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# Police crack down on drunk driving this weekend
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/police-crack-down-on-drunk-driving-this-weekend/
- Published: 2004-09-03T15:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T05:00:45.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: Crime, Ocean Park, #archive-import

*By Daily Press staff*

POLICE HDQTRS. — Police will be on the lookout for drunk drivers this weekend, and specifically on Lincoln Boulevard tonight.

Throughout the evening, Santa Monica Police Department will conduct a sobriety checkpoint in the 2600 block of Lincoln Boulevard, which is between Ocean Park Boulevard and Hill Street. The check-point is in accordance with a State of California Office of Traffic Safety grant. The grant entitled, “You Drink & Drive. You Lose” is part of a national campaign to reduce the number of people killed or injured in alcohol-related crashes.

Police also are warning drivers and passengers that officers will be issuing tickets to people not wearing seat belts. The crackdown will occur from Sept. 2 through Sept. 8\. The special enforcement period is part of the California Seat Belt Compliance Campaign.

In July, a family of eight traveling on a California highway lost five members in a rollover crash, in which no one was secured by a safety belt or child passenger seat. They were all ejected, and the three who survived were seriously injured, police said.

“What does it take to convince people to buckle up?” asked SMPD Chief James T. Butts Jr. “Taking the few seconds to buckle a seat belt is the most effective thing a person can do to save their life.”

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on September 3, 2004.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/090304.pdf?ref=smdp.com)