“I miss my daughter every single day. I will until the day I die,” Krystal Kazmark’s mother, Mary, tells Inside Edition.
With recreational marijuana now legal in 24 states, some people are getting behind the wheel after smoking the drug. Inside Edition has found that the act can have potentially deadly consequences.
In California, a 21-year-old driver under the influence of marijuana killed three people after causing a car crash involving five cars. In Texas, a man is accused of killing a family of six. Court documents reportedly say he had marijuana in his system at the time of the wreck.
Every state has a legal limit on how much alcohol you can drink before driving, but that is not always the case with marijuana.
Mary and Craig Kazmark say their daughter Krystal would be alive today if not for her boyfriend, Josh Daugherty, who tested positive for marijuana the night he swerved into oncoming traffic, crashing their car at 70 miles per hour.
“I miss my daughter every single day. I will until the day I die,” Mary tells Inside Edition. “If he would have just been a responsible person, my daughter would be here today.”
This was not the first time a passenger was killed while Daugherty was behind the wheel. “He’s done it twice now; it didn’t seem to change anything the first time,” Craig says.
In 2009, Daugherty crashed his vehicle, killing 16-year-old Alexis Vega. Daugherty was convicted of misdemeanor vehicular manslaughter for the death of Krystal Kazmark. He served 200 days in jail.
Inside Edition tried to speak with Daugherty about his driving history. We found him at a California DMV office in the renewal licensing line. “I don’t have any comment,” Daugherty tells Inside Edition.
Officials say without stricter legal limit driving laws, incidents like these will likely continue.
A list of the marijuana-impaired driving laws in the states that have legalized marijuana can be found on the National Conference of State Legislatures website.
