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Over 200 Drivers Stopped, Ticketed During Police Crackdown On Traffic Violations

MACOMB COUNTY (WWJ) - A crackdown on speeding and other aggressive driving on I-94 in Macomb County leads to hundreds of traffic stops.

Michigan State Police had 12 troopers stopping drivers Tuesday at I-94 near Nine Mile Road and that amounted to more than 200 traffic violations issued -- with 115 tickets written for speeding.

First Lt. Mike Shaw says they caught drivers who were doing more than just speeding:

"We were able to set aside four warrant arrests, 38 people were without their seat belts, 14 distracted driving citations and also 10 people that were driving without a license," says Shaw.

Shaw says a similar crackdown on I-275 earlier this month resulted in more than 300 traffic stops.

"We send our motor units out were a lot of people are not expecting to see a state trooper on a motor cycle, and we put them in targeted areas were we start to get a lot of citizen complaints."

Shaw says that drivers have been taking advantage of the cuts to law enforcement and have steadily increased their speed over the years. He wants that behavior to swing in the other direction so drivers observe the speed limits.

"We lost a lot of troopers - took a lot of budget cuts so at times we just didn't have enough troopers on the freeways to actually keep the speeds down to a normal rate," says Shaw. "So as citizens realize no more troopers on the road they ... started picking up speed and we saw an uptick in fatal crashes as well as regular crashes."

Shaw says they send special traffic details out into certain areas to keep the number of accidents and fatalities down.

Shaw says the goal is to have troopers on the roads to help prevent the accidents before they happen. "So if one speeding ticket or one seat beat citation either saves somebody's life or prevents a crash actually we feel pretty good about that."

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