Social Media Can Hinder Police Catching Drunk Drivers

In this day and age, social media is becoming a staple of our everyday lives, but some websites and Facebook pages may be curbing the Mississippi Highway Patrol’s efforts to minimize drunk or impaired drivers on the road.

Many people use to social media to alert friends about D.U.I. roadblocks. We make think that we’re doing our friends a favor by reporting these road blocks on social media, but in reality, we could be indirectly hurting them.

Benjamin Seibert of the Mississippi Highway Patrol says, "They’re putting that information out there when we’re trying to do our job, and it thwarts what we’re doing because everyone’s connected. So, not only does it go to their friends, but it spreads kind of like a spider web and it will go out to those bad people too. When we have someone who’s going to go through one of our checkpoints and that we could have stopped and we could have locked him up, now they’re more likely to drive around."

The Mississippi Highway Patrol does encourage you to be their eyes and ears though. If you see any suspicious driving or to report a drunk driver, dial *HP to connect with the Mississippi Highway Patrol.