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Florida is just one of five states that doesn’t allow police to pull you over if they see you texting while driving – you’d have to be speeding or doing something else. As Matt Galka tells us, lawmakers got their first look at a proposal that would make penalties involving a crash tougher.

It only took us about 5 minutes to find people texting while driving right outside of our office.

A cop can’t pull you over for texting while driving – you’d have to be doing something else and it could be added on to the charges.  Representative Irv Slosberg (D-Boca Raton) has multiple proposals that would stiffen penalties. He wants to make it a minimum 2^nd degree felony if a driver who was texting kills someone.

“Unfortunately as far as road safety goes in Florida, things move very slowly.  I have to just be patient and persistent,” he said.

But Representative Dwight Dudley – who is also a criminal defense attorney – isn’t sure the legislation would stop people from taking their eyes off the road.

“This is a headline grabber…but we need to do more to curb the actual texting while driving,” he said.

Multiple other bills will have the chance to amend texting while driving laws this legislative session.  A proposal to move it up to a primary offense where you could be pulled over by a police officer is gaining traction. Other  bills this year include prohibiting anyone under 18 from using any wireless device behind the wheel and also prohibiting anyone from using them in school zones.