would you want onstar in your car?

from the morning sun

OnStar leads police to drunken drivers

By SUSAN FIELD
Clare Managing Editor

They found the "on“ button, but they couldn't turn it off, and it landed them in jail.

Brent Patrick Farmer, 25, of St. Charles, wound up in the Isabella County Jail after following his arrest for third-offense drunken driving early Thursday morning after an OnStar advisor led police to the Cadillac Escalade he was driving on U.S. 127.

His passenger, 35-year-old Denis Gavin Grant, of St. Charles, the owner of the Escalade, was arrested for allowing his friend to drive drunk and for having open alcohol in the sports utility vehicle, state police Sgt. Del Putnam said.

Farmer and Grant were in the Isabella County Jail late Thursday afternoon but had not been arraigned on the charges because they were still drunk as of 2:30 p.m., according to jail officials.

Farmer was being held on a $70,000 bond and Grant on a $6,000 bond, according to court records.

An OnStar advisor called Isabella County Central Dispatch at 4:15 a.m. Thursday in an effort to assist the men, who repeatedly hit the Escalade's OnStar button panel but would not talk to the advisor, Putnam said.

Fearing for Farmer's and Grant's safety, the OnStar advisor contacted emergency dispatchers, telling them the Escalade was traveling north on the highway near the Gratiot-Isabella County line, Putnam said. Because OnStar-equipped vehicles have global positioning systems, the advisor was able to pinpoint where the Escalade was, giving dispatchers the information they needed to direct state Trooper Scott Taylor to the vehicle, Putnam said. Taylor caught up with the red sports utility vehicle near the Summerton Road overpass, stopped the vehicle and arrested Farmer for drunken driving, driving with a revoked or denied license, having open alcohol and for resisting and obstructing police, Putnam said. Grant told Taylor that he was too drunk to drive, instead letting Farmer get behind the wheel, Putnam said. Farmer's blood-alcohol content exceeded .30 – the legal level for drunken driving in Michigan is .08, Putnam said. The "dazed and confused“ Farmer told Taylor that he and Grant were "just messing around“ with the OnStar button, Putnam said. "Sometimes, you get help that you didn't expect,“ Putnam said. Anne Mittelstaedt, a spokeswoman for OnStar in Detroit, said that the advisor followed protocol when she alerted Isabella County Central Dispatch after the emergency button on the Escalade's rear-view mirror had been hit repeatedly. When the advisor could not get either Grant or Farmer to talk, she notified dispatchers, Mittelstaedt said. While at times people accidentally push OnStar buttons, most people who hit the emergency button do so because they are in need of emergency medical or other help, Mittelstaedt said.

i would totally get onstar in my car cause i would fucking hate to be stuck somewhere in need of help and not be able to get it... itd be great...
those guys are just dumb... :D

My vehicle is waaaay to personal a thing to have it hooked up to that shit, besides I dont even like air bags

id definatley get it, I have a kid and and any type of security is nice.
And for the article...good,im glad they were arrested. fucking morons

I wouldnt im paranoid about that sort of thing i have GPS in my cellphone that can switch on and off in case of an emergency and emergy charger batteries for my cell in case it goes dead.

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Originally Posted by Pull~My~Hair

id definatley get it, I have a kid and and any type of security is nice.
And for the article...good,im glad they were arrested. fucking morons

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Ditto...

I want to direct on of those onstar commercials where you only hear the audio conversations, it'd be like. "Hello Onstar i need directions to "Gun World' and then the 'First Virginia Bank' and then i need directions to 'Dulles International Airport'. And then you hear the driver call later and there are police sirens in the background and you hear people yelling inside the car and the driver goes "Hello Onstar I need to get onto the interstate and..." "Shit Steve, Rob is bleeding pretty bad man, he's fuckin bleeding all over the place" "Shut the fuck up Dave!...like i was saying Onstar the interstate and the quickest way out of virginia" i think it would be a good commercial

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Originally Posted by mmmcherry

i would totally get onstar in my car cause i would fucking hate to be stuck somewhere in need of help and not be able to get it... itd be great...
those guys are just dumb... :D

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That's what a Cell Phone's for. (Though those guys ARE dumb, and No one with a 3.0 BAC should be driving a car.)

I don't need some corporation tracking me everywhere I go. (The same reason I refuse to get EZPass.)

I just want a car.

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Originally Posted by Dark Z

That's what a Cell Phone's for. (Though those guys ARE dumb, and No one with a 3.0 BAC should be driving a car.)

I don't need some corporation tracking me everywhere I go. (The same reason I refuse to get EZPass.)

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but say you were like driving around in the woods looking for your lost poodle one night. And a tree falls on your car..your arms and legs are pinned, and you cant reach into your pocket to grab your swvaurski crystal sidekick ...OH NO!!!! So while your trying to figure out what to do, your poodle runs right by your car, "NOOOOO Fluffy come back!!!"
If you had onstar, they would've already sent the jaws of life AND animal control....
yup maybe you need to re-evaluate your decision.

NOOOfluffy come back HAHA thats priceless...

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Originally Posted by mmmcherry

NOOOfluffy come back HAHA thats priceless...

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lol cmon, it's a perfectly feasible situation..no?

I have onstar in my car. As often as I look my keys inside it will probably pay off in time.

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Originally Posted by Marcus Ravenheart

I dont see much of a problem with on-star. GPS tracking is now in almost everything electronic these days and the new vehicles almost all have a gps technology in them... wether you want it or not. These people... are simply stupid and diserved to be pulled over before they hit a family of midgets or take out a bus load of old people. The peopel at on star where not invading their privacy either... these people where pressing a button over and over again... and the people of onstar sent help just in case these people where in danger. If the case was that a person was restrained and being abducted... pressing the button could have saved their lives due to the fact that the onstar person sent police aid.

-Marcus Ravenheart ( I like the commercial they have about the car going into the lake and the guy says "Uh... I think i am in the middle of a lake... and their is water coming in my car and im slowly sinking." If your in water and sinking... and water is flowing into your car... your probably in a lake.)

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you think onstar was helping their customers by calling the police on them? driving drunk they probably deserved to be pulled over but i wouldn't call that customer service.