I killed a man.
I was out with some friends, we were all drinking really heavily.
We were just trying to have a good time and I lost control.
What is this?
I just drank to get out of my head for a few hours.
And that particular night, I made a mistake and got in my truck.
I ended up going the wrong way down the highway...
and I struck a car.
Was he drinking and driving?
I killed a man.
I'm glad that he's bringing awareness to this, though.
I consulted some high-powered attorneys who told me stories about
similar cases, where the drivers got off.
And all I would have to do for that was lie.
That's not cool.
Well, I won't go down that path.
My name is Matthew Cordle.
And on June 22nd, 2013, I hit and killed Vincent Canzani.
Oh my gosh.
This video will act as my confession.
If I took a different route, maybe I would get a reduced sentence,
and maybe I would get off,
but I won't dishonor Vincent's memory by lying about what happened.
Wow, there are people like this.
But I'm willing to take that sentence...
for just one reason, and that reason...
is so I can pass this message onto you.
I know this is supposed to be sad, but it's making me happy.
It's restoring my faith in humanity a little bit.
I'm begging you, please don't drink and drive.
- Wow. - Don't make the same excuses
that I did.
Don't say it's only a few miles, or you only had a few beers,
or you do it all the time, and it'll never happen to you.
Because it happened to me. I can't bring Mr. Canzani back.
And I can't erase what I've done.
But you can still be saved.
- Your victims can still be saved. - That's...that's deep.
I promise. I promise, I won't.
That was heavy. That was heavy.
This guy actually took a stand for what he did,
and he's putting it out there, trying to tell people
not to do what he did.
Excuses are just words, but when people take
the bad experiences that they've done to try and help other people
in the future, I think that's an amazing thing to do.
(Finebros) So what did this guy do in this video?
He...drank alcohol before driving, it looks like,
and he drove on the wrong side of the road and killed a man.
He's trying to punish himself, not let the country decide what's wrong with him.
He's deciding what he did himself was wrong.
It's just awesome to see someone live up to something
that's horrible, and they know it's horrible.
I would like to think that I would do the same thing,
but I honestly don't know if I would.
Just because I would be selfish and think of my own life
You know, I'm still young. I have a whole life ahead of me.
(Finebros) Do you think, if you were in his shoes,
that you could take responsibility like this?
That's a hard question because, obviously, the right answer is,
"Yes, I want to do what he does and I will take full responsibility."
I would hope to say that you can have the same guts, and balls, and morals
to confess, but it's hard.
I would hope that I would be able to do something like that,
but let me not do that from the get go.
Let me just not drink and drive.
- (Finebros) And have you drank alcohol before? - Mmm-mmm.
I hear stories about them throwing up on people's lawns.
That's just not what I want to do.
You can have fun so many different ways. You don't need to drink.
I haven't. I've seen what it can do to people.
Maybe it makes you happy for a couple hours,
but, in the long run, it's just a temporary happiness.
I've had alcohol before, yes.
Yeah.
Mmm-hmm.
No, I'm not 21.
I mean, I think it's safe to say everyone's at least tried it.
Everyone's drank alcohol.
I can't be like, "Oh, I have a fake and go to bars," right?
I can't say that.
Freshman year of college, when you just move into the dorms,
it's kind of a celebratory thing. Like, let's just get drunk this weekend!
After going out every weekend and doing that whole hangover thing,
I honestly got over it.
- (Finebros) Why do teens like do drink? - I think it's more of a social thing.
It's a lot of peer pressure. I get that a lot.
You want to seem cool, so you go to the parties,
and then everyone's drinking at the party, so you don't want to feel left out,
so you have to drink because you're there.
(Finebros) Have you ever been in a situation
- where you considered driving drunk? - No.
Never.
My brother was exactly at the legal limit.
He didn't get in an accident or anything, his car--a tire popped.
I mean, my brother's getting his doctorate degree in Engineering.
He's a smart guy, but he made a really stupid decision.
I mean, that really taught me that.
Maybe if my parents were like, "You have to get home now"
and I was at a party.
I might be like, "Oh my god. They're gonna kill me."
I have friends that have gone out drinking,
and have called me late at night, and they're like,
"I don't know what to do. I can't call my parents, I'll get grounded."
Parents can even just look at them different.
I was 16 and my parents are like, "Oh, you have a curfew!
You can't be out late!"
No one's gonna want to drive me home early,
so might as well just drive myself.
I'm not really proud of it. Nothing happened, but...
things could happen.
Parents just make their kids feel like they can't talk to them about anything.
If I'm in a situation that I need help, why can't I call my parents?
(Finebros) And what are your thoughts about drunk driving and why
- you think it happens? - Because it happens so often
and people get away with it.
If someone drives drunk, and then they make it,
they're like, "Pff. Easy! I can do this every time."
As humans, we have this feeling like, "I don't want to rely on other people."
People think it's not gonna happen to me.
It's not gonna happen to me, I don't even drink that much.
Oh, you know, I'll be fine. You know, I'm not even that drunk, guys.
I'm just a little buzzed.
You're just gonna drive five blocks, but it's that five blocks could be
the last five blocks of your life, or somebody else's life.
(Finebros) What more do you think could be done to help bring
drunk driving incidents down?
I feel like these videos are good because they're helping,
and maybe not in a statistic sense.
If someone were to develop an app that, through your camera,
you hold it up, and you could actually see what life is like
while you're intoxicated, so kids can see even before they start drinking.
Like, this could endanger you.
How about you actually call if you see somebody in front of you
displaying the behavior. Do something about it
before somebody gets hurt. And that someone could be you.
(Finebros) So drunk driving kills more than 10,000 people every year.
See, how many people's it gonna take to die
until you realize that, you know what, maybe I should stop drinking
alcohol and driving at the same time.
My brother's friend ended up drinking and driving.
He left a party on a motorcycle, and he hit a patch of sand,
and then he spun out and hit a tree and died.
I have had friends who have been in accidents,
and I've know a lot of people who knew people who have died.
I had one friend. He had been drinking.
He swerved off and just hit a pole and instantly just died.
You don't know what to feel, you know? It's somebody that you knew
for your entire life, and now, suddenly, they're just gone.
(Finebros) Back to the video, do you think his plea might stop
- some people from drinking and driving? - Oh, definitely. It made an impact on me,
so it can make an impact on anyone.
Absolutely. I think experience is the best teacher.
This video would have a huge impact on people who have drank and drive before
because he's just like us.
This guy really did drive drunk. This guy really did kill somebody.
This guy is in jail, and the other guy is dead.
In a PSA, all those actors get to take off the makeup,
and go home, and see their family.
(Finebros) What advice do you have for people watching, if they find
themselves drunk and thinking about getting behind the wheel?
Don't get behind the wheel.
I mean, there's nothing much more I can say.
If you're gonna get drunk, fine. I can't stop you from doing that.
There's only an extent of what can be said,
and then some of it's just you. You just have to think,
"Maybe I shouldn't do this."
Call a cab. I promise you, the $20 cab ride
can save someone's life.
Put yourself in the other person's shoes. If you were the one that ended up
killing someone, how would you feel?
Don't drink and drive. Call a taxi.
There's so many applications now. You can literally press a button
and a taxi comes to you.
There's literally a list of [bleep] that you can do instead of
just being an idiot and getting behind the wheel.
That's so hard, 'cause everybody knows it's not okay to drink and drive.
People know people die, and they still drink and drive.
I don't even know. People are just really stupid
and I just...
I can tell people not to drink and drive, but they'll still make
their own decisions and I can't really do anything about it.
I don't know.