Suffolk to crack down on drunken driving

On the heels of a rash of alleged wrong-way drunken-driving incidents on Long Island, Suffolk County Executive Steve Levy will announce Tuesday a major enforcement campaign aimed at stopping drunken drivers.

The campaign will include DWI checkpoints at what officials called "highly trafficked intersections," as well as highway ramps and shopping centers across Suffolk County.

In addition police will unveil a Holiday DWI Team, announce STOP-DWI patrols ,and unveil a public service announcement titled "Wrong Way Holiday," which will air on Long Island radio stations.

"Safety on our streets is paramount, during the holidays and all year 'round," Levy said in a prepared statement. "We are reminding members of the public that law enforcement will be out in force to prevent anyone else from being involved in another horrific 'wrong way' or DWI-related crash."

The announcement, to be made at a news conference Tuesday featuring police Commissioner Richard Dormer and representatives of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, comes a day after Nassau police stopped a 20-year-old alleged drunken driver from Huntington Station just 100 feet after police said she exited "an establishment" in East Meadow - and began to travel westbound in the eastbound lanes of Hempstead Turnpike.

Officials said it was the sixth time since Nov. 15 a motorist has been arrested after driving the wrong way on a major Long Island road. The first accident in that chain left an off-duty NYPD officer dead after his car was hit head-on on the Northern State Parkway by an alleged wrong-way drunken driver who police said had a blood-alcohol content of 0.26 - more than three times the legal limit.