Click It or Ticket: Traffic Stops Coming through June 2

Bellmawr, Berlin, Gloucester City, Haddon Heights, Merchantville, Pennsauken, Pine Hill and Winslow.

Those are the Camden County towns in which local law enforcement has been awarded additional funds for policing seat belt safety through motor vehicle stops.

(The New Jersey Division of Highway Traffic Safety, or NJDHTS, also provides a complete list of participating municipalities.)

According to the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA), more than 22,000 motorists and their passengers were killed in car accidents in 2010. More than half were not wearing seat belts.

Memorial Day weekend is one of the most heavily traveled weekends of the year, and motorists need to be careful, said Division of Highway Traffic Safety Acting Director Gary Poedubicky in a statement.

“Buckling up is the single most effective way for a motor vehicle occupant to avoid death or serious injury in a crash,” Poedubicky said. “During what we expect to be a highly trafficked period, motorists and their passengers need to make their safety the top priority and wear their seat belt no matter how long the journey.”

Since the advent of the Click It or Ticket campaign, seat belt compliance in New Jersey is up to nearly 95 percent of all front-seat drivers, according to a 2011 Fairleigh Dickinson poll. Yet only 61 percent of passengers in the back seat comply.

“Passengers in the back remain at a critical risk, especially adults, who only put on a seat belt in the back 35 percent of the time” Poedubicky said.

In an effort to improve those numbers, seat belt safety laws carry a financial penalty for adult, back-seat passengers as well. Police may issue a summons and a $46 fine to every unbuckled back-seat passenger discovered when stopping a vehicle for another violation.

Although the primary goal of traffic stops is deterrence, says Anthony J. Vecchio, a Freehold, NJ lawyer who specializes in DUI defense, they also provide a wealth of opportunities for law enforcement officials to uncover other illegal activities.

"In my practice, over 90 percent of all my drug possession clients are charged following motor vehicle stops," he says.

"Checkpoints also give police a great opportunity to write summons for document issues like expired driver's licenses and registrations—resulting in a surge of revenue for the state. Drivers should make sure their vehicles are properly insured and their credentials are in good order."

Vecchio points out that the most common arrests by far are for suspected drunken driving, outstanding warrants and marijuana possession. He also notes that surprise is no longer an acceptable legal defense when collared in such a stop.

"While sobriety checks have traditionally required advance public notice and careful selection of the targeted area, the courts have begun to gradually chip away at these requirements, making it much easier to prosecute drivers arrested at these checkpoints," Vecchio says.

In 2011, 419 of 493 police agencies in New Jersey ramped up their traffic enforcement for a two-week period around Memorial Day weekend. That netted more than 32,000 seat belt citations (down from 35,000-plus in 2010), more than 900 car seat tickets, 5,800 speeding citations and more than 950 drunken driving arrests.