Too many DWIs?
Records show Daryl Begay allowed to dodge earlier drunken driving charge

Copyright © 2009
Gallup Independent
By Phil Stake
Staff writer

GALLUP — McKinley County has recorded 15 DWI-related fatalities this year, according to statistics compiled monthly by the New Mexico Department of Transportation. That’s two fewer fatalities than Bernalillo County, which has recorded 17 — the highest number of DWI fatalities in the state. The difference in population between the two counties, however, is much greater: about nine to one, according the U.S. Census Bureau Web site. The above statistics do not include 11 reported DWI-related fatalities on the New Mexico side of Navajo Nation.

The DWI problem in McKinley County is not a new one. Veteran law enforcement officers have analogized that in the mid-’90s, when DWI arrests were at more than double the current count, nabbing a drunken driver was like casting a line into a fishery pond — there was always a fresh harvest. But catching drunken drivers is not the problem, according to a report released in late August by Mothers Against Drunk Driving — MADD — which has been hired by the state to monitor court activity. The DWI Task Force, funded through the office of DWI Czar Rachel O’Connor, arrested 46 drunken drivers in September alone. And that number does not reflect the scores of arrests made by regular patrol officers with the New Mexico State Police, Gallup Police Department and McKinley County Sheriff’s Office.

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