Officers issue 1,009 seat belt tickets during traffic enforcement program

Wichita police netted nearly as many seat belt violations as they had vehicle stops during a special traffic enforcement program last month.

The state-funded Special Traffic Enforcement Program focused on DUIs and seat belt usage, Lt. Dan East said. Officers stopped 1,154 vehicles over the last three weeks of May and wrote 1,009 citations for seat belt usage violations.

There were also five DUI arrests, two citations for texting while driving and 191 other assorted violations, East said.

The seat belt violations were not limited to drivers alone, he said. Children under the age of 14 accounted for 48 of the violations and teens between 14 and 17 were cited another 21 times.

“We would like to not see that number” so high, East said of the seat belt citations topping 1,000.

This story was originally published June 4, 2014 at 1:47 PM with the headline "Officers issue 1,009 seat belt tickets during traffic enforcement program."