Police Make 60 DUI Arrests on First Nights of Crackdown

Santa Clara County police agencies reported they arrested 60 people for driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs after the first two nights of the Winter Holiday Anti-DUI crackdown. 

The arrests came from routine traffic enforcement and special Avoid the 13 DUI deployments overnight in Santa Clara County, according to Sgt. Jose Cardoza of the Santa Clara County Sheriff's Office, which coordinates the anti-DUI program throughout the year.

In 2011, 79 DUI arrests occurred during the same 48-hour time period.
There were no DUI deaths overnight. 

For Saturday Dec. 15, a DUI warrant sweep was conducted in Santa Clara County, a DUI checkpoint was conducted in the City of San Jose, and extra local DUI "saturation patrols" were deployed in the cities of Mountain View, Gilroy, and Morgan Hill.

All regularly scheduled traffic and patrol officers will focus efforts at stopping and arresting DUI drivers during their normal shifts, Cardoza said. Multiple DUI/Driver’s license checkpoints, multi-agency DUI task force operations and local roving DUI patrols are all part of this region-wide crackdown during the 19-day Winter Holiday Campaign.

DUI arrest data collection will continue through New Year’s weekend, midnight Sunday, Jan. 1, 2013.

The program is paid for with a grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety, through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.