First of a Series
Jim Leach began his law enforcement career in 1975, and he shares his insights as a Criminal Justice Consultant for Golden Media Group. Mr. Leach has served as the Director of Criminal Investigations for the Tennessee Highway Patrol.
According to a story from WSMV in Nashville, published October 27, 2025, former Tennessee state troopers, Ashley Smith and Adam Potts, allege the THP has exerted pressure and even instituted quotas in an attempt to force troopers to make DUI arrests.
They claim a lot of innocent people have been arrested for DUI in Tennessee, so that troopers could reach specific goals set by management. The story says, “The repeated insistence to increase DUI arrests is inadvertently resulting in innocent people being charged with DUIs.”
Here are a couple of quotes from the article:
Smith says, “This is corruption. We’re ruining people’s lives. We’re being forced to ruin people’s lives.”
The WSMV article quotes Smith as saying, “I was basically forced to arrest this gentleman for DUI and he wasn’t.”
When asked by a reporter if he had ever arrested a sober driver, Potts said, “Yes, sir. I’m sure I have.”
WSMV 4 obtained internal maps emailed to troopers in the Jackson District showing the number of DUIs made by each trooper.
The article reveals a tape recording of a meeting in the Chattanooga District, and “officials” can be heard telling troopers to “arrest every DUI that you can get your hands on. Load the jail full of them.”
In the meeting, the official, said to be Captain Patrick Turner, goes on to stipulate that troopers on the midnight shift would be required to make 100 arrests each year. This statement was apparently made to describe “hard work”, saying, “It could look like arresting a hundred plus DUIs a year.” He went on to say, “You turn in 33 DUIs for a year, and 1.7 contacts (meaning people pulled over for traffic violations)… You’re gonna get spanked.”
The former troopers also said they were told to concentrate on DUI enforcement when they were working overtime designated for drunk driving enforcement. Potts said this creates pressure on officers working in these designated, grant-funded programs to “find someone to arrest.”
WSMV says they “exposed that fifteen people have been wrongfully arrested by THP.”
A THP spokesperson issued this statement in response to allegations of wrongful arrests. “Troopers are highly trained, and expected to use their judgement, and make necessary traffic stops based on observed violations and public safety needs.”
In future articles, we will delve into these issues a little deeper.
(PHOTO: Jim Leach)
