Costa Mesa DUI Checkpoint results in one DUI arrest
Our Orange County DUI Lawyers have learned, through communication from the Costa Mesa Police Department, that a recent Costa Mesa DUI Checkpoint results in one DUI arrest and that police cited or arrested 13 others on suspicion of driving without a valid license at a DUI checkpoint on October 30, 2015.
As we had previously announced, police officers had staffed the checkpoint from 8 p.m. to 2 a.m. on the northbound side of Harbor Boulevard at Peterson Place, within the Costa Mesa City Limits.
As is typical for Orange County DUI checkpoints, during the six hour operation, 1,335 vehicles passed through the checkpoint, officers stopped 529 of them for screenings and checked 22 drivers for possible intoxication, and ended up impounded five vehicles during the operation.
The LA Times also reported on this DUI Checkpoint in Costa Mesa. The Associated Press reported also that social media has changed DUI checkpoints, and as a result, DUI checkpoints may be on the way out.
Opponents point to constitutional privacy rights as one of a number of reasons why the checkpoints are a bad idea, says Doug Honig, for one, who is with the ACLU of Washington state.
“In our society, if you’re out and about on the highway and you aren’t doing anything wrong, law enforcement shouldn’t be stopping you,” Honig says. “They should have to have an individual suspicion that you are doing something wrong and not engaging in fishing expeditions.”
Although typically not very effective, as you can see from the statistics from this particular operation, DUI checkpoints are a big money maker for law enforcement – impound fees from unlicensed drivers (as in this DUI checkpoint, where impounded vehicles and unlicensed drivers were many times greater than the one DUI arrest), plus substantial money grants are only funded for checkpoints, and not the more effective DUI Saturation Patrols, through grants from the California Office of Traffic Safety and the Federal National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, and in some cases, Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD).
Contact our DUI lawyer Orange County Robert Miller if you have questions about defenses in a DUI, or about handling DMV hearings in a DUI case. We can help.
