Personal Injury Law

Missouri law enforcement plan to limit fatal crashes

By Ryan Bradley, Esq.

A statewide law enforcement campaign to limit the number of serious Missouri car accidents will be returning this summer after some success last year.

The campaign, called High Enforcement Action Teams (HEAT), consists of increased patrols on area highways with particular attention paid toward stopping aggressive drivers. The plan, which is sponsored by the Missouri Highway Safety Division, is being adopted by agencies all across the state, including the Missouri State Highway Patrol and numerous local police departments.

HEAT began last year after officials began to notice a jump in the number of accidents during the summer months. Patrols were stepped up on Interstates 70 and 44 and there was a decline in serious injury accidents from the prior year. For 2010, the HEAT program has been super-sized to include more roadways and for a longer duration.

One of the areas that will be focused on this year is Interstate 270, according to a St. Louis Post Dispatch report. That report said that local law enforcement already writes dozens of tickets every hour in that area, but reckless and negligent drivers continue to break the law.

Aggressive driving is a major problem across the country. This includes excessive speeding, tailgating, or reckless lane changes. Studies show that these types of negligent behaviors are present in a large portion of serious car accidents and cause thousands of deaths each year.

While law enforcement will do its best to prevent these incidents from happening, inevitably, there will still be accidents. Negligent drivers must be held accountable for their behavior and no one should have to pay because somebody else decided to drive aggressively and caused an accident. If you have been injured in a Missouri car accident, contact a Missouri personal injury lawyer to make sure your rights as an accident victim are protected.

Full post as published by Missouri Accident Lawyer Blog on June 14, 2010 (boomark / email).