From Maryland State Police:
This Labor Day weekend, as friends and family travel to picnics and barbecues across the country, troopers from the Maryland State Police Bel Air Barrack will be out stopping impaired drivers by targeting those who put lives in danger.
On Friday, August 31, 2018 the Maryland State Police Bel Air Barrack will begin their holiday enforcement patrols by conducting a sobriety checkpoint in Harford County. The goal will be to locate impaired drivers and to promote public awareness of the dangers of impaired driving.
If your holiday weekend plans include consuming alcoholic beverages, plan a designated driver as well. Keep in mind that impairment by alcohol or drugs can be deadly. The cost of a ride home is cheap. Download NHTSA’s SaferRide mobile app available for Android and Apple devices or any of the rideshare apps. Drivers caught driving impaired can expect the impact of a DUI arrest to include jail time, fines, fees, DUI classes, license suspensions and other expenses that can exceed $10,000.
This should be implemented Maryland-wide.
This has nothing to do with DWI….This has to do with Federal Grant Money and overtime. Don’t kid yourself.
Still, if it keeps the drunks off of I-95 and the streets of Harford County, it might be worth it.
How much would it be worth to you to prevent one of your loved-ones being killed or maimed by a drunk driver?
The fact is it doesn’t decrease the number. Patrols on the road and not stopping people with no probable cause is more effective at DUI enforcement. They use DWI an excuse to make illegall stops to try to o find probable cause.
It amazes me how people are willing to go very up their freedom.
Or lets put it like this, you are called to the emergency because your daughter has been in an automobile accident. She is not expected to live through the night. The car she was riding in with her date was hit by a driver with a blood alcohol content above the legal limit who, while was not seriously injured, can not remember what happened.
An announcement had been made that due to overtime cutbacks and other budget cutbacks, a decrease in the number of the cars patrolling HC streets had been ordered.
Do you connect the two occurrences or do you classify them as distinct and separate?
Getting drunks off the road is always a good thing, but in modern times I think cell phone distraction is the bigger distraction that is causing a large portion of automobile carnage in our county.
It just absolutely amazes me how sober people can crash their cars at the same traffic controlled intersection every week.
In reality, I think all the cops standing a checkpoint would make a bigger DUI enforcement if they all got in their cars and drove around, like what goes on, everyday anyway, but that’s just my opinion.
Set it up outside 924 & rt 1 this weekend
Ca Ching
I am certainly glad the police are keeping us safe . Traffic Stops without probable cause to try and find probable cause. Any probable cause they can find BTW. Guaranteed!
Then you will have the ambulance chasing defense attorneys all ready to “Help You Out”. Wouldn’t surprise me if the attorneys are kicking some of their proceeds back to the Police.
What a racket they have.
Constitutionally speaking, if they find any probable cause other than alcohol related offenses, I am not so sure it will be admissible. Furthermore, even though the Supreme Court ruled to allow “Sobriety Checkpoints”, they are repugnant to the Constitution from the word go. Their reasoning was the potential danger to the public involving drunk driving and that drinking and driving was a crisis on a national basis. This is a load of crap. They threw out cases due to law enforcement pulling people over without probable cause or falsified probable cause. Why would this be any different? It is nothing but a Gestapo technique, affirmed by our highest court, which allows completely unreasonable searches to all who pass by relying on the government owns the roads so there an be no trespass doctrine. People are supposed to be secure from unreasonable searches of their persons, houses, papers, and effects. Your car is an effect because it’s one of your personal belongings and the Supreme Court got this wrong. It is truly incredible for SCOTUS to rule this way, in light of their prior rulings.
The governments own statistics show that texting and driving is about six times more dangerous than drinking and driving. Don’t see checkpoints for that. As has been stated. This is just a money maker totally violating a person’s rights.
Some people bob and weave through the traffic on the Beltway as if they’re driving on the Autobahn.
If the police think that they’re driving under the influence and, upon pulling them over, discover that they’re simply driving recklessly, they still kill a bird with one stone.