'No refusal' weekend a success, officials say

A special DUI enforcement program focused on Route 21 during Labor Day weekend accomplished what it set out to do, officials said Monday.

There was not a single DUI-related serious crash in all of Lake County through the weekend, and no one died because of drunken driving.

"I think that really says it all about our effort," Buffalo Grove Police Chief Steve Balinski said. "Our goal was to keep the highways safe, and it appears we did that."

The weekend also featured Lake County's first experiment with not allowing suspected drunken drivers to refuse chemical testing to determine their blood alcohol level.

While in most cases, a motorist has the right to refuse field sobriety testing and a breathalyzer, the state Supreme Court ruled in a 2002 case that no such right exists when it comes to chemical testing.

So, on Friday and Saturday nights of Labor Day weekend, anyone suspected of drunken driving who refused a breath test was taken to a meeting with an assistant state's attorney. The prosecutor informed the person a search warrant would be prepared and signed by a judge, ordering that person to submit to a blood test.

Of the 18 people eventually charged with DUI during the project, Lake County State's Attorney Michael Waller said, three initially refused a breath test.

Two agreed to take the breath test after meeting with the prosecutor, and registered blood alcohol levels of .114 percent and .175 percent, Waller said. The third person persisted in refusing all testing, Waller said, and was charged with contempt of court as well as DUI.

"We did not intend to hold people down on tables while their blood was being drawn, and we thought that the contempt citation was the appropriate response," he said. "It is our position that the search warrant is a lawful court order and a person must comply."

Eight police departments with enforcement powers on Route 21 participated in the program, with 51 officers working a total of 366 hours.

The average blood alcohol level of those drivers who agreed to a breath test was .120 percent, while the average of those who did not was .127 percent.

The highest blood alcohol content recorded was .224 percent, nearly three times the legal level of intoxication of .08 percent.

Police made 44 arrests for other traffic law violations, including 36 for driving without a license and eight for driving on a suspended license. Waller said 17 were people ticketed for failure to wear seat belts.