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LAPD Won't Impound Cars Of Unlicensed Drivers Caught At DUI Checkpoints

Dan Watson |
March 14, 2011 | 7:03 p.m. PDT

Senior Staff Reporter

(Creative Commons)
(Creative Commons)

Leticia Galvan remembers how helpless she felt the day she watched one of her family member’s cars get impounded, leaving two frightened children without a ride to school.

That day, Galvan sat in the passenger seat while a police officer cited her relative for driving without a license, she said.

"I have a license,” Galvan told the officer. But he would not let her drive the car.

Left on the side of the road, Galvan and her relative walked the children four blocks to school before returning 10 blocks home, she said. It took 30 days before they could get the car back, she said, and it cost more than $1,000.

On Monday, Galvan attended a press conference in downtown Los Angeles where Los Angeles Police Department Chief Charlie Beck announced his department is changing its procedure for impounding cars of unlicensed drivers at DUI checkpoints following criticism it was targeting illegal immigrants.

“Now, I’m going to be able to do something about it,” Galvan said, through a translator.

Until now, Los Angeles police officers impounded a car at DUI checkpoints if the driver did not have a valid license, regardless of the driver's blood alcohol level.

The procedure unfairly targeted illegal immigrants, who cannot obtain licenses, Beck said.

"No longer will these checkpoints have an adverse impact on someone merely because of their status,” Beck said. “The sad truth is, the people that were most impacted by this law were the people that could afford it least.”

The new procedure calls on the officer to first attempt to contact the registered owner of the car, and then try to release it to someone with a driver’s license.

Beck stressed that the driver is still cited, and nothing changes for those driving with a revoked or suspended license, or driving drunk.
Not all agree with the change.

Lupe Moreno, president of Latino Americans for Immigration Reform, which advocates strict enforcement of immigration laws, called it “asinine.”

By not becoming legal citizens of the United States, and paying for a driver’s license, illegal immigrants are “stealing from the state,” Moreno said. "It gives people more incentive not to do what they’re suppose to do."

Others said the old system unfairly targeted illegal immigrants at checkpoints in an attempt to generate more revenues for their cities.

"The checkpoints have been abused in many cities,” said Arturo Chavez, district director for Assemblyman Gilbert Cedillo. “If it’s for drunk driving, you don’t start a checkpoint at 7 a.m. in the morning. You don’t start one in front of a construction site at 5 o’ clock.”

Of the 3,200 California checkpoints performed over the last two years, most occurred in or near Hispanic neighborhoods, according to an Investigative Reporting Program analysis done at UC Berkeley. The study found that 61 percent of checkpoints were in areas where the population was at least about a third Hispanic.

According to the California Watch data center, there were 1,027 impounds and just 233 DUI arrests in the city of Los Angeles during the 39 checkpoints conducted in the 2008-09 fiscal year. More than 48 percent of those who had their cars impounded were Hispanic.
Impounds accounted for about $40 million in towing fees and police fines in 2009, divided between the towing companies and city, according to the Berkeley analysis.

In the city of Bell, checkpoints were called “fundraisers,” said Cedillo.

"They’re actually using this as a method to keep some of these smaller cities afloat,” he said.

The courts have recently sided in favor of unlicensed drivers.

In 2005, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that law enforcement authorities cannot impound a vehicle if the sole offense is unlicensed driving. But that ruling hasn’t stopped departments from impounding the cars of unlicensed drivers.

Proponents of the procedure change cite the Fourth Amendment, which restricts law enforcement’s authority to seize private property without a court order.

Beck cited meetings with immigrant rights groups, media scrutiny and court rulings as his reason for changing the procedure.

But the overriding thing that made me come to this decision,” he said, “was that it is the right thing to do.”

To reach Dan Watson by email, click here.



 

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