Anne Arundel County Police Department Announces Results of its “Thirty-Five to Save Lives" Campaign
From December 10, 2012, through January 7, 2013, under the direction of Chief of Police Larry W. Tolliver, the Anne Arundel County Police Department mobilized personnel in a comprehensive campaign designed to reduce crashes, injuries and deaths on Anne Arundel County roads. The plan targeted predictive behaviors and crashes on roadways using a data driven, multi-disciplinary approach involving education, enforcement, and engineering, major components of highway safety.
The campaign, “Thirty-Five to Save Lives” dedicated an officer for at least 30 minutes per shift to traffic enforcement targeting five specific behaviors in an effort to save the lives of motorists. The plan is consistent with the Maryland Strategic Highway Safety Plan (SHSP) and deployed officers to focus on the following five specific behaviors: distracted driving, impaired driving, aggressive driving, pedestrian safety and speed enforcement. The ultimate goal of the enforcement plan was for motorists and pedestrians to voluntarily comply with rules of the road without the requirement for a continuous police presence. During the initiative, each Traffic Coordinator compiled a report consisting of roadways with the highest frequency of impaired driving, crime and crash data. District Commanders directed enforcement activities within their district based on the roadways identified as having high frequency of crimes and/or crashes and each officer was deployed to the identified location to provide targeted traffic enforcement for at least 30 minutes per duty day.
During this initiative, the Anne Arundel County Police Department conducted 4,816 traffic stops, issued 11,003 tickets, warnings and repair orders and affected 428 traffic arrests and 41 criminal arrests after making contact with drivers. From the period of December 27, 2012 through January 7, 2013, the agency conducted 3,440 traffic stops as compared to 2,170 during that period the previous year. This campaign is part of the Police Department’s overall comprehensive strategy to reduce the amount of life altering and fatal crashes on Anne Arundel County roads. The agency remains committed to keeping area roads as safe as possible.
