Guadalajara’s program to reduce alcohol related automobile accidents and fatalities will step up a gear in August.
The Salvando Vidas (Saving Lives) program, colloquially referred to as “el Torito,” is to expand with 50 newly contracted officers and additional nighttime breathalyzer check points to trap inebriated drivers.
Introduced in November 2012, the program’s first year of operation saw the number of alcohol-related deaths in metro area road accidents drop from 60 to 41.
The optimism was short lived, however. The figure rose back up to 61 for the next 12-month period through November 2014. And with this year’s running total already at 41, officials at the state Transportation Department (Semov) have decided to ramp up the program.
The new recruits will bring the total number of officers participating in Salvando Vidas to 160. This will allow smaller checkpoints to be introduced in more diverse areas of the city.
Anyone caught in a Semov checkpoint driving with an alcohol level exceeding 0.41 mg/lit is arrested taken to the Centro Urbano de Retención Vial por Alcoholimetría (CURVA) drunk driver detention center in Zapopan to sit out 12 to 36 hours under administrative arrest.