Despite warnings that police would be out in full force looking for impaired drivers, Minnesota saw an increase in the number of drivers who were pulled over for drunk driving during the Labor Day weekend.
The extra DUI enforcement began on August 28th and ran through September 7th, but authorities were primarily focused on the four-day holiday stretch from Friday, September 4th through Monday, September 7th. Initial reports show that a whopping 462 Minnesotans were arrested for drunk driving during that four-day holiday stretch. Only 395 people were arrested for DUI during the same period in 2014, meaning Minnesota saw a 17 percent in Labor Day DUIs in 2015.
While it may not come as a surprise that Minnesotans drove drunk over the Labor Day weekend, findings from the DUI crackdown revealed that drunk driving didn’t just occur during a holiday weekend. Authorities reported that 448 Minnesotans were arrested for drunk driving during the four-day stretch from August 28-31, which was just a regular weekend.
Avery Appelman, a criminal defense attorney in Minneapolis, said the findings from the last weekend in August were really surprising.
“We’ve been hearing that drunk driving arrests across the state have been falling in 2015, but the numbers from the last two weekends seem to suggest otherwise,” said Appelman. “We almost always see an increase in calls from potential clients in the days after a holiday weekend, but the large number of arrests during the final week of August suggest that too many people continue to get behind the wheel after drinking.”
Appelman concluded by saying his job is to help people who are arrested for DUI, but ideally the phone would never ring.
“I’m head to help people navigate the legal system, but in a perfect world, I wouldn’t have any DUI clients because people would make smarter decisions and plan a sober ride home.”
