Editorial: Efficient, convenient police blood draws are a good tool in fighting DUI

When a police officer pulls over a driver, it can be the start of a process that costs that driver a lot of time and money.

What can be missed is how much it costs the law enforcement agency, too.

A suspected drunken driving stop takes longer than a simple speeding ticket. Instead of a matter of minutes, it could be an investment of an hour or more. It might involve field sobriety assessment, breath tests and transportation to a hospital for a blood draw. All of that takes time.

Police departments can bear the up-front cost of the medical tests. That could be about $250. In short, pulling a car over isn’t necessarily cheap or easy, but what is a law enforcement agency to do?

They could look at the question creatively.

Ligonier Valley Police Department is doing that by having an officer who can do more than the law enforcement side of the process. Officer Shawn Knepper is a one-stop shop for DUI stops. In addition to pulling over drivers and doing what other police might do when evaluating a driver, Knepper can also fill the medical role. He is one of 19 officers in Pennsylvania certified as a phlebotomist — a medical technician trained in drawing blood.

That means he can save the department — and the driver — the time and inconvenience of driving to a hospital, having blood drawn by medical staff and then returning for the next steps in the process.

This addresses multiple issues with the process. Many areas are at risk of losing their hospitals. If a rural area had an officer able to draw blood, it could eliminate long drives.

In addition, those longer drives can mean longer waits between when an incident occurs and when the blood is analyzed. That’s important because a delayed draw can affect the accuracy of a blood alcohol content assessment. And that’s assuming that an emergency room wasn’t already jammed with critical patients whose care took precedence.

If a phlebotomy-certified officer like Knepper was available, that evidence would require neither transportation nor appointment. It could be collected immediately without excess cost or delay.

The benefit is obvious. The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation says the state has more than 120,000 miles of road. There are about 9.1 million licensed drivers. There were more than 42,000 DUI arrests in Pennsylvania in 2023, the last year with data.

A blood test is necessary for a successful prosecution, especially given the number of ways a driver can be incapacitated. A Breathalyzer might tell you someone was intoxicated. A blood test will tell you exactly what is in the person’s system, like alcohol, marijuana, methamphetamines, etc.

That means easily available phlebotomy can make people safer. It could make prosecutions more complete. It could save lives.

It could also save a department like Ligonier Valley a lot of money, which could go back into other aspects of policing. That’s important when departments are stretched to the financial breaking point.

Is it the solution to every prosecutorial and policing problem facing municipalities or law enforcement agencies? Of course not. There is no magic wand to fix every problem.

But by trying new solutions to one problem, police departments just might find something that can address several. It can open the door to creative thinking with other issues.

In 2023, there were 308 alcohol-related crashes in Pennsylvania. If a cost-saving, efficient response like an in-house phlebotomist can help lower that number, it seems like an attempt worth taking.