SHOULD POLICE AUTO CHASES BE CURTAILED?

I know a lot of cops won't chase motorcycles who run, because there's a good chance someone's getting hurt.

It is good learn about this. However, I would like to see very strict rules governing chases.

But if they officially made restrictions for cops not to chase people, you'd have people running all the time.

They still have to let the cops make a judgement call. Some kid on a sportbike running from you because he did a wheelie, maybe not worth the chase. Someone who they ran their plate and there's a warrant for their arrest? Chase.

One of the problems of "hot pursuit" is that both the suspects and the police have been exposed to hours upon hours of fictional car chases in television drama.

The actors and stunt people make high speed driving look easy--and gullible drivers assume:

A) Peeling out and leaving the fuzz behind is normal behavior.

B) Peeling out and leaving the fuzz behind is safe behavior.

Real Men peel out and leave the cops behind.

Television drama is not necessarily based on reality.

Judgement definitely needs to be used.

I'd like to see ground-level chases replaced by aerial surveillance.

LAWS would eliminate the need for most such chases

Ehm...I believe the idea was to protect the lives of the innocent bystanders, timberlandko? I'm not sure LAWs do that...

Well, the cops would hafta be trained to use discretion ... select their launch opportunities with mind to situationally appropriate targect intercept locus.

Now, employing TOWS, though certainly offering high probability of mission success, most likely would introduce an unacceptable level of collateral damge risk, so that's right out. IMO, LAWS are better for eliminating chases than TOWS ... nowhere near as messy.

One of the most graphic examples of the idiocy of those who attempt to allude the police by high-speed driving was in a video of a pursue suspect who suddenly veered onto an exit ramp, and due to the high-speed (even though he was obviously trying to brake and reduce speed), lost control, striking the base of one of those hundred-foot tall pillars which support the lights over the exit ramp. The vehicle was not totalled by the impact, which could be seen in the video.

However, the pillar fell, crushing the vehicle and killing the occupant.

OK, Buster, time to get outta the gene pool . . .

Thanks for the interesting solutions, especially the one involving the high-explosive anti-tank weapon.

I agree that it is pretty idiotic to race away from the police. However, I doubt that one should effectively receive capital punishment for it. Further, the one getting this punishment is often the innocent bystander or motorist. Sometimes the chaser gets killed or injured.

A recent case in my area involved nine (count em) teenagers driving erratically and with a temporary tire on one wheel. A police officer chased them at speeds up to 100 mph, and the kids crashed, killing all nine. I was amazed that there were no condemnations of the chase in the local paper. The policeman was required to get his supervisor's permission to chase, and it was murky in the media whether this was received. The police officer was not punished.

I think that a chase should be reserved for a really egregous case, such as chasing a serial killer or like.

Or simply require those that flee to undergo the same punishment as those innocent bystanders....

Advocate--

You say the car full of teenagers was "driving erratically". Were they driving in such a way as to be a danger to the general public? Damage from erratic driving isn't limited to the young and light-hearted.

The kids were not endangering anyone. They were driving relatively slowly in a commercial area of a city.

I agree in a situation where police are simply giving a high speed chase to stop for a driving violation - then caution should prevail over harming innocent victims.

However, I don't understand - if these teens were driving slowly - how could it be a high speed chase?

My guess is that the cop saw a bunch of black teens in an old car with a temporary tire and figured that there may be violation. Thus, he flashed his lights and sounded his siren for the car to stop. I doubt the cop's claim that the kids were driving erratically. At that point, the kids drove off at high speed, with the cop in pursuit. The chase was at speeds reaching 100 mph.

And you know this how? Simply because you doubt the testimony of the police officers involved? Certainly, given the demographics of DC, one can often reasonably allege "police brutality." However, that does not make it a foregone conclusion. You have simply provided your anecdote. Like the readers of a cheap and inept detective novel, we have no more information than you choose to provide us. Got a link?

Set, do you really deny this is the type of thing going on all over the country? The media reports this type of thing all the time, and there are a number of TV shows showing such chases.

The example I gave, which really typifies what is going on, was not in the DC area.

You have before stated that you are in the DC area, and you said that this was an example from your area, so the assumption that you referred to DC was reasonable.

But that just points up more starkly my point about having no information about your "evidence" than you choose to provide. You have not provided an outside source for the incident to which you refer.

As for whether or not this type of thing is going on all over the country, i haven't a reasonable source for data in the matter--and you have not provided any. You simply contend, without supporting evidence, that "this type of thing [is] going on all over the country." If it were, one would still have no base line upon which to determine if unnecessary tragic consequences were commonly attendant upon police chases. Finally, you do not address the extent to which such behavior by members of law enforcement is subject to the review of police oversight agencies. I don't contend that one should not deplore avoidable tragedy--i do contend that you have provided no basis for taking alarm at a situation which you only claim is rampant and widely dangerous based upon bald assertion, and not upon evidence that this is the case.

I would think one should blame the driver of the crashed auto, not the officer.

The driver of the car took himself out of the gene pool. Sadly, he took the others in the car with him.