This just isn't going to end well, is it..sigh
More risky actions are being alleged against former Minnesota Viking Everson Griffen, this time he has been ticketed for going 130 miles per hour on a Twin Cities interstate while on probation for drunken driving.
The 37-year-old Griffen was stopped about 10:15 p.m. Friday in Minnetonka by police on Interstate 494 near Stone Road, according to court records.
The citation, for misdemeanor reckless driving and petty misdemeanor speeding, says Griffen was driving a Bentley Bentayga SUV at 130 mph. That’s more than double the 60 mph speed limit on that stretch of interstate.
The Minnesota Star Tribune reached out to Griffen on Wednesday regarding the traffic stop.
Griffen, who has remained in the Twin Cities after his retirement, was accused in July of creating an unspecified scene soon after takeoff from Chicago to the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, according to TMZ Sports.
Delta Air Lines said pilots went back to O’Hare International Airport “to have an unruly passenger removed.”
In November, Griffen was sentenced to a 60-day term for driving while drunk in May on a Minneapolis interstate. Judge Gina Brandt set aside a year in the workhouse for Griffen and put him on supervisory probation for four years.
In July 2023, he was stopped in Chanhassen and accused of driving 60 mph in a 40 mph zone. His blood-alcohol content was 0.09%. Griffen pleaded guilty to a reduced careless driving charge in February 2024 and was placed on a year’s probation.
In the months following that allegation, Griffen crashed his car into a fence and gazebo in Mound on Oct. 28, 2023. He was cited and convicted of failure to drive with due care, a petty misdemeanor.
On Dec. 7, 2023, in Shakopee, police stopped Griffen for driving 55 mph in a 30 mph zone. He was convicted of a petty misdemeanor in that case as well.
In December 2021, following multiple troubling incidents, Griffen announced on social media that he had been living with bipolar disorder.
Griffen called 911 shortly after 3 a.m. from his Minnetrista home on Nov. 24, 2021, saying someone was with him, and he needed help. He also told the dispatcher he fired one round from a gun, but no one was wounded, police said. They added that no intruder was found.
The same day, Griffen had posted, then deleted, a video on Instagram saying people were trying to kill him as he held a gun in his hand. He was alone inside the house, with police outside, until he emerged and agreed to be taken for treatment.
He also spent four weeks undergoing mental health treatment in 2018 after two incidents that September — one at the Hotel Ivy in downtown Minneapolis, the other at his home — that prompted police involvement.
He later revealed he lived in a sober house for the remainder of the 2018 season.
Strib
Hurry-up Vikings, we ain't getting any younger!
StickierBuns wrote:
He won't stay on his meds....and with his issues, off the meds mean shit like this will keep happening. Driving a car at 130 mph means you can't react to stop or swerve for anything, its just too fast. That's how people get killed, especially innocent ones.
I was thinking this is a systematic issue with mental health system (i.e. gun violence etc.)
But if you arent institutionalized? You cant force someone to take their meds. Not that I'm aware of anyhow.
Wonder what the family/friends can do? Its not going to end well...
Hurry-up Vikings, we ain't getting any younger!
purplefaithful wrote:
I was thinking this is a systematic issue with mental health system (i.e. gun violence etc.)
But if you arent institutionalized? You cant force someone to take their meds. Not that I'm aware of anyhow.
Wonder what the family/friends can do? Its not going to end well...
Which really is the problem. Most of this kind of stuff is mental health combined with substance abuse of some type and these people cannot be forced to take their meds. They can be placed on mental health holds, but 99% of the time they hold them just long enough to get them detoxed from whatever is in their bodies, give them meds to stabilize them, then kick them out with a future doctors appointment. The problem is most of these folks aren't capable of wiping their own asses much less being put in charge of following up with their own mental health issues. It's a nation wide broken system. The answer really is to open up mental health institutions again because you don't have the right to drive 130 mph potentially injuring someone else, you don't have the right to drop your pants and shit on a public sidewalk, you don't have the right to plant a tent in a public park and take up residency while you do nothing all day but do drugs or drink. This country has a major issue on this front
purplefaithful wrote:
I was thinking this is a systematic issue with mental health system (i.e. gun violence etc.)
But if you arent institutionalized? You cant force someone to take their meds. Not that I'm aware of anyhow.
Wonder what the family/friends can do? Its not going to end well...
at this point he needs to be locked up, I know its not the best path for people with mental issues, but do innocent people need to die before he gets put away from society?
there are monitors for all sorts of health issues, I wonder if somebody can make chem specific monitors that will alert professionals when a person goes off their prescribed meds? kind of as a condition of their release they have to wear this monitor. ( think ankle bracelet for the chemically imbalanced)
Why isn't Chuck Foreman in the Hall of Fame?
About a dozen years ago I was working for a guy who was bipolar (while being a functioning alcoholic...what could go wrong?).
You just never knew who was going to show up each day. Did he take his meds or not?
Mental health is nothing to dismiss.
purplefaithful wrote:
I was thinking this is a systematic issue with mental health system (i.e. gun violence etc.)
But if you arent institutionalized? You cant force someone to take their meds. Not that I'm aware of anyhow.
Wonder what the family/friends can do? Its not going to end well...
Sadly I agree. Our mental health crisis hasn't improved since closing down so many of the institutions. Some were bad places and nobody should be abused or mistreated. But leaving them out on the streets (living there or driving 130) isn't good for them or anyone else.
I wonder where his support team, family, friend are in all of this. His choice to take his medications, but if not then he has made plenty of money in his career to be able to have a driver. If I were an agent for any of these guys, the first thing I would have them do with their money is hire a driver, as so many of them get into trouble on the road. Had Addison done that after his first incident he would be playing Monday.
JimmyinSD wrote:
at this point he needs to be locked up, I know its not the best path for people with mental issues, but do innocent people need to die before he gets put away from society?
there are monitors for all sorts of health issues, I wonder if somebody can make chem specific monitors that will alert professionals when a person goes off their prescribed meds? kind of as a condition of their release they have to wear this monitor. ( think ankle bracelet for the chemically imbalanced)
I agree. This is where a Three Strikes type of scenario should come into play. At some point, it is brutally obvious this man is going to kill someone else and likely himself. He should be placed in a psych ward or jail, and only once he's totally proven to whip the problem (I'm talking 10 yrs type the problem) should he ever be released back into the wild. Somebody will die because of this guy.
greediron wrote:
Sadly I agree. Our mental health crisis hasn't improved since closing down so many of the institutions. Some were bad places and nobody should be abused or mistreated. But leaving them out on the streets (living there or driving 130) isn't good for them or anyone else.
Prioritization and $$$. If its not going to get done on the Fed level? Then its up to the states...
But the states are already scrambling and stretched. IOW, I am not expecting much to change.
Oh, we're having our discussions in MN after last weeks tragedy in a catholic church, but I am expecting little bi-partisan action as an outcome.
Hurry-up Vikings, we ain't getting any younger!
purplefaithful wrote:
Prioritization and $$$. If its not going to get done on the Fed level? Then its up to the states...
But the states are already scrambling and stretched. IOW, I am not expecting much to change.
Oh, we're having our discussions in MN after last weeks church murders, but I am expecting little bi-partisan action,.
hopefully people are willing to discuss it now. The psych meds have a use, but they also have side effects. If we could actually discuss it openly, it would be a start.
I would welcome a state or private solution rather than a top down federal one.
purplefaithful wrote:
Prioritization and $$$. If its not going to get done on the Fed level? Then its up to the states...
But the states are already scrambling and stretched. IOW, I am not expecting much to change.
Oh, we're having our discussions in MN after last weeks tragedy in a catholic church, but I am expecting little bi-partisan action as an outcome.
its going to be hard to find bi-partisanship on an topic when those involved cant even agree what it is they are trying to fix, and only when there is trust. until the parties quit trying to "gotcha" the other side when they have the conche, nobody is going to be willing to cede an inch IMO.
Why isn't Chuck Foreman in the Hall of Fame?
I feel like you guys are living in some sort of bizarro reality.
Trust of our governments and of our medical institutions is at an all time low. We can’t even take care of our elderly or military veterans in a dignified manner. Cost to house a prisoner is like $65k a year. Cost to house an elderly person is $120k in a nursing home. Institutions died out in large part because they cost too much … back when we could afford things. Nevermind the issues with giving the government the power to determine who is too mentally ill and needs to be imprisoned, in a world where several states are actively letting actual criminals back out on the streets. Who should get imprisoned? If you go back 15 years ago, everyone would probably agree that conspiracy theorists were mentally ill with their tin foil hats and what not, but here we are now, where literally everyone is a conspiracy theorist, and probably like half the population believes their politicians participated at Epstein island, the left celebrates their mental illnesses, their traumas, and their therapy.
Like lets start with nursing homes and figuring out how to make being old affordable and a dignified way to live the home stretch of our lives.
medaille wrote:
I feel like you guys are living in some sort of bizarro reality.Trust of our governments and of our medical institutions is at an all time low. We can’t even take care of our elderly or military veterans in a dignified manner. Cost to house a prisoner is like $65k a year. Cost to house an elderly person is $120k in a nursing home. Institutions died out in large part because they cost too much … back when we could afford things. Nevermind the issues with giving the government the power to determine who is too mentally ill and needs to be imprisoned, in a world where several states are actively letting actual criminals back out on the streets. Who should get imprisoned? If you go back 15 years ago, everyone would probably agree that conspiracy theorists were mentally ill with their tin foil hats and what not, but here we are now, where literally everyone is a conspiracy theorist, and probably like half the population believes their politicians participated at Epstein island, the left celebrates their mental illnesses, their traumas, and their therapy.
Like lets start with nursing homes and figuring out how to make being old affordable and a dignified way to live the home stretch of our lives.
Well as I said, federal control doesn't seem to be the way. Nursing home are a good example because of medicare/medicaid and the rampant fraud that goes with it.
Institutions are costly, but the cost of the homeless/mentally ill isn't nothing. And something has to be done.
We could take care of the elderly, incapacitated, disabled etc if it was a priority, particularly to the current administration.
Instead, they put up a concentration camp in the swamps of Florida to the tune of $225 million. Waste and fraud in Medicare and Medicaid? Peanuts compared to the money that will be spent painting the wall black.
Maybe stop electing folks who are too busy protecting pedophiles and vote for folks who might care about the welfare of their constituents?
Is that virtue signaling or just not being an asshole?
“Hell is empty and all the devils are here”
Shakespeare
JustInTime wrote:
We could take care of the elderly, incapacitated, disabled etc if it was a priority, particularly to the current administration.Instead, they put up a concentration camp in the swamps of Florida to the tune of $225 million. Waste and fraud in Medicare and Medicaid? Peanuts compared to the money that will be spent painting the wall black.
Maybe stop electing folks who are too busy protecting pedophiles and vote for folks who might care about the welfare of their constituents?
Is that virtue signaling or just not being an asshole?
I'd love to see your calculations for waste and fraud in Medicare and Medicaid as compared to the cost of painting the wall black. I'm sure it's factual. lol
Concentration Camps, huh? I thinks libs think that the more preposterous their claims, the more people will listen. Oh, the rest of us listen. We listen and are assured just how crazy TDS sufferers become. Congratulations on sounding every bit as delusional as your counterparts. lol
Their food is below avg at best...
Sounds like a great strategy to remain irrelevant to a new generation (of any and all political affiliations).
My $$ is they're out of business within two years.
Lost souls is what they are.
You’ve shared your voices in recent weeks not just on our logo, but also on our restaurants. We’re continuing to listen. Today, we’re suspending our remodels. If your restaurant hasn’t been remodeled, you don’t need to worry, it won’t be. With our recent announcement that our…
— Cracker Barrel (@CrackerBarrel) September 9, 2025
Hurry-up Vikings, we ain't getting any younger!
purplefaithful wrote:
Their food is below avg at best...Sounds like a great strategy to remain irrelevant to a new generation (of any and all political affiliations).
My $$ is they're out of business within two years.
Lost souls is what they are.
You’ve shared your voices in recent weeks not just on our logo, but also on our restaurants. We’re continuing to listen. Today, we’re suspending our remodels. If your restaurant hasn’t been remodeled, you don’t need to worry, it won’t be. With our recent announcement that our…
— Cracker Barrel (@CrackerBarrel) September 9, 2025sounds like they are going to be addressing their food as well.
Why isn't Chuck Foreman in the Hall of Fame?
JimmyinSD wrote:
sounds like they are going to be addressing their food as well.
I read that, and they've tried the menu fix.
I dont think they are being strategic or have an holistic plan. Part of their problem imo is that they are perceived as antiquated and irrelevant to many. Way more and better choices for dine-out or take home.
Their traffic is down and not by a little. They may fix some food, but that wont be enough imo.
Google AI:
Cracker Barrel has experienced a significant downward trend in customer traffic since 2019, with declines in the 16-20% range, due to losing relevance with consumers and challenges in adapting to modern dining trends. While some tactical efforts like value offerings and menu innovation showed improvements in specific areas, these were insufficient to reverse the overall traffic decline. A recent backlash to a logo change in late August 2025 further exacerbated sales slowdowns
Hurry-up Vikings, we ain't getting any younger!
purplefaithful wrote:
I read that, and they've tried the menu fix.
I dont think they are being strategic or have an holistic plan. Part of their problem imo is that they are perceived as antiquated and irrelevant to many. Way more and better choices for dine-out or take home.
Their traffic is down and not by a little. They may fix some food, but that wont be enough imo.
Google AI:
Cracker Barrel has experienced a significant downward trend in customer traffic since 2019, with declines in the 16-20% range, due to losing relevance with consumers and challenges in adapting to modern dining trends. While some tactical efforts like value offerings and menu innovation showed improvements in specific areas, these were insufficient to reverse the overall traffic decline. A recent backlash to a logo change in late August 2025 further exacerbated sales slowdowns
I think they need to focus on what made them great and take it up a level. They need to make it nostalgic and fun. The problem they now have is that they've entered the political arena and many liberals will probably now boycott the restaurant even while claiming the changes weren't made for woke reasons. We already know we disagree on this.
I've went to Wrigley Field many times over the years and they have been able to mix tradition with innovation. Go Cubs Go after every game, the W Flag, keeping the bleachers, upgrading concessions, Clark the Cub, the rooftops, keeping the 7th inning stretch. That's the model a Cracker Barrel needs to emulate in my mind. Making new and fun things while never trying to rip down the ivy. That's where Cracker Barrel erred in my opinion.
Purple, just pushing this back up above my vaccination post as the forum has been dead lately and wanted this one to be on top. Didn't work, sorry!
purplefaithful wrote:
Prioritization and $$$. If its not going to get done on the Fed level? Then its up to the states...
But the states are already scrambling and stretched. IOW, I am not expecting much to change.
Oh, we're having our discussions in MN after last weeks tragedy in a catholic church, but I am expecting little bi-partisan action as an outcome.
That is the problem and where the gap is. No one is looking to meet in the middle or find common ground. Money and staffing are also issues. If budgets are cut, then resources are limited. There is also the issues of effectiveness and efficiency with resources. I am hoping for more conversation though
You're only given a little spark of madness. You mustn't lose it. — Robin Williams
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