"Drive Hammered...Get Nailed" Holiday DUI Task Force Nabs 223 Drunk Drivers This Week

If the Governor's Office of Highway Safety hasn't made itself abundantly clear that it won't be tolerating drunk drivers this holiday season, the shear number of drunk drivers it has nailed as part of the Holiday DUI Task Force should probably clear up any misunderstandings.

Since the task force began the day before Thanksgiving, law enforcement agencies from across the state have nabbed more than 2,000 drunk drivers, including extending the long arm of the law to 446 "extreme" drunk drivers.

Last week's big winner was the Phoenix Police Department, which is at the top of the list for single-city police departments, with an impressive 131 DUI busts, followed by the Tucson PD's 114.

This week -- with each booze-filled breath -- the Phoenix PD's lead over Tucson is grew even larger.

With nearly 100 busts this week alone, the Phoenix PD's total is now 225, as Tucson could only muster a measly 60 -- putting its total at 174.

The task force includes several multi-agency efforts like the East Valley DUI Task Force, a combination of several police departments. The multi-agency task forces, as well as the Department of Public Safety, make the large majority of the state's total DUI busts.

The DPS has 349 busts, while the East Valley DUI Task Force, which includes the Tempe Police Department, has a whopping 656 busts since the DUI roundup began about three weeks ago.

There is, however, one law enforcement agency that isn't exactly pulling its weight -- the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office.

So far, the MCSO have managed a meager 112 DUI arrests since the task force began, putting Joe and his goon squad in seventh place statewide, just behind Scottsdale.

Let's cut Joe and the boys a little slack, they've been busy doing all the, um, important stuff like intimidating judges and making house calls on county employees.


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Manteca Police Conduct DUI Sweep

MANTECA, Calif. --


Teams of officers searched Manteca Wednesday, with warrants in hand for suspected drunken driving offenders.
Police said some of the people had multiple arrests in the past.
"For the most part, the drunk drivers that we run into that get arrested, this is their first offense," Rex Osborn from the Manteca Police Department said. "The ones we are arresting today, the majority of them have other criminal behavior. They know the system, they know the likelihood of being caught is one of these sweeps or a traffic violation, so they work the system."
Officers had a list with 241 names on it -- all of them from the Manteca area. They are people who didn't show up for court or who didn't show up for jail after being convicted.
Police find that most have moved away, but there are some who are handcuffed and taken off to jail -- no longer able to put off serving time.
"We have guys that get sentenced and they have to wait six months to go to jail because there is no room, so they wait and they just don't show up," Osborn said. "And the others, they just don't show up to court on the date we give them and either move out of the area -- which is most of them -- and they think it goes away, but it doesn't."



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