UPDATE NO. 2, FEB. 16, 12:22 P.M.: A 29-year-old man who failed to stop at the DUI checkpoint in San Clemente late Friday night crashed and later found himself arrested on suspected driving under the influence.
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James A. Gates smashed into the checkpoint at El Camino Real and Escalones around 11:30 p.m. Friday, according to Orange County Sheriff's Lt. Jeff Hallock, the department spokesman. Neither Gates nor any deputies manning the checkpoint were injured, Hallock added. There were two other arrests during the sobriety stop that ran from 7 p.m. through 3 a.m.: one also for suspected DUI and the other for an outstanding warrant. An unlicensed driver, a driver using a suspended license and a driver with a provisional license were cited. A total of 568 vehicles passed through the checkpoint and of those, 523 were screened, according to the sheriff's department, which added 24 vehicles were directed to secondary screening areas and 10 drivers were given field sobriety tests. Two vehicles were towed away.
UPDATE NO 1, FEB. 13, 9:37 A.M.: The Anaheim Police Department Traffic Detail conducts a DUI/driver license checkpoint at Santa Ana Canyon and Imperial Highway from 7 tonight through 3 a.m. Meanwhile, the Orange County Sheriff's Department will have a checkpoint up somewhere in San Clemente from 6 this evening through 3 a.m.
Anaheim PD also announced special DUI roving saturation patrols that begin tonight and continue through the end of February. Dates and times are after the jump … The patrols, which put extra units on streets known for drunken driving arrests, crashes and fatalities, run from 7 p.m. through 3 a.m. tonight, Saturday and Feb. 17, 19, 21, 24, 26, 27 and 28.
ORIGINAL POST, FEB. 13, 6:03 A.M.: A woman was held on suspicion of driving under the influence after allegedly losing control of her vehicle that struck and extensively damaged three parked cars in the 12500 block of Haster Street in Garden Grove early Tuesday. Fortunately, no one was injured, but the incident may put a little more gitty up in Garden Grove cops holding a DUI checkpoint tonight. Costa Mesa's got one scheduled also.
The Costa Mesa checkpoint runs from 8 p.m. through 2:30 a.m., Garden Grove's is from 9 p.m. through 3 a.m. and neither police agency disclosed a location. So … surprise all you drivers in those cities thinking about ushering in/drowning out Valentine's Day with some hooch.
The police departments of Garden Grove and Costa Mesa received funding for the operations from California Office of Traffic Safety grants, through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
Email: mc****@oc******.com. Twitter: @MatthewTCoker. Follow OC Weekly on Twitter @ocweekly or on Facebook!
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.