CALLER to 911 DISPATCHER: I believe I'm following someone who is drunk. He swerved over and almost hit us. He's weaving back and forth.
DISPATCHER: What kind of car is it?
CALLER: It might be a white GEO car.
DISPATCHER: Hold one minute and let me get it dispatched. (Dispatcher announces the incident on a police radio.) I have a vehicle swerving at 90 miles an hour at excessive speed. . . .
CALLER: Oh, he just . . . oh my gosh, he almost hit somebody. (Scream heard in the background). He almost hit a truck. Now he's swerving to the left. He bumped into that . . . he's swerving to the right.
DISPATCHER: (Minutes later.) Is the officer pulling him over?
CALLER: Yes, he is. Oh my . . . he just went over the curb.
DISPATCHER: If you'll just pull up behind the trooper and stay in your car until the officer comes and talks to you.
Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt and a local drunken driving watchdog group hope more people will make these kinds of important calls to police this holiday season.
Leavitt is joining a group called Freeway Watch and other community organizations in an effort to crack down on drunken driving. On Dec. 6, he will sign a proclamation urging residents not to drink and drive during the holiday season.
Freeway Watch is a nonprofit group that trains and encourages citizens with cell phones to call 911 toll free to report drunken drivers.
"It's a Neighborhood Watch on wheels," said Suzanne Peterson, who started the nonprofit organization with her husband, Utah Highway Patrol Sgt. Jeff Peterson, seven years ago.
The idea for Freeway Watch was born in a tragic accident on I-I5.
Seventeen-year-old Sean Adkins and his friends from Highland High School were on their way to a high school basketball game March 1, 1994, when the station wagon in which they were riding got a flat tire.
While the teens were changing the tire off the side of the road, a drunken driver with a blood alcohol level three times the legal limit careened into the emergency lane and hit Adkins.
Paul Guy Bredehoft, who had been drinking at Uncle Bart's Club and Charley's Club that night, was traveling 63 miles per hour when he hit the teenager. The impact threw Adkins 106 feet to his death.
Bredehoft was sentenced to 15 years in prison for the crime. He had 10 prior drunken-driving convictions before the fatal March crash.
It was Jeff Peterson who investigated the accident that night and led Bredehoft to an ambulance to notify him that a blood test would be taken to determine his blood alcohol level.
A parent whose son was involved in the crash but was not hurt asked Peterson how to prevent similar drunken-driving tragedies, and Freeway Watch resulted from that conversation, Suzanne Peterson said.
"Why didn't someone call and report this drunk driver to the police before he killed someone?" Jeff Peterson asked. "It was easy to tell he was drunk. He was driving in the emergency lane when he hit and killed the teenager."
There are still too many cars with drunken drivers at the wheel in Utah, the Petersons say. More than 16,650 people were killed by drunken drivers last year in America, accounting for 40 percent of all traffic deaths.
"I don't think people realize that one person is killed every 15 minutes," said Jeff Peterson. "Drunken driving is still the most frequently committed violent crime in our country."
The group has two important functions in the fight against drunken driving in Utah.
One is the Web site it sponsors: www.freewaywatch.org/lesson, which offers student work sheets about drunken driving and a comprehensive outline about how to recognize drunken drivers and to report them to the police.
There are five online classes, including the following:
"DUI Drive" puts participants behind the steering wheel of a car operated by a drunken driver. The experience simulates the driving impairment of a drunken driver with slow reaction time and dangerous weaving patterns.
"Numbers" displays a script of an actual 911 call, which illustrates the function of Freeway Watch. The page includes phone numbers for reporting a DUI driver.
Freeway Watch and the Utah Highway Patrol have also developed a lesson plan for police officers to teach community, civic, church and school groups the dangers of drinking and driving and to teach them to recognize and report a drunken driver.
The curriculum is presented to driver education classes and is well-organized and interesting, said Mary Phillips, president of Utah's chapter of Mothers Against Drunk Driving.
"I've been in the class, and it really keeps the students' attention."
E-mail: lucy@desnews.com