Drivers age 15 to 20 are the deadliest age group on the roads, and now a safety organization is trying to drum up support for bumping up the driving age in U.S. states to 17 or 18, to reduce the carnage on America’s roadways.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety today is releasing a report encouraging higher driving ages at a conference of the Governors Highway Safety Association in Scottsdale, Ariz. The institute notes that most of Europe as well as China, Japan, Russia and Brazil allow people to start driving at age 18. The agency, funded by the insurance industry, says several U.S. states have tried but failed to boost the age to 17 or 18.

More individuals looking to treat young adults as children and further removing their personal responsibility. They raise the smoking age to 19, fight to keep drinking at 21, make SCHIP cover those upto the age 25. The childification of these young adults will only cause greater problems.

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AKRON, Ohio – A medical examiner must change her autopsy findings to delete any reference that stun guns contributed to the deaths of three people involved in confrontations with law enforcement officers, a judge ruled.

Friday’s decision was a victory for Taser International Inc., which had challenged rulings by Summit County Medical Examiner Lisa Kohler, including a case in which five sheriff’s deputies are charged in the death a jail inmate who was restrained by the wrists and ankles and hit with pepper spray and a stun gun.

Kohler ruled that the 2006 death of Mark McCullaugh Jr., 28, was a homicide and that he died from asphyxiation due to the “combined effects of chemical, mechanical and electrical restraint.”

Visiting Judge Ted Schneiderman said in his ruling that there was no expert evidence to indicate that Taser devices impaired McCullaugh’s respiration. “More likely, the death was due to a fatal cardiac arrhythmia brought on by severe heart disease,” the judge wrote.

Schneiderman ordered Kohler to rule McCullaugh’s death undetermined and to delete any references to homicide.

The judge also said references to stun guns contributing to the deaths of two other men must be deleted from autopsy findings. Dennis Hyde, 30, died in 2005 after a confrontation with Akron police, and Richard Holcomb, 18, died the same year after being hit with a stun by a police officer in suburban Springfield Township.

It was unclear what affect Schneiderman’s ruling may have on the upcoming criminal trial of the five sheriff’s deputies. One of them, Deputy Stephen Krendick, is charged with murder. Other deputies face charges of reckless homicide or felonious assault. All have pleaded not guilty.

Krendick’s trial is scheduled to begin June 16. A spokesman for the Cuyahoga County prosecutor’s office, which is handling the case, said its lawyers are prepared to go forward.

Steve Tuttle, vice president of communications for Taser International, said the Scottsdale, Ariz.-based company is pleased with Schneiderman’s ruling.

“Taser International believed from the beginning that these determinations of cause of death must be supported by facts, medical research and scientific evidence,” Tuttle said.

John Manley, a Summit County prosecutor who represented Kohler, said the judge’s order went too far. The county is considering an appeal, he said.

“Taser is quite a force to be reckoned with and does everything to protect their golden egg, which is the Model X26,” Manley said.

Wouldn’t a high voltage shock from a taser possibly aggravate “severe heart disease”? Exactly how is it that judge knows better then the medical examiner?

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