AUGUSTA – The parents of an Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School honor student who was killed in a highway accident last summer asked a legislative committee Monday for help in getting habitual offenders off Maine’s highways.

Doug and Bonnie Van Durme of Norway said their son, Travis, might be alive today if Maine had a law last August to lift the driver’s license of anyone cited twice within a year for driving to endanger.

Travis Van Durme, who had been a star football player at Oxford Hills, was killed last Aug. 5 in a wreck in Mechanic Falls caused by a driver who had been cited earlier for multiple driving-to-endanger violations.

The accident happened 10 days shy of Travis’ 19th birthday, Bonnie Van Durme told the Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee. “He had a wonderful future ahead of him,” she said.

The Van Durmes said they were surprised to learn after the accident that the driver of the pickup truck in which their son was riding had repeat citations for driving to endanger. His driver’s license has since been suspended.

“Who let that boy drive?” Bonnie Van Durme said. “Who let him on the road?”

Doug Van Durme acknowledged that the bill, LD 705, which is sponsored by Sen. Richard Bennett, R-Norway, faces technical and legal challenges.

“I think we should do something, because if we don’t, our son’s life was pretty much in vain,” he said.

Oxford County Sheriff Lloyd Herrick pointed out that police can only get a driver’s conviction record during a traffic stop. So officers don’t know whether a driver has been cited, but not convicted, on a driving-to-endanger violation, he said.

But Herrick, speaking in support of Bennett’s bill, said he believes something can be salvaged from it. “I totally believe something’s doable here,” he said.

State Driver Licensing Director Robert O’Connell Jr. said Bennett’s bill as proposed could violate due process. While driving is a privilege, he said, case law makes it clear that a license can’t be taken away “willy-nilly.”

The committee found even more serious flaws in a separate bill aimed at discouraging drunken driving and voted 10-0, with three absent, to kill it.

Rep. Kevin Glynn’s bill, LD 694, would hold drunken passengers partially responsible for crashes involving drivers who are also intoxicated.

Glynn, R-South Portland, decided to sponsor the bill after a crash last year that killed three Portland teenagers. The bill could lead to jail time for drunken passengers 18 and older who are being driven by a drunken driver.

Glynn said people who drink together sometimes pressure a member of the group who seems least intoxicated to drive. He said his proposal would make them “share some responsibility” if an accident occurs.

While recognizing Glynn’s intent to keep impaired drivers off the road, committee members said they disagreed with his approach. If all 13 members vote against the bill, it’s dead for the session.