Dodge County Sheriff's Office to publicly shame OWI offenders on social media

DODGE COUNTY, Wis. (CBS 58) -- The Dodge County Sheriff is working on a new way to stop people from drinking and driving by the end of August. Anyone who's arrested for an OWI will have their picture and name posted to the Sheriff's Office social media accounts.

"It's our hope that by doing that, people will understand that we are serious about impaired driving," said Dodge County Sheriff Dale Schmidt. "Hopefully people make that conscious decision not to commit that violation of the law."

The bar manager at Danny Boys says they have "Safe Ride" Ron, the Wisconsin Tavern League, and he drives people home himself, too. "We do make every effort that we can to stop people from driving home," said manager Corey Ronge. But he believes the Sheriff's Office is taking it a step too far. 

"They've made a bad choice, and humiliating them to everyone on Facebook isn't going to change the fact that something happened," he said.

Deadly crashes are on the rise in Dodge County. Nine people have been killed this year.

"It's the families and the victims that I'm worried about," said Sheriff Schmidt. "The people who are complaining about this are not the people who are showing up to these scenes like EMS, fire, and my own deputies are, when we're showing up to scenes where there are dead bodies."

The sheriff says this is their effort to deter people from drinking and driving so they don't end up on their Facebook page. 

"In Dodge County, we are not going to tolerate people getting behind the wheel of a vehicle while impaired," he said. "They are going to be arrested, and we are going to ensure that they are prosecuted, and if they make that choice, unfortunately their picture is going to be on social media as well."

Releasing names and photos of OWI arrests is legal, and public record.