COLORADO SPRINGS – Police were preparing for one of the busiest nights of DUI patrols all year, despite bitterly cold temperatures expected to keep many New Year’s Eve revelers from heading out and about to ring in 2019.
“It does normally start to pick up after midnight,” said Officer Craig Calkins with the Colorado Springs Police Department’s DUI Enforcement Division. Calkins was among four dedicated officers working on intoxicated-driving enforcement for New Year’s Eve, in addition to other patrol officers looking for signs of intoxication during routine traffic enforcement.
News 5 rode along with Officer Calkins early in his New Year’s Eve shift from the Stetson Hills Division substation. Within minutes, he received a request for assistance from other officers who had responded to reports of a driver stopped in the middle of a street near North Nevada Avenue and Austin Bluffs Parkway. Calkins observed the driver to apparently be under the influence of meth. He read her her Miranda rights and asked her to voluntarily submit to roadside sobriety testing. The woman declined and was taken to UC Health Memorial Hospital Central for blood testing to determine the presence of methamphetamine.
“I’ve seen some signs of impairment from her,” Calkins said.
