Say goodbye to all civil liberties kids.

NEXT we'll all be worshipping a statue of Hitler if this keeps up.
Man come on everyone can't we just live in peace and harmony, lets get it together and be GOOD for once.


Checkpoints may not be worth effort


Imagine you are driving down U.S. 41 with your family around 9 p.m. -- perhaps headed home from dinner or a movie. Suddenly, you notice a police officer in the road waving at you to pull into a vacant lot.

Once you do, your car is approached by one or more uniformed officers who want to see your driver license and registration. Sometimes they may ask you to get out of the car and walk around.

This happens every month -- sometimes more often -- in Charlotte County. It is part of an ongoing campaign by Sheriff John Davenport to deal a blow to those who would drive drunk.

The checkpoints are somewhat controversial. Some claim they are a violation of a person's rights. Those same people contend that pulling someone over without probable cause is harassment. It is more than an inconvenience -- it opens the door for discriminatory search and seizure.

There are others who say "phooey" to such concerns. Being asked to pull over for a period of three or four minutes is a minor inconvenience and very tolerable if that is what it takes to get a drunk driver off the road.

Sheriff Davenport makes two strong points in defense of his policy. First, the Supreme Court has ruled the random checkpoints are not a violation of rights. Second, violators other than drunk drivers have been snared in the checkpoint net. Last week, officers confiscated 223 hydrocodone pills, 63 Oxycotin pills, some cocaine and marijuana. They have also charged people who were driving with a suspended license and those who had outstanding warrants.

What is most amazing about the arrests made is that -- according to law -- drivers must be given a two-to-three-block warning there is a checkpoint ahead. Drivers then have the opportunity to turn off onto side roads or divert around the traffic stop. Yet, drivers -- who either are not paying attention or feel invincible -- go through the checkpoint with drugs in their car or without a valid driver's license. Anyone with those decision-making skills probably needs to be arrested.

Davenport argues the checkpoint program is accomplished with no overtime hours and is not enforced at the expense of patrols in other areas.

We do not believe the checkpoints are an undue hardship.

At the same time, we question if the program is worth the effort and the principle of whether it is right to randomly stop innocent citizens. Could we not locate just as many drunk drivers -- perhaps even more -- with random rolling stops?

We would like to see statistics that prove the checkpoint program is superior to normal policing methods. There has been no spike in the number of drunk driving accidents that we are aware of. Davenport, who has been an effective sheriff, did not make drunk driving an issue when he was elected. Why do we need checkpoints now?