By Jon Johnson
GREENLEE COUNTY – Speed kills, and Greenlee County Sheriff Eric Ellison has made lowering the number of criminal speeders on Greenlee County’s highways one of his new administration’s top priorities.
“The speeding has gotten out of control,” Ellison said. “It’s just been going on too long.”
A bedroom community, a large swath of employees of Freeport McMoRan’s Morenci Operations copper mine commute back and forth to Morenci from Safford. The ensuing speeding on U.S. Highway 191 North through the Black Hills and into the 3-Way intersection, connecting U.S. Highway 191 with State Route 75 and State Route 78, is often attributed to commuters.
Greenlee initiated its anti-speeding campaign and adopted a strict stance on reckless drivers just one month into Ellison’s tenure as sheriff in February. He said he has gotten other law enforcement agencies, including the Arizona Department of Safety, the Safford Police Department, the Arizona Department of Transportation, the Clifton Police Department, and the Graham County Sheriff’s Office, to help educate the public and curb criminal speeding, which is anything 20 mph over the posted limit.
To draw attention to the speeding problem on U.S. Highway 191, Ellison invited press from throughout the state to take a ride-along with a deputy and observe the early-morning speeding shift firsthand.
The Gila Herald rode along with Deputy Andrew Esparza, a four-year veteran of the Sheriff’s Office who earned his mettle by starting as a detention officer for three years before becoming a deputy.
Esparza currently works the morning shift and is often the initial lone deputy on duty as he travels Highway 191 during the early morning hours, looking for aggressive and reckless drivers.
As part of the “harsh stance” against speeding, Greenlee County Sheriff’s Office deputies have been instructed to tow the vehicles and take the drivers to jail who commit criminal speeding.
Ellison says the crackdown has seemed to make a difference in terms of safety, as there have been no fatalities on Greenlee’s highways so far this year. In contrast, the previous year saw numerous fatal crashes.
“The collision rate has gone down, (and) our citizens are safer,” Ellison said. “The hard approach – the hard stance – has worked.”
During the Gila Herald’s ride along, it took only minutes before Esparza had his first catch of the day, pulling over a speeding Dodge Ram truck just as the daybreak from the sun began to appear on the distant horizon.
One after another, as soon as Esparza was done with one citation, he was back on the road seeing multiple speeders in minutes. The traffic detail has become second nature for Esparza, as he masterfully checks his laptop computer and then initiates his radar, all while maintaining control of his patrol vehicle at a high rate of speed.
There are a couple of safety pullouts and some areas with extra shoulder, but for the most part, there is little room during a traffic stop on the side of the highway through the Black Hills. This endangers law enforcement as speeders continue to zip past as the deputy conducts a traffic stop. Esparza does his best to initiate traffic stops in areas with ample room, but sometimes the space is narrower than what is comfortable. He said that other drivers should be aware of law enforcement during traffic stops and slow down and move over when possible.
In the few hours the Gila Herald was with Deputy Esparza, he wrote six speeding tickets, with the worst offender reaching 89 mph in a 65 mph zone. None of those ticketed were going less than 80 mph. In one series of events, Esparza made a U-turn to chase a speeder in a group of vehicles. However, while doing so, a speeder traveling even faster in the opposite direction, with no following traffic, caused Esparza to make another U-turn and ticket that offender instead.
“Aggressive driving, reckless driving, criminal speeding, passing in a no-passing zone… Pretty much you name it, we’ve got it out here,” Esparza said. “We’ve had an influx of complaints about reckless driving and criminal speed on these highways, and some of the accidents that we have seen out here have often been attributed to speeding and other reckless driving (and) impaired driving. It’s kind of been our focus when working out here on Highway 191.”
One after another, like shooting fish in a barrel, as soon as Esparza was finished with one citation, there was another speeder to chase down. Ellison hopes the crackdown will have a lasting effect by lowering the number of criminal speeders traveling through the Black Hills and other highways in Greenlee County.
“With all this attention, our goal is to educate the pubic to stop speeding on 191, State Route 75, U.S. 70, all throughout the county,” Ellison said. “That way we can make the county a little safer for the motoring public.”
