Checkpoints:
A Roadblock to Progress on Drunk Driving

Sobriety checkpoints are an ineffective way of catching drunk drivers that primarily serve to scare responsible alcohol consumers out of having even a single drink.

Checkpoints often fail to make even a single drunk driving arrest despite stopping hundreds or even thousands of vehicles. The FBI has reported that “Typically, sobriety checkpoints do not yield a large volume of DUI arrests.”

The average BAC of a drunk driver in a fatal crash is .19% — that’s more than double the legal limit. Because checkpoints are highly visible by design and publicized in advance, they are easily avoided by these chronic drunk drivers who cause the majority of alcohol-impaired traffic fatalities.

A 2009 University of Maryland study of checkpoints in the state concluded: “There is no evidence to indicate that this campaign, which involved a number of sobriety checkpoints and media activities to promote these efforts, has had any impact on public perceptions, driver behaviors, or alcohol-related crashes, police citations for impaired driving, and public perceptions of alcohol-impaired driving risk.”

Proponents of checkpoints claim that the purpose of the exercise is to raise awareness about impaired driving. This renders the expensive exercise little more than a PR stunt. In fact, after reviewing checkpoint programs in several states, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reported “It was thought that the increased media and enforcement program would be associated with an increase in awareness of the enforcement program, a reduction in driving after drinking behavior, as well as an increase in the perception of being stopped by the police for an alcohol offense and arrested if over the limit. Such changes in awareness, perceptions, and self-reported behavior did not occur.”

Far more often than arresting drunk drivers, checkpoint officers hand out citations to drivers with expired insurance, broken taillights, etc. By calling these roadblocks “sobriety checkpoints,” police departments are allowed to question all drivers and write tickets for all kinds of minor violations (typically not drunk driving).

While checkpoints rarely catch drunk drivers, any driver who admits to drinking is typically forced to perform sobriety field tests and may even have to blow into a breathalyzer to prove their innocence. Despite the fact that drinking moderately prior to driving is legal and safe in all 50 states, drivers are guilty until proven innocent at checkpoints. It’s easy to see how sobriety checkpoints harass responsible, non-impaired drinkers who are driving home after having a glass of wine at dinner.

“[Checkpoints are] just this notion that the police are in the back seat looking over my shoulder." — Bill Lewis, MADD Lobbyist

A Better Solution

There is a more effective tactic than checkpoints: roving police patrols. During roving patrols—also known as saturation patrols—police patrol the streets and highways looking for dangerous drivers. Roving patrols catch many more drunk drivers than sobriety checkpoints. State Supreme Cases from both Pennsylvania and New Hampshire showed that roving patrols caught 10 times more drunk drivers than checkpoints. According to the FBI “It is proven that saturation efforts will bring more DUI arrests than sobriety checkpoints.”

Patrols also stop speeding, aggressive, drowsy, and distracted drivers because officers can catch them in the act.

Case Study

In 2009, California conducted 1,740 sobriety checkpoints, stopped 1,791,481 drivers and arrested 5,015 drunk drivers. That is a .45% success rate. The state also conducted 3,058 saturation patrols, stopped 39,837 cars and arrested 5,863 drunk drivers. That is a 14.7% success rate.

In other words, saturation patrols were 32 times more effective at catching drunk drivers than checkpoints!

Data from other states confirm this finding:

Across the country, roving patrols tend to be more effective. For example, roving patrols in Virginia in 2007 had a success rate of 8.1%, making them 24.5 times more effective than Virginia’s checkpoints.

Fact Check

Some supporters claim that a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) compilation of studies found that checkpoints contribute to a 20 percent decrease in drunk driving fatalities. That study is both flawed and outdated. How?

• More than half of the studies cited were conducted outside of the United States. Of the studies that were actually done in the U.S., all are 11 to 25 years old, and many of the checkpoints cited in them were conducted nearly 30 years ago. This was prior to the huge public education campaign, greater enforcement, and harsher penalties of the 1980’s that, according to Mother Against Drunk Driving, contributed to a decrease in alcohol-related traffic fatalities by nearly 50 percent.
• The other half of the studies were conducted outside of the United States—in France and Australia (both of which have a legal BAC of .05)—using a checkpoint system where every single driver gets a breathalyzer test (these checkpoints are illegal in the U.S.). This clearly represents a very different situation than your typical checkpoint in the U.S., skewing the results.
• Among the studies conducted in the U.S., half measured only nighttime crashes, not drunk driving crashes. The rest took into account what the study’s authors call “had-been-drinking crashes,” not drunk driving crashes—the figure includes anyone killed in a crash in which at least one person (driver, pedestrian, cyclist, etc.) was estimated to have had any alcohol.
• In this study, the CDC even acknowledged “the degree to which changes in social norms have contributed to the long-term maintenance of the beneficial effects of sobriety checkpoints is unclear.”

The Supreme Court’s Take

In 1990, the Supreme Court approved the use of sobriety checkpoints in Michigan v. Sitz. In his dissenting opinion on the case, Justice John Paul Stevens made some important points:

• “The net effect of sobriety checkpoints on traffic safety is infinitesimal and possibly negative.”
• “Any relationship between sobriety checkpoints and an actual reduction in highway fatalities is even less substantial than the minimal impact on arrest rates.”
• “Any driver who had just consumed a glass of beer, or even a sip of wine, would almost certainly have the burden of demonstrating to the officer that her driving ability was not impaired.”
• “The evidence in this case indicates that sobriety checkpoints result in the arrest of a fraction of one percent of the drivers who are stopped, but there is absolutely no evidence that this figure represents an increase over the number of arrests that would have been made by using the same law enforcement resources in conventional patrols.”

Currently, 12 states do not operate checkpoints: Alaska, Idaho, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana Oregon, Rhode Island, Texas, Washington, Wisconsin, Wyoming.

The Experts Agree…

"Studies have shown that saturation patrols are actually better [than sobriety checkpoints] in taking drunk drivers off the street"
- Henrico, Virginia Police Sergeant A.J. Gordon

“When you set up a checkpoint in this day and age of technology, it’s just a network of communication and everybody knows where the police have set up. Saturation patrols are more effective.”
- Bristol, Virginia Police Captain Daryl Milligan

"We can cover more ground, observe more traffic with roving patrols."
- Stony Point, New York Police Chief Patrick Brophy

Checkpoints are “really a public relations campaign"
- Colorado State Patrol Sergeant Scott Elliott

“The problem is they are so incredibly labor-intensive. It just takes so many people and so much time.”
- San Marcos, Texas Chief of Police Howard Williams

“They [saturation patrols] are very effective, they are highly visible, and hopefully accomplish the same goals without having the legal loop holes that you might run into with a DWI checkpoint,”
- Wilmington, Delaware Police Corporal Joseph Fitzgerald

“Roving patrols would have given us more arrests”
- Niagara Falls, New York Police Traffic Division Captain Salvatore Pino

Roving patrols are “not concentrated on one area. They can hit anywhere in the city and you have a higher visibility."
- Anaheim, California Police Sergeant Rick Martinez

"Once folks see a stationary checkpoint, they call all their acquaintances and make sure they don't go to that point."
- Virginia State Police Sergeant Frank Pyanoe

“With the patrols, you don't have that whisper campaign”
- Chautauqua County, New York STOP-DWI Coordinator Sheriff Joe Gerace