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Clash over checkpoints
Activists decry impound policy at DUI checkpoints, say illegal immigrants face undue hardship
Alicia Roman, an attorney and immigrant-rights activist, talks to an unlicensed driver who had his car impounded during a DUI/driver's license checkpoint set up July 23 by Petaluma police. “It's just not right for police to impound cars of non-drunken drivers for 30 days,” Roman said. “Especially when they are allowing drunken drivers to pick up their cars the very next day.”
CRISTA JEREMIASON / The Press DemocratPublished: Saturday, July 31, 2010 at 3:00 a.m.
Last Modified: Saturday, July 31, 2010 at 10:25 p.m.
Standing on the side of Old Redwood Highway, just south of Jay Palm's saddle shop in Penngrove, a Latina held up a colorful sign with the word “Reten” written twice. About 500 yards down the road, local attorney Alicia Roman held up a similar sign.
For Spanish-speaking illegal immigrants, the meaning — “checkpoint” — was clear that Friday evening.
Some took heed and quickly turned off at Goodwin Avenue. Those who ignored the warning, or did not understand it, suddenly found themselves amid a sea of orange cones as Petaluma police officers slowed traffic and guided drivers through a stop aimed at nabbing drunken drivers, unlicensed drivers and those with suspended licenses.
One Petaluma woman, an illegal immigrant without a license, was pulled over and lost her husband's '98 Mustang convertible to a 30-day impound. Late for her job as a cleaner at the nearby shopping center, she walked toward North McDowell Boulevard, talking to her husband on her cell phone.
“I feel horrible,” she said, speaking in Spanish as she walked, hauling her son's car safety seat.
“I've heard about these things, but I never imagined it would happen,” said the woman, who asked that her name not be used. “I need to work and I can't get a driver's license.”
She was one of four drivers that night whose cars were impounded for license infractions. They were snared in a state-funded program that has developed into a high-profile crackdown with two aims: Take drunken drivers off the road and enforce state law requiring drivers to have a license.
For every one DUI arrest made at a Petaluma checkpoint in the past five years, four people were cited or arrested for driving without a license.
Even as a tow truck hitched up the Mustang, an untold number of illegal immigrants successfully avoided the checkpoint in what has become a sort of cat-and-mouse game that pits traffic safety efforts with local immigrant-rights activists.
State officials say that what's driving the $14 million that goes toward funding traffic safety checkpoints in California is a dramatic, 20 percent decline in “alcohol-impaired” deaths, from 1,298 in 2005 to 1,029 in 2008.
Immigrant-rights advocates like Roman, a Santa Rosa lawyer, focus on the economic and emotional hardship immigrant families suddenly face when their car is confiscated. The cost of recovering a car after 30 days can reach up to $2,000, a figure that includes a $50-a-day storage fee at a local tow yard, a towing fee and a police administrative fee.
“It's just not right for police to impound cars of non-drunken drivers for 30 days,” Roman said. “Especially when they are allowing drunken drivers to pick up their cars the very next day.”
Preventing accidents
But Petaluma Police Sgt. Ken Savano, coordinator of the “Avoid the 13” Sonoma County DUI Task Force, which represents 13 law enforcement agencies in the county, says the checkpoints are first and foremost about traffic safety. He points to traffic safety studies that show that unlicensed drivers and those who drive with suspended or revoked licenses cause a disproportionate number of accidents.
“Traffic safety is saving lives and preventing injuries, and one of the tools that we have is to enforce the laws that the people have enacted that are designed to improve safety,” said Savano.
Late last year, the California Office of Traffic Safety dubbed 2010 “The Year of the Checkpoint,” alerting California drivers of record funding for checkpoint campaigns throughout the state, from $5 million in 2009 to $8 million this year.
The Petaluma Police Department, which last year became the county's coordinator of state-funded “Avoid” checkpoints, has been involved in 15 checkpoints so far this year. Two more are planned in Sonoma and Cloverdale before Labor Day, and another two are scheduled for the Christmas and New Year's holidays.
Since May 2005, Petaluma has staged 70 checkpoints, screening about 64,500 vehicles, conducting 2,027 field sobriety tests and arresting a total of 742 people. Of these arrests and citations, 111 have been for drunken driving, 134 for driving on a suspended license and 418 for driving without a license. There also have been 21 arrests for drug offenses and 30 arrests for other violations.
Checkpoints as deterrent
Chris Cochran, a state traffic safety office spokesman, said sobriety checkpoints nab fewer drunken drivers than so-called “saturation patrols,” where police units target specific roads to identify and arrest impaired drivers.
However, the checkpoints send a much stronger and visible message, one that is highly publicized, beginning with a press release from the local police department.
“You want there to be a large deterrent,” said Cochran.
New technologies have helped get out the word. When a checkpoint is encountered, he said, word of the operation spreads fast, via cell phone calls, Twitter messages and text messages.
“This is all fine with us,” Cochran said. “We want more and more people to know about them.”
“Those people who may have contemplated going out and drinking, they will be more likely to arrange for a designated driver or a cab or some way of getting around,” he said.
Two checkpoints on July 23 in Petaluma netted three suspected drunken drivers, one with an blood-alcohol level three times the legal limit.
The early checkpoint on Old Redwood Highway near North McDowell Boulevard was held between 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. and coincided with the happy-hour bar crowd.
The second was staged on Petaluma Boulevard North, near Gossage Avenue, between 11 p.m. and 2 a.m., and was aimed at late-night downtown bar-goers.
At the Old Redwood Highway checkpoint, motorcycle patrol officers kept a lookout for drivers who turned off the street. Savano said avoiding a checkpoint is illegal if the driver commits a traffic violation in the process, such as an illegal U-turn.
Fear of deportation
One driver, another illegal immigrant who asked that his name not be used for fear of deportation, drove through the checkpoint early in the evening and lost a 2000 Mercury Cougar to a 30-day impound.
The man, who works as a ranch hand, never strayed far from the checkpoint after losing his car. Something was troubling him, he later admitted. Several family members joined him on the sidewalk, waiting to talk to Savano.
The man asked why his citation called for an appearance in Sonoma County Superior Court, rather than traffic court. He wanted to know if immigration enforcement officials would be there waiting for him.
“Immigration is not going to deport you for driving without a license,” Savano said, adding later than he recognized the man's fear.
“I feel bad about the financial impact,” Savano said in a follow-up interview last week. “But our fundamental duty is public safety.”
Immigration advocates call for the use of greater discretion in the 30-day impound rule.
Roman, who represents local tenants in eviction cases, is one of the main organizers of the checkpoint protests. Since last year, the loose-knit group of activists have mobilized up to 10 people for a checkpoint operation, she said.
She acknowledged that a possible fallout from warning Spanish-speaking drivers about the checkpoints is that a drunken driver could be tipped off, avoid the checkpoint and later cause an accident.
She said the signs used to be in both English and Spanish, but the group narrowed them down to Spanish to minimize the possibility of aiding drunken drivers avoid the checkpoints.
“That would be terrible,” Roman said. “I can't say that there's not going to be a Latino that's not going to see our signs and drive drunk. . . . I'm out here trying to help the families of the poor. The majority of the people at this time, it's people coming home from work.”
Impound discretion
She said the police have a choice: “You don't have to impound cars.”
Cochran said state law does give local law enforcement officials the discretion to avoid the 30-day impound rule for driver's license violations.
“Some jurisdictions say, ‘I'll give you 20 minutes to get a licensed driver to come here.' That's a local policy call which may or may not be actionable in court.”
But he added that such a call is “much more the exception than the rule” for the more than 470 law enforcement agencies in the state.
Savano said jurisdictions that enforce the 30-day impound law are “clearly concerned with improving traffic safety.” He said the intent of the legislature when it enacted the rule was to remove the vehicle from the drivers who statistically had been shown to cause anywhere from four to five times as many crashes as licensed drivers.
Savano said the primary concern of enforcement officers is applying traffic laws equally.
“If we were to suddenly change our policy to allow certain unlicensed drivers some different opportunity or policy, how then do we stay fair and impartial to other people who are caught or stopped for driving without a license?” he asked.
Last Tuesday, four days after the ranch hand lost his car, the man, his wife, a daughter and a friend visited the Petaluma police station to try to get his car out of the impound lot. The car, which was being held in the Petaluma Towing yard at 1800 Petaluma Boulevard, had already racked up hundreds of dollars in storage and tow fees.
Tow hearings are held at the police station between noon and 2 p.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Aside from a $140 administrative tow fee, Petaluma Towing charges a $186 tow fee and a $50-a-day storage fee. The administrative tow fee is authorized by the state and allows the city to recover costs associated with the storage and impound of the vehicle.
The man said he desperately wanted to get the Mercury Cougar out of impound so that he could sell it and keep his financial loss to a minimum. He said he figured he could get $4,000 for the car, though he would have to pay about $2,000 in impound costs after 30 days.
Amalia Greenberg Delgado, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California, said the practice of impounding vehicles for 30 days where a traffic safety issue does not exist may violate some drivers' Fourth Amendment rights, which limit the forfeiture of property without due process.
“The 30-day impound is discretionary,” she said.
Local law enforcement officials said the checkpoints will continue because they have been effective at raising public awareness about important traffic safety issues.
As a line of cars drove through the recent Old Redwood Highway checkpoint, Savano pointed out that there were a total of 608 DUI arrests in Petaluma last year.
Since 2005, DUI arrests are up 80 percent, from 334 to 608, he said, and alcohol-related collisions have declined by 20 percent.
“Arrests are up, crashes are down,” Savano said. “But the most significant statistic is that nobody died from an alcohol-related collision in Petaluma in 2009, and so far the same is true in 2010.”
You can reach Staff Writer Martin Espinoza at 521-5213 or martin.espinoza@pressdemocrat.com.
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