Tremain Mack was not set up. He was found out. The Cincinnati Bengals' safety was not lured behind the wheel by some Channel5 decoy. He was discovered driving, of his own volition, with a suspended license.

        How the story came to light is of little lasting consequence. What matters here is that the authorities get this guy off the road. A man convicted three times of driving under the influence of alcohol — with three other cases pending — qualifies as a public menace in my book. Such a man who takes the wheel in violation of his probation does not deserve our sympathy, but our scorn.

        Just so we're clear, should I spot Mack driving a car, my first call is not to my editors, but to the police. I don't care if the Bengals believe Mack has been singled out because of his celebrity. I don't want him driving on any road my children might travel. There are larger issues involved here than the scuffed feelings of a scofflaw.
       

Misdirected blame
        The Bengals do a lot of dumb things — it seems to be their specialty — but their instinctive defense of Mack is self-absorbed stupidity. In their anger with WLWT-TV for exposing Mack's transgression, Bengals players and management are blaming the messenger instead of the miscreant. They have placed their concern for a teammate ahead of the law and the public safety.

        They are, as usual, on the wrong side of the scoreboard.

        It's one thing to support a friend in trouble. It's quite another thing to countenance, neglect or ignore criminal behavior because the criminal happens to excel at returning kickoffs. The Bengals' attitude — from Mike Brown on down — is that this story never would have surfaced were Mack an ordinary citizen and not a professional athlete. They don't condone Mack's behavior, exactly, but neither do they condemn it. Their disapproval is directed almost entirely at the ambush tactics of the television station.
       

Just one of many
        Perhaps Channel 5 should have conducted a more comprehensive investigation, examining a random sample of DUI cases to see how many other individuals might be driving with suspended licenses. Scrutinizing Mack's behavior without placing his actions in context leaves the station open to charges of sensationalism. Worse, it diminishes the impact of a potentially important story.

        The fact is Mack is a high-profile example of an epidemic problem.

        “There are people out there driving with enormous numbers of DUI's,” said Charlie Rubenstein, Cincinnati's chief deputy prosecutor. “I can't give you an off-the-cuff number, but I was amazed at the number of people with over 10. It's unreal. It's actually scary.”

        Scarier still is the mind set that Mack's driving is nobody else's business. Andrea Rehkamp, executive director of Southwestern Ohio Mothers Against Drunk Driving, says there were 458 alcohol-related fatalities on Ohio roads last year, and 15,786 nationwide.

        “Tremain Mack falls into MADD's definition of a higher-risk driver,” she said. “Those drivers are often overrepresented in DUI fatal crashes. Many of them escape detection until there is a crash and someone is injured or killed.”

        As a preventive measure, MADD members will be at Paul Brown Stadium Sunday, signing up spectators as designated drivers.

        “Maybe,” Rehkamp said, “we should go down on the field.”
       E-mail: tsullivan@enquirer.com.

Sellout fever? Not for Bengals SULLIVAN Tremain Mack

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