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Rumford police stop cars at a sobriety checkpoint, where they hand out brochures detailing the fines and fees that accompany an OUI conviction. The price tag: $7,000. Staff photo by David A. Rodgers

RUMFORD - The phalanx of police cruisers, and their blazing blue lights, look incongruous on the winding, silent back road surrounded by woods and fields. Police have set up their roadblock here, they say, because neighbors have reported seeing empty beer cans tossed along the road.

The roadblock is part of a tough campaign against drunken driving waged by police here for the last several years - a campaign, it is widely said, that has been strikingly effective.

With the help of federal grants, police have used so-called saturation patrols and roadblocks to bear down on those operating under the influence of alcohol.

This year, Rumford police got $10,000 - and Mexico police $4,000 - to add as many as three cruisers to their regular two-cruiser patrols on local roads at key times. The money is also used for roadblocks.

The OUI campaign, says Sgt. George ''Chip'' Cayer of the Rumford police, ''has worked - I've seen the difference.''

Cayer, who runs the OUI program, cites statistics showing that OUI arrests are dramatically down. He also cites changes in attitude, exemplified by those calls to police by neighbors noticing beer cans on their road.

Police have encouraged such activism. They have been rewarded, says Cayer, with increasingly frequent calls from cellular phone users about drunken drivers.

Police have also used their campaign as a preventive tool, advertising roadblocks ahead of time in local newspapers. And they have stressed the practical ramifications of driving drunk, flooding the area with literature.

At roadblocks, they hand out one of their most visible brochures. It shows a brimming beer mug with a large price tag representing the total costs of an OUI conviction, from fine to lawyer's fees to insurance surcharge.

The price tag: $7,000.

Rumford police officer Don McKeen performs a sobriety test on a motorist at an OUI roadblock. With the help of federal grants, police are using saturation patrols and roadblocks to bear down on drunken drivers. Staff photo by David A. Rodgers

At their recent roadblock on the back road, almost 12 miles from downtown Rumford, the blue lights from the four parked cruisers are blinding. Police have set up early, about 6 p.m., to look for what they call ''early birds'' or ''sneaky Petes,'' who know about the roadblocks and hope to elude them.

As each car reaches the assemblage, one officer leans into the driver's window, explains they are out here ''to make sure the roads are safe,'' and asks if the driver has been drinking. The officer is very polite, almost gentle.

As the first officer speaks, another painstakingly scans the inside of the car. Others, meanwhile, swarm around the car, checking lights, tires, plates, rust. After dark, they wield long-handled flashlights, so large they manage to look sinister.

As they lean into each car window, the police often find friends, neighbors, colleagues, people they at least know of, if not actually know. They recognize a guy who is usually drinking but is sober tonight; maybe, they suggest, it is due to his new girlfriend. They stop another guy they briefly mistake for his brother, whose license, they know, is under suspension.

Under law, Cayer says, police require ''a reasonable and articulable suspicion'' that something is wrong to stop a car for more than a few seconds. That something can be as minor as a brake light out or failing to signal a turn, or as substantive as slurred words, bloodshot eyes or the smell of alcohol.

If they find anything wrong, police give a series of field sobriety tests. They include a finger dexterity exercise; a so-called horizontal gaze nystagmus, or HGN, in which an officer holds a pencil and the driver's eyes - the smallest muscle group, and thus the first affected by alcohol - must follow it; and directions to walk, turn, step heel to toe, and stand on one foot.

At the roadblock, police pull over a disheveled-looking man who cannot find his insurance. His car has rust. Its interior is chaos. A computer check shows he has had a previous OUI conviction.

An officer gives him the sobriety tests. Much to everyone's surprise, he passes them all. The police send him on his way, warning him about the rust.

Staff art. Source: Rumford Police Department.

In order to make an arrest, police must have probable cause, or more than a 50 percent chance the driver has been drinking. If they do make an arrest, they then bring the suspect to the police station and administer a breath test.

Acceptable blood-alcohol levels have gradually dropped over the years. In the 1960s, anything under 0.15 percent was legal. Today, levels must be under 0.08.

Suspects can refuse the test, says Cayer, but must ''suffer the consequences.'' Refusal can mean a license is administratively revoked. Refusal can be used against suspects in court. If they are convicted, it means they must serve a mandatory jail sentence, often 30 days.

Conviction on a first offense OUI - after taking the test - usually brings a $400 fine, a 90-day license suspension, and no jail time. With each offense, the penalties get stiffer: A fourth offense means a $2,000 fine, a six-year license suspension, and six months in jail.

In a town as intimate as Rumford, news of an OUI conviction travels fast.

A few years back, such news might have brought knowing laughs, or the sort of good-old-boy respect once afforded outlaws. Today, says Cayer, it brings humiliation, expense and the hassle of getting from here to there - in a place where everything is driving distance from everything else - without driving.

Over the past 17 years, Cayer estimates he has taken more than 500 drunken drivers off the road. He says he always wanted to get 50 in one year, a goal he came close to but never achieved.

Still, he says, ''we've made a major dent in OUIs.''