After 700 DUI stops, Fairview Heights cop still driven to get drunken drivers off the road

Fairview Heights Police Sgt. Greg Hosp has noticed a difference in drunken drivers compared to when he started his law enforcement career 25 years ago.

“Years ago you used to be able to almost set your watch by closing time depending on where you were,” said Hosp who wrote his 700th DUI citation on June 22. “When I worked in Caseyville it was easy enough to go and sit off the north end of town when the bars were closing around 2 a.m.

“It was easy enough to sit down there and wait for those violations.”

Now, with the legalization of marijuana, a full-blown opioid epidemic, and a spike in the use of heroin and oxycontin, officers are seeing a different type of impaired driver. The routines have changed, Hosp said.

What hasn’t changed is the frequency of tragic endings.

Hosp says notifying families that a loved one has died in an substance-induced tragedy remains as difficult for him as it’s ever been. His desire to avoid that part of the job is what motivates his pursuit of impaired drivers, he said.

“There has been countless times that I’ve had to make notifications that a family member was killed. It’s tough,” he said. “It’s not something that I ever want to do. If I could prevent it beforehand has always been my philosophy.”

Sgt. Hosp says he has made it a priority to hunt for drunken drivers since the beginning of his career.

“Any time I got in that squad car and I was working a night shift my focus was searching for drunk drivers and arresting them,” he said.

Although Hosp began his career in 1996, he knew what career he wanted to pursue since a kid. He joined the Fairview Heights Police Department in 2011. He left for a while to work for the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).

“In my family I have several uncles that were in law enforcement ever since I was a young child,” he said. “Growing up, I idolized them and that’s what drove me down that path.”

Even after two decades, Hosp says he is still passionate about his job.

“I’ve been doing this for 25 years, there’s a sense of duty and responsibility,” he said. “Like any job some days are a little more motivating than others. When it comes to DUI arrests I’ve realized the importance of getting that person off the roadway.”

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, more than 10,000 lost their lives in a drunk-driving crash in 2019. One person dies every 52 minutes in a drunken-driving crash, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

Hosp urges drivers to call the police if they ever encounter an impaired driver on the road.

“If you’re hesitant about calling because you don’t want to get that person in trouble, let us do our job by determining if the driver is impaired or not,” Hosp said. “One thing about driving under the influence is no one ever accidentally got behind the wheel impaired. That just doesn’t happen.”

Impaired drivers will do anything to avoid getting a ticket. Some drivers will spark up a conversation and others won’t speak at all, he said. Despite crazy encounters and chatty impaired drivers, reaching this milestone is important to the law enforcement veteran.

“It’s an accomplishment but it’s no more important than the very first one I did,” he said. “If I could assign a number of people that I potentially saved that would be something I could hold high.”

The Fairview Heights Police Department celebrated Hosp’s 700th career DUI citation with a Facebook post.

“Thank you, Sergeant Hosp, for your commitment to making our streets 700 times safer!” the post said.