A county sheriff’s office in Florida used an infamous Christmas character to enforce traffic laws the weekend before the holiday.
Monroe County Sheriff’s Office Colonel Lou Caputo wore a Grinch costume as he monitored traffic on Friday. Those who were minimally speeding were given a choice between a citation or an onion, a reference to the 2000 movie How the Grinch Stole Christmas, where actor Jim Carrey, playing the Grinch, bites into a raw onion during a scene.
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Caputo told Reuters that the onion was the most popular choice among the drivers on the segment of the Florida Keys Overseas Highway that includes the Key Largo Elementary School zone.
“If they choose the citation, we’ll probably have to take them out and do a sobriety test on them,” Caputo told the outlet.
The highway has a speed limit of 50 miles per hour on the 100-mile road. All of the Florida Keys island chains are connected by this highway, which is the furthest south in the U.S.
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Drivers were reminded by “Officer Grinch” to slow down and stay off of their cellphones while driving.
Florida saw over 400,000 traffic accidents in 2021, which was the most recent data released by the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles.