08.22.09

City-wide DUI Crackdown in Atlanta

Posted in Uncategorized at 5:49 pm by Kimbrell & Burgar, LLC

Please be careful these next few weeks as the Georgia State Patrol and the other metro Atlanta police agencies are conducting a crackdown on DUI cases.

Police launch metro DUI crackdown
By AJC Staff Reports

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Police throughout the metro Atlanta area are out in full force this weekend as part of a statewide drunk driving crackdown.

On Friday, police launched “Operation Zero Tolerance,” which runs through Labor Day.

The traffic enforcement campaign is being is being run in conjunction with the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety’s “100 Days of Summer HEAT” campaign. HEAT stands for Highway Enforcement of Aggressive Traffic.

“The sad fact is one out of three of our fatal highway crashes in Georgia each year is caused by impaired drivers,” said Bob Dallas, director of the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety. “And every one of those tragic alcohol-related deaths is completely preventable.”

During the next two weeks, officers will be issuing no warnings to impaired drivers, officials said.

“We even warn motorists what days to watch out for blue lights,” Dallas said. “We hope every driver will pay attention to our enforcement warning.”

More than 13,000 people died on Georgia’s highway in alcohol-related crashes in 2007, state officials reported.

The crackdown runs until Sept. 7.

-Reporters Mike Morris and Megan Matteucci contributed to this report.

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08.11.09

Interesting Statistics from NHTSA

Posted in Uncategorized at 10:11 am by Kimbrell & Burgar, LLC

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) recently published new statistics suggesting the percentage of drivers on the road with a blood alcohol concentration over .08 has been reduced from 7.5% in 1973 to 2.2% in 2007. While we are generally skeptical of any analysis presented by NHTSA, given their long history of skewing data, it is at least interesting to see the downward movement of the data.

More interesting in that same report was the assertion that 16.3% of nightime drivers are on drugs. This data includes 8.6% of drivers testing positive for marijuana, 3.9% for cocaine, and 3.9% for prescription drugs. Again, while we are skeptical of any NHTSA data, even if this is half true the numbers are shockingly high. The lesson to be learned is to be extraordinarily careful driving at night. You simply do not know the condition of the other drivers out there.

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