Wake deputies conduct DWI checkpoint

Raleigh, N.C. — Wake County sheriff’s deputies turned their sights on those who drink and drive at checkpoint just outside southeastern Raleigh on Saturday night.

The checkpoint at Poole and Barwell roads yielded 134 charges, said Phyllis Stephens, public-information director of the Wake County Sheriff's Office.

“We pick out different areas throughout the county where we’ve had problems, where there’s been a lot of wrecks lately or there’s been complaints of speeding,” Sheriff Donnie Harrison said.

Charges against motorists from Saturday included eight for driving while impaired and three felony drug offenses, as well as 24 for driving with a revoked license and another 24 for driving without a driver's license. The other charges were for various motor-vehicle infractions.

Harrison said his department conducts the checkpoints every few months, and that practice "pay(s) off," because it makes people rethink drinking and driving.

“What we try to do is let people know, ‘Hey, you can’t drive and drink. You can’t drive without a driver’s license. You can’t drive and haul dope,’" Harrison said. "And the best thing to do is have these checkpoints and work it like crazy."

Sobriety checkpoints netted more than 4,000 DWI arrests statewide during one month-long period in 2007.

Last Sunday in Raleigh, a DWI-related crash on the Inner Beltline left three people dead.

Francisco Javier Martinez, 30, of 1925 Village Squire Circle in Knightdale, was charged with DWI, three counts of felony death by motor vehicle, two counts of felony serious injury by motor vehicle, and one count each of driving the wrong direction and driving without a license.

Martinez was traveling westbound in an eastbound lane when his van collided with a Lexus near the on-ramp from Capital Boulevard, police said.