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RCMP busy charging people with impaired driving in Red Deer

Another four people charged over the weekend
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Another checkstop, another impaired driver.

Red Deer RCMP have been busy in December charging people with impaired driving and other driving offences.

“We go out, we find impaired drivers. It doesn’t seem to matter the time of the year — summer, winter — there’s always people out there driving impaired. A lot of these people it’s not their first time being picked up,” Sgt. Al Nickolson said Monday.

“It’s one of those things where you can’t tell people what to do. It’s why we have laws. They’re just going to do it. They are just going to take that chance.”

On the first weekend of December, local RCMP charged eight people with drunk driving. This was the result of both checkstops and roving patrols. Just this past weekend four more people were charged.

“After midnight it’s not very hard to find an impaired driver,” Nickolson said.

Patrols on Friday resulted in three drivers being charged. Police nabbed another impaired driver on Saturday saw one driver charged.

Police also said they continue to investigate a snowmobile rollover within the city that sent a 32-year-old man to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. The rollover was on Lord Close at approximately 8 p.m. on Friday. Police have not said this was an impaired driving incident.

Clear-thinking people are going to say they shouldn’t drive if they are going to drink but when someone has too much alcohol or drugs, they lose their inhibitions and do things that a normal person wouldn’t do, Nickolson said.

The Red Deer RCMP detachment does have officers who are trained as drug recognition experts. If an officer comes across someone they believe to be impaired by drugs, the expert is called.

Nickolson said it is helpful that when a person does spot a suspected impaired driving they provide the location and licence plate number if possible to police.

“We’re always looking for impaired drivers.”

barr@www.reddeeradvocate.com