We have written posts on this blog before questioning whether DUI checkpoints are worth it. These setups are expensive, involve many officers and, it could be argued that they violate the rights of many innocent people who are not suspected of committing any crime. Are they worth all the time and effort?
What prompts us to ask this question is the sobriety checkpoint Riverside County authorities set up in San Jacinto the night of Saturday, Feb. 1. After eight hours, they had nabbed one allegedly drunk driver, according to the Press Enterprise. How many hundreds of innocent drivers were subjected to the DUI checkpoint?
To be fair, the checkpoint also flagged 21 drivers who apparently did not have a valid license and allowed police to serve one felony warrant. Still, those are comparatively minor successes and were not the aim of the checkpoint.
Now, we are all in favor of increased public safety. That being said, do you think it was worth the time, tremendous expense and the potential infringement of hundreds of innocent people's rights to have this checkpoint, considering it brought in only one DUI suspect? Given that we have limited law enforcement resources, it could be argued that there are better things to do with our officers' time and our tax dollars.