Cops Target Drunken Drivers

DWI Patrols, Roadblocks Planned During Holidays

Hitting the road after a couple of cocktails is a quick way to ruin the holiday season, police are warning drivers.

Agencies around Northwest Arkansas are stepping up drunken driving enforcement over the Christmas and New Year’s season, looking to remove the inebriated from the driver’s seat and toss them in a jail cell.

Roadblocks and sobriety checkpoints serve dual roles, especially during high-traffic holidays, said Capt. Lance King of the Arkansas State Police.

“We put as many troopers on the road as we can, plus manning checkpoints,” King said. “The checkpoints work as enforcement, getting those who do drink and drive off the road, and as a deterrent to keep people from getting behind the wheel drunk in the first place.”

Deterrence is the reason the agency aggressively advertises the fact that checkpoints will be in place over the holidays, King said.

Roadblocks can also identify some of the inebriated drivers who aren’t giving obvious signs to patrol officers as they drive, he said.

Benton County sheriff’s deputies also plan sobriety checkpoints, said Capt. Mike Jones, head of the office’s field division.

“We realize people like to celebrate and have a good time during the holidays,” Jones said. “But we want them to make sure they have a designated driver and not get behind the wheel impaired.”

Overall, DWI arrests in Fayetteville should be down this year unless there’s a big spike in late December, said Cpl. Rick Crisman of the police department. Fayetteville police made 999 drunken driving arrests in 2007 and 1,046 in 2008, but 818 as of Dec. 8 this year. Fayetteville issued 41 percent more DWI tickets than Springdale in 2007 and 44 percent more last year.

“We’re unique. We’re in a wet county, unlike Rogers and Bentonville, and we’ve got the biggest entertainment district in the area,” Crisman said. “Add the university, and that’s tacking on 15,000 students who consider drinking a social norm, and our numbers will always be higher.”

Fayetteville has no policies regarding roadblocks, so police don’t use them, although they will assist the sheriff’s office or state police if they want to set up roadblocks inside the city, he said.

Fayetteville also uses grant money from the state Highway and Transportation Department’s Selective Traffic Enforcement Program to pay overtime for officers to conduct DWI patrols.

“We’ve got officers on the street looking just for that. They’re not taking calls or anything else,” Crisman said. “As far as I know, we utilize STEP for drunk driving enforcement a lot more than other departments in this area.”

The average blood-alcohol level of drunken drivers arrested in Springdale last year was just more than 0.16, double the legal limit. Most drivers who agreed to a breathalyzer registered between 0.12 and 0.18, said Capt. Ron Hritz.

“At 0.8 or 0.10, there aren’t as many clues as they’re driving down the road. Those arrests are usually incidental, when they’re pulled over for having a taillight out or expired tags or something. They’re not typically weaving all over the road,” Hritz said. “On the other side of things, people at 0.20 are having a hard time walking, let alone driving, so we don’t see too many of them get out on the road.”

Nineteen people were being held on DWI charges on a recent day at the Washington County Jail. Most also had other pending charges. In Benton County, which breaks down DWI arrests by number, there were six people held on a first DWI, seven looking at a second DWI offense, six on their third DWI and three arrested for a fourth drunken driving charge.

INFOBOX

By The Numbers

Drunken Driving

Springdale police analyze data related to drunken driving arrests in a variety of ways. A look at some of the characteristics from 2008:

- 728: Total DWI arrests.

- 27: DWI arrests for drivers impaired by drugs instead of alcohol

- 0.16: Average blood-alcohol level of those arrested

- 85: DWI arrests made on Thompson Avenue, more than any other road in town

- 58: Most DWI arrests by a single officer

- 87 percent: DWI arrests that were male

- 19 percent: Drivers who refused a breathalyzer test

- 531: First-time DWI arrests

- 128: Crashes related to DWI

- 4: Fatal crashes related to DWI

- 33 percent: Drunken drivers who left the scene of an accident

- 14: Crashes involving underage DWI drivers

- 41 percent: DWI drivers who had no driver’s license or a suspended license

- 24 percent: Drunken drivers without insurance

Source: Staff Report

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