The police departments in the cities of Irvine, Santa Ana and Newport Beach are scheduled to conduct DUI checkpoints tonight, while extra Orange cops will be out on patrol looking for impaired drivers.
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Few Places in Orange County DON'T Have Weekend Anti-DUI Patrols and Checkpoints
In order of start time, the city of Orange is up first with “saturation patrols” of streets known for drunken driving arrests, collisions and fatalities from 7 tonight through 3 a.m. Saturday.
The Irvine and Newport Beach checkpoints begin at 8 p.m. Held in partnership with the Tustin Police Department, Irvine's will be held in the area of Jamboree Road and Barranca Parkway through 2 a.m. Saturday.
Newport Beach did not disclose the location of its sobriety stop, which runs through 3 a.m. Saturday.
The Santa Ana checkpoint kicks off at 9 tonight and continues through 3 a.m. Saturday in the area of 2400 W. Fifth St.
All these operations are part of the “Avoid the 38” task force, with 38 referring to the number of Orange County law enforcement agencies that are members. The Orange County Sheriff's Department previously announced the task force's long slate of anti-DUI operations as part of an end-of-summer enforcement period that ends with Labor Day, at 11:59 p.m. Monday.
Other spot checkpoints, saturation patrols and operations aimed at drunken drivers could go up in other cities and parts of the county through the end of the enforcement period, the sheriff's department announced at the time.
3 DUI Defendants Arrested in Courthouse Sting as End-of-Summer Enforcement Continues
Funding for all of this comes from a California Office of Traffic Safety grant, through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
UPDATE: From 12:01 a.m. Friday, Aug. 15, through midnight Thursday, Aug. 28, Orange County officers and deputies have arrested at least 573 people for driving under the influence of alcohol and/or drugs, compared with 535 DUI arrests over the same 14-day period in 2013. These numbers are provisional as some agencies have yet to report.
There have been no DUI related deaths during this time in 2014.
The CHP will be deploying all available officers onto freeways and county roads during their “Maximum Enforcement Period” beginning tonight at 6, according to Avoid the 38.
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