I got quite a few positive responses to my recommendation to boycott Lehi while their PD was conducting their police state checkpoint. Thank you to all that chose to avoid Lehi. This sort of thing – done in the name of “safety” – can’t be allowed to continue.
I checked the Lehi PD Website, and found it to be so wonderfully up to date. But they did have some statistics relating to the last time they did this “sobriety checkpoint” in 2009.
It said that between 10 PM and 3 AM they stopped a total of 826 cars. They found the following violations…
7 alcohol arrests
16 misdemeanor arrests
6 DUI arrests
11 traffic violations
8 arrests for outstanding warrants
5 vehicle impounds for improperly registered vehicles.
That means that they impeded 826 vehicles and only caught 13 vehicles with alcohol-related offenses. They caught 40 other offenses unrelated to alcohol. 53 total offenses.
That means that they impeded 773 law-abiding citizens in their police-state effort, which was ostensibly for “safety”. Chad Smith (Lehi Police Chief) went on to say…
Impaired driving is unacceptable and we, as a police department, are committed to get these type of drivers off the road. We are going to continue this type of proactive enforcement to make this a safer community
So Chad, you see stopping and impeding the lawful travel of 773 people as acceptable?
Sorry Chad. While you may be “legal” in doing so, you are morally and ethically WRONG. Please stop this kind of activity in Lehi. Have your officers OBSERVE, and then act when the observation warrants it. We don’t want a nazi-like police state here in Lehi. It makes it unfriendly and uncomfortable. We aren’t supposed to feel like that here in America.
If you enjoy doing this, there are plenty of places you can go to practice this type of enforcement. I understand that this is still acceptable in many of the Balkan states, and in much of the Middle East. Please, don’t do this here again.