Maybe after the 3rd DWI offense, the lawyer should serve the time WITH the defendant on 4th and subsequent offenses...

Mostly what happens is that the family (wife, parents, girlfriend) needs the income of the slob and doesn't want to see him in jail for the rest of his life, so they hire a lawyer to defend.

This happened in my sister's case. Her SOB, drunk-jerk boyfriend (whom she has one child by, and another on the way, won't establish paternity, and he DOESN'T CARE ABOUT CHILD SUPPORT EITHER!) did a DWI which nearly killed a family. Through draining grandma's lifetime savings, they managed to keep his jail time down to about 9 months with good behavior and avoid prison. Now, grandma is desperately ill and is falling on the mercy of the hospital system to give her indigent care.

This guy desperately needs to be taken out and shot for the good of society.