SANTA FE - Drunken drivers, and even drunken juveniles, are targets of state legislators.

Rep. Zachary Cook, R-Ruidoso, filed a bill Wednesday to seize the vehicles of people arrested on suspicion of a second DWI offense.

"It's a very stiff penalty," Cook said in an interview.

Gov. Susana Martinez endorsed his bill during a news conference in which she called drunken driving "an epidemic" in New Mexico.

The defense bar said Cook's bill would raise constitutional questions about due process rights and would be unworkable financially.

Albuquerque, Las Cruces and Santa Fe already have vehicle seizure laws, but implementing a statewide statute would create new expenses for court staff and impound lots, said Ousama M. Rasheed, president-elect of the New Mexico Criminal Defense Lawyers Association.

"It is pretty much undoable from a financial standpoint," Rasheed said.

Asked about costs, Martinez said the state would find money to fight drunken driving and all the human damage it does. Her guest at the news conference was Pauline Espinoza, whose 40-year-old husband, Mark, was killed by a drunken driver in April 2009.

The man who caused the crash was Sam Padilla, then 18, who plowed into the Espinozas' vehicle after leaving drug court.

Cook said he expected opposition on the seizure bill from people who say taking a family's vehicle would punish an innocent spouse and children.

Sen. Kent Cravens, R-Albuquerque, introduced a similar bill to seize the vehicles

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of those whose licenses were suspended or revoked for drunken driving. It has stalled in committee.

In addition to the bill by Cook, Martinez backed two measures by freshman Rep. Tim Lewis, R-Rio Rancho. They would mandate longer sentences for those convicted of repeat drunken-driving crimes.

One bill would require that a DWI conviction count as a crime when a defendant is charged as an habitual criminal. It currently does not.

Lewis' other bill would lengthen prison sentences for people with multiple DWI convictions.

Martinez said that, as the district attorney in Las Cruces, she prosecuted a man who had 21 arrests for drunken driving and 10 "usable" convictions.

But a deficiency in New Mexico law is that punishment for drunken driving does not increase after the seventh conviction, Martinez said. Lewis' bill would change that, so those with extraordinary numbers of convictions could be punished with more prison time.

Cravens is sponsoring another bill to tighten a section of New Mexico law aimed at teenagers who drink.

Cravens said it is illegal for those under 21 to possess or buy alcohol, but it is not illegal for them to be drunk. His proposal, SB 309, would change that.

Santa Fe Bureau Chief Milan Simonich can be reached at msimonich@tnmnp.com or (505) 820-6898. His blog is at http://elpasotimes.typepad.com/newmexico.