July 4, 2011 is a day Annette Murray will never forget.
“My niece was only 11, so she was a tiny little girl. We miss her smile. She just got braces and glasses. She just started to be her own person. My sister was only 44-years-old and she was a hospice nurse. Killed by a drunk driver on I-435 at 8:30 a.m.”
Less than two years later, Murray experienced more heartache.
“My brother-in-law was killed by a drunk driver in April 2013. Not even quite two years later, the same family was hit by a drunk driver. So, we’ve lost three family members to two different drunk driving incidents, and it can happen to you.”
Annette Murray is making a plea so that it doesn’t happen to you. And if you don’t hear her, you could hear police sirens this 4th of July weekend. Sgt. Christopher Bentch says KCPD will be ready.
"We’re going to do four on-duty checkpoints the rest of this year in lieu of grant-funded ones we were doing before,” said Sgt. Bentch.
The number of people dying on the road continues to go up, at least in Kansas City. According to KCPD, there have been 43 traffic fatalities between January 1 and June 28, compared to just 27 last year. Investigators say four percent of these fatalities were alcohol related.
“These guys are a danger to everybody, and with gas prices being as low as they are, we’re seeing more people on the roadways,” said Sgt. Bentch.
Every year, federal leaders provide grant money to MoDOT, but Missouri lawmakers recently passed a bill that cut funding for DUI checkpoints to just one dollar ($1) as an incentive for departments to use saturation patrols instead. Bentch says that will not deter his department from using checkpoints.
“We believe this is a viable strategy and an effective deterrent to drinking and driving,” he told 41 Action News.
The checkpoints begin Friday night and go through the holiday weekend.
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