Glendale City Council recognizes police officers for DUI arrests, crackdown

Six Glendale police officers were recognized Tuesday for their crackdown on motorists driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

The City Council honored officers Bryan Duncan, Art Obrusnik, Matt Bolton, Marc Tarzia, Ryan Gunn and Ben Bateman, who make up the Police Department’s DUI team.

The team has “worked tirelessly for the last 8 1/2 months,” Duncan said.

The team works odd hours to fit the demands of apprehending DUI suspects, he said, often spending nights sleeping at the police station, only to wake up the following morning and go to court and work again.

“Our families have made some sacrifices for this and we definitely appreciated the recognition,” Gunn told council members.

The team was created to deal with a spike in DUI-related incidents, including hit-and-runs, police Capt. Todd Stokes said at Tuesday’s council meeting.

The team began its crackdown in January. Twelve days later, officers had already made 120 DUI-related arrests, Stokes said.

He said the team made a “pretty tremendous effort for the first two weeks of the program.”
Driving under the influence arrests are up 103% this year compared to the same period in 2011, according to Police Department statistics.

Meanwhile, DUI-related traffic collisions were down this year by 24%.

-- Veronica Rocha, Times Community News

Follow Veronica on Google+ and Twitter: @VeronicaRochaLA