For most Americans, Thanksgiving is a time of tradition, eating turkey, spending time with family and watching the Detroit Lions lose on national television. For the California Highway Patrol, it is one of their busiest weekends of the year as it brings DUI arrests and traffic fatalities.This year, DUI arrests were down and traffic fatalities were up in California and the Bay Area.
“CHP is reporting that Statewide, CHP officers have arrested 1475 drivers for Driving Under the Influence of drugs and/or alcohol,” reads a CHP memo released Monday. “CHP DUI arrests are down from last year’s total of 1546, after the fourth of four nights of the Thanksgiving Holiday weekend.”
The CHP defines its Thanksgiving Holiday Maximum Enforcement Period as starting at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 23 and ending at 11:59 pm on Sunday, Nov. 27, according to the memo.
CHP made 262 arrests for DUI in the Bay Area over the Thanksgiving weekend this year down from 278 arrests over the same period last year, according to Officer Elon Speers, spokesperson for the Golden Gate Division of the CHP.
However, both in the Bay Area and statewide, traffic fatalities were up over Thanksgiving weekend, according to the memo.
Twenty-nine people — at least 12 of whom were not wearing seatbelts — were killed in traffic accidents over the weekend across California, according to Speers.
“The major trend we’ve seen this year is people not wearing seatbelts,” Speers said. “These did not have to be fatalities.”
In the Bay Area, two people were killed in traffic accidents over the Thanksgiving weekend, according to the memo. One was a pedestrian and one was a driver who was not wearing a seatbelt when their car rolled over.
“We’ve never let up on seatbelts,” Speers said. “It remains a high priority.”
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