New Year comes in with limited incidents, arrests police say

As local residents cel- ebrated the turn of the year, sheriff’s office deputies were on patrol, responding to a slight uptick in calls for service, though nothing unusual for a Saturday night, with no major incidents reported.

Most of the calls, a Charles County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson

said, were officer-initiated, such as traffic stops, checks on businesses and shopping centers, though there were a handful of incidents of disorderly conduct, assaults, and possible sounds of gunshots or, perhaps, fireworks. Patrol officers were, as they always are, the spokesperson said, on the lookout for impaired drivers, and arrested at least one person suspected of driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

From 8 p.m. to midnight on New Year’s Eve, sheriff’s office deputies responded to 96 calls, mostly officer-initiated checks. Close to midnight, they received calls concerning disorderly people and sounds of gunshots, though officers were unable to confirm whether or not a firearm had actually been discharged, or if the callers had heard fireworks.

From 12 to 7 a.m. New Year’s Day, officers went on 151 calls, again, mostly at their own discretion, but responded to a few fights and reports of loud music as well. Around 2:40 a.m., a suspected impaired driver was arrested during a traffic stop on U.S. 301.

Compared to an average Saturday night, the patrol officers responded to more calls from citizens than usual, but “nothing really out of the ordinary,” Diane Richardson, an agency spokesperson, told the Maryland Independent.