asked how many students agreed with the new law. About half raised their hands.

Background

• Motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death for U.S. teens, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

• When drivers talk on a cell phone, they’re as impaired as drunk drivers with a .08 blood-alcohol level.

• Cell phone talkers are a half-second slower to hit the brakes in emergencies, and miss more than half the visual cues spotted by attentive drivers.

• When drivers text, their collision risk is 23 times greater.

• Texting drivers look down at their devices for five seconds at a time. At highway speeds, that’s more than a football field’s distance.

• Washington State Driven to Distraction Task Force is a grass-roots group of citizens concerned with the state’s number of drivers who talk or text on their cell phone while driving, according to the group’s Web site.

• Other states with similar cell phone restrictions for drivers include California, Oregon, Utah, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas and Illinois, according to a report in the Chicago Tribune.

• According to a 2009 report by the Pew Research Center, 40 percent of teens said they have been in a car when the driver used a cell phone in a way that put themselves or others in danger. The report also cites research from the University of Utah, suggesting that “talking on a cell phone while driving impairs driving ability in ways that conversing with a person in the car does not.”

• Read the bill in its entirety at http://apps.leg.wa.gov/billinfo/summary.aspx?bill=6345&year=2010