New Year’s DUI arrests increase here

By Cindy Landrum  

JANUARY 5, 2012 1:32 p.m. (1)

Greenville County Sheriff’s deputies were out in full force over the New Year’s weekend to find people who partook in too much holiday fun.

And find them they did.

From Wednesday through Sunday, the Sheriff’s Office’s traffic division made 29 arrests for driving under the influence, according to spokesman Zack Hinton. That’s up from 18 DUI arrests during the same period last year.

The arrests were made during traffic stops during proactive patrols, not during DUI checkpoints set up on Greenville County’s roadways.

The traffic division also arrested 13 people for driving under suspension, 86 for speeding and 85 for other traffic offenses.

Hinton said the Sheriff’s Office’s three proactive patrol units – the traffic unit, the community patrol unit and the directed patrol unit – were out in full-force over the holiday, a time when call volume goes up because people are off work, drinking alcohol and traveling more.

The directed patrol unit is deputies who respond to specific complaints in specific areas, Hinton said. They conduct everything from general car stops to prostitution stings.

“Call volumes go up during this time, and some of them are alcohol-related,” Hinton said.

Hinton called the DUI arrests “fairly significant,” but said Greenville County is the largest county in the state with more than 400,000 residents and thousands of times of roadways.

Other law enforcement agencies in the Upstate also cracked down on driving under the influence, as New Year’s is a holiday that is widely associated with drinking and parties.