Let's not mince words here. Your average American loves watching a good ol' red blooded police chase. As entertaining as they are, you've really got to wonder if discretion is the better part of valor when it comes to running Johnny Perp to ground. In "Scott v. Harris," the U.S. Supreme Court didn't seem to think so. The Justices watched this video of police chasing of a 19-year-old man who refused to pull over after being caught speeding. In what Justice Scalia described as, "The scariest chase I ever saw since 'The French Connection'," the teenager led police on a 10-mile plunge down a two-lane highway at night. A police officer ended the chase by ramming the back of the teenager's car at 90 mph, sending the car flying down an embankment, rendering the fleeing teenager quadriplegic. The Court held that the officer's use of deadly force to stop the fleeing speeder (clocked doing 73 in a 55 mph zone) was reasonable– despite the option of calling off the pursuit and tracking down the driver by his license plate. The Court states, "After watching the video, no jury could find the Police Officer's use of force unreasonable." What say you?
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1. The chase scene in ‘The French Connection’ sucked.
2. I disagee with the court’s assertion that, “…A police car’s bump-ing a fleeing car is, in fact, not much like a policeman’s shooting a gun so as to hit a person.” Executng a PIT is very dangerous due to the high speeds involved and the unpredictable behaviour of the fleeing vehicle once you execute it. I remember seeing a similar video of a chase that started in South Carolina involving a teenage girl fleeing from the state troopers in a Jeep Cherokee. When she crossed the state line into Georgia, the chase was taken over by Georgia state troopers who executed a PIT at 90 mph. As soon as the Jeep got sideways, it rolled over, killing the girl.
3. It’s not determined in the decision whether Deputy Scott was properly trained in executing a PIT manuever. If he wasn’t then he should not have attempted it.
4. It’s not determined in the decision whether other tools were available to end the pursuit beyond falling back. If anybody has ever watched “World’s Wildest Police Videos,” you’ll see clip after clip of local law enforcement employing a variety of tools, from helicopters that can track a suspect from the air to spike strips that instantly deflate the tires of a fleeing suspect. What you’ll also notice is that these tools are employed by small towns and state toopers, and not just the Los Angeles Police Department, so it would seem far-fetched for me to believe that these tools were not available to Deputy Scott or any other deputy who responded at the time. Given the duration of this chase, it also seems far-fetched to believe that they did not have enough time to properly coordinate the employment of these tools if they were available.
Given the Supreme Court’s failure to properly address Deputy Scott’s level of trainig in executing the PIT or address the availability of other tools designed to safely end a high-speed puruit, I must disagree with their assertion that no jury would find Deputy Scott’s actions unreasonable.
I do not agree that deadly force is necessary in a situation like this. If the person was armed and dangerous and likely to harm others, that’s different. There has been case after case where an office kills an innocent by-stander during high speed chase over something as silly as a speeding ticket. I would like to see the policies changed to simply go to the persons house and arrest them.
Skip the chase! I know TV won’t be the same without it, but I’d just as soon not die in a high speed chase crash ’cause of someone else’s speeding issues.
I vote for take them down. Anyone fleeing the police at high speed in a couple of tons of metal is threat to the public.
Knowing that all they have to do is floor it to escape the law, will have police watching helpless as everyone simple flees from them everywhere.
I have zero sympathy for any idiot who tries to flee the poilice and gets injured as a result. Simple. don’t run.
I’m with the cops on this one.
How can you assume you can track someone down by the license plate number? What if it’s stolen and not yet reported as such? What if the plates are taken off of another similar car to throw off the police?
The cop didn’t know why the guy was running. He could have had guns, warrants, just killed someone or any host of terrible reasons.
People make choices in life. This guy chose to run. At 19, you should know better. I’m sure the driver had seen a police chase on TV and is aware of how it could end.
I have no sympathy for such recklessness.
If cops don’t give chase, offenders are sure as heck going to be taken advantage of that timidness.
Let us not forget the zeitgeist of this court. Scalia and his hand puppet Thomas would OK use of deadly force for scalping tickets or crosswalk violations.
http://www.0-60mag.com/wallpaper/1200/0-60wallpaper.32.jpg
Thats how you run from the cops. Know what they are going to do before they do.
Oh, and as far as chases go:
Bullit
Ronin
French Connection
I think the biggest difference between using a gun to subdue a perpetrator vs. a high speed car chase is the amount of damage and the increase in injuries and death that a vehicle, especially a large truck or SUV, could inflict on innocent people. Not only that but the amount of adrenaline pumping in the officer’s blood will force him to keep the chase up increasing the risk to everyone around the perpetrator and him. They’ve done studies on that already that show that it’s a horribly bad idea to allow high speed chases because the ability to make good decisions goes out the window.
In this day in age there is no reason to pursue like this. Stay back, use the radio, call in a helicopter if you need too. It’s just not worth the risk and damage caused by these pursuits.
This just shows how messed up our government has become.
Here is an idea… if you see red, blue, or both lights behind you… pull the f*&% over! If you run from the police you deserve to get hurt bad. I feel no remorse for anyone who is hurt or killed by the police when they are in the wrong and the police used fair judgement.
I think everyone here agrees if an officer is pulling you over, pull over.
If you continue to pursue the perpetrator, they will continue to flee at higher and higher rates of speed – that is a given. Watch the video above – they obviously had time enough to radio ahead enough patrol cars to shut down intersections. Why didn’t they slow down and call in air support? Instead they continued to put many people at risk by following adrenaline and blind rage to catch someone.
I’ll use a case in point – I used to have a dog that was adept at escaping the yard from time to time. If I would follow him to get him home he would keep running. I learned quickly that I needed to employ other methods of getting him back other than pursuit. I was smarter than the dog. Granted no risk was involved here, but it makes a point – we have the means of tracking and following without putting our officers and the general public at risk. We have the tools to catch these people with far less risk than stuff like this has.
When multiple officers elect to pursue someone like this you now have multiple multi-ton projectiles all over the place. Think of what the law enforcement agencies would be dealing with if one of their cars were to lose control and kill an innocent person on the way. Is that risk really worth it?
This was not “OK’ing high-speed police chases.” The chase was not at issue. The force that Scott used to stop Harris was. And even then, SCOTUS didn’t say what Scott did was right. It said that it wasn’t unreasonable for Scott to act in the manner he did, given the facts available to him at the time, including the fact that Harris had earlier rammed the police car.
In case anyone wants to read what a lawyer thinks of this case, try these links:
http://volokh.com/posts/chain_1172720514.shtml
http://volokh.com/posts/chain_1166394077.shtml
Of course, the comments there are closed, because this case was decided a year ago.
We are rapidly heading towards cars that can be easily diabled remotely. In 20 years most of the cars on the road will have interactive capability. Sure, it might be disabled but not easily by casual car thiefs.
As to the validity of chasing them, that’s the price of law enforcement. Otherwise the perps get into a car, shoot the police the bird and ride off into the sunset.
I do not agree that deadly force is necessary in a situation like this. If the person was armed and dangerous and likely to harm others, that’s different.
If you are stopping someone for speeding and they run, how do you know what they have in their car. I would consider someone fleeing the police in a car to be armed and dangerous (the car being the weapon).
There has been case after case where an office kills an innocent by-stander during high speed chase over something as silly as a speeding ticket.
Please cite your source. I don’t know what you mean by “case after case”. According to this, about 1% of all chases end in a death:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E0CE5D71E39F935A15751C1A964958260
According to this, about 1/3 of the deaths are not involved in the chase:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2194/is_7_71/ai_89973554
So, about 0.33% of police chases end in the death of an innocent bystander. I am NOT trying to diminish the seriousness of those deaths, but that is not “case after case” of innocent bystanders being killed.
I would like to see the policies changed to simply go to the persons house and arrest them.
If the car is stolen, how do you know where to go? And what is an officer supposed to think when someone runs over something as silly as a speeding ticket. If he was just speeding, then he would have received a ticket and lost about 15 minutes of his time.
It is a shame that this young man is now crippled, but it was due to his actions.
jaydez :
Here is an idea… if you see red, blue, or both lights behind you… pull the f*&% over!
I couldn’t agree more. Life is full of risks. Driving a car can be considered risky, when running from the law your risk factor significantly increases. If those who try to outrun law enforcement don’t have the good sense to pull over then they put themself and the surrounding community at risk and it is law enforcement’s job to reduce that risk which usually prevails in a pursuit.
No law enforcement officer can be held to predict what collateral damage may result. All that is known that someone is disregarding the request from a officer to stop. In most cases but not always there is a very good reason why people run. You don’t want these people on the street to begin with. Bottom line is; You run, you get what you get with the choice you made.
Hey olddavid:
The decision was by an 8-1 vote. So 3 of the 4 liberals joined the “puppet” and his “master” Scalia, along with the rest of the conservative wing. The only dissenter was socialist John Paul Stevens.
The kid deserved what he got. It was a miracle that he didn’t kill somebody going through those red lights, driving his 2 ton Caddy at over 100mph. The police kept their distance probably longer than they should have, but they were trying to do the right thing. The manuever appeared to be executed perfectly, the moron kid over-corrected, it is his own damn fault.
The Video Tape doesn’t lie. Good for the Supreme Court to come down on the side of personal responsibility and the law.
Couple of things to add:
– The event the court decided on happened in 2001. Police doctrine at the time was not as big on things like spike strips and Stop Sticks as they are now. These products were available, but police executives across the country were still hesitant to deploy them in the field as they were waiting for more data about effectiveness, safety and support infrastructure (officer training and such).
– Rural departments often do not have a whole lot in the way of resources to deploy vehicle stopping technology. When a chase takes place, ancillary officers (i.e. the cops not directly chasing the suspect) are prioritized towards shutting down intersections and attempting to protect people by keeping them out of the chase path. Deploying spikes requires taking at least 2 cruisers off of protecting people. That doesn’t sound like a whole lot, but in rural areas, finding an extra officer when you are blocking as many intersections as possible can be difficult.
(BTW – spikes can’t be used by an officer protecting an intersection because the vehicle being stopped could try to evade the strips and plow into waiting traffic).
– Helicopters? HAHAHAHA. Very few departments in the country have the resources to have helicopter access. Much less the resources to have a bird standing by 24/7 for a chase event.
I get the feeling that righteous anger, indignation and a touch of blood lust mixed with desire for vengeance and a rage for order and control inform a lot of the opinions on police pursuit(and a lot of other issues, for that matter).
The question should be, is there a smarter way of dealing with a situation like this, not whether or not the perp “deserved what he got.” Our culture seems to be in love with brute force as a solution to pretty much every problem. There’s a place for that kind of solution, but we consistently reach for the hammer and wind up breaking stuff rather than fixing it.
Please cite your source. I don’t know what you mean by “case after case”. According to this, about 1% of all chases end in a death:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E0CE5D71E39F935A15751C1A964958260
According to this, about 1/3 of the deaths are not involved in the chase:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2194/is_7_71/ai_89973554
I don’t find this an acceptable risk. 1/3 of all deaths related to a chase are uninvolved? Wow! yeah, it’s only 1% of cases, but 33% of the people who die are unrelated? The primary duty of law enforcement should be to the health and welfare of the citizens…not to “upholding the law.”
The second article you quote, goes on later to say, “Police pursuit records provide some frightening statistics[…]Innocent third parties who just happened to be in the way constitute 42 percent of persons killed or injured in police pursuits.[…]Further, I out of every 100 high-speed pursuits results in a fatality.”
Of course, we can run around all day with statistics. That’s not the point.
In this case, the officer was doing his best to end the chase before someone got hurt. There was no one else around at that moment, so the risk of third-party injury was minimal. I have a hard time feeling bad for this guy who was callously putting other’s lives at stake.
I don’t know that there should be an “always-chase” policy…just because the guy runs, doesn’t mean that the most important thing to do is to catch him…when you’ve got lots of people around you have to weigh the potential for innocents harm against the crime (again health and welfare of the populace). Obviously a “no-chase” policy is just asking for trouble.
Agree with BuckD. We were given brains. There’s always more than one solution to a problem. Often these questions are posed in such away that the only two solutions seem to be, let the suspect escape, or chase the suspect down by any means necessary no matter what the collateral damage. Obviously C. None of the above is the correct answer. It’s not a judge’s job to decide what alternatives should be used. Its their job to determine whether or not a law was broken. In this case I believe they ruled correctly, as no current law was broken. However, it’s up to us to see that politicians change laws.
That being said, I have to admire the PIT move there. Notice the cop used only his brush-guard to hit the caddy. Did not even touch with his fender, zero damage to the police car.
Virtual Insanity:
Bullit
Ronin
French Connection
How about Tarentino’s “Death Proof”? (Note the 1st half of this ‘2 pic in 1’ sucks).
gakoenig :
– Helicopters? HAHAHAHA. Very few departments in the country have the resources to have helicopter access. Much less the resources to have a bird standing by 24/7 for a chase event.
That’s why George Bush’s tax cuts are so vile. Every mid-size police dept in the nation would have a standby fleet if the ‘Copters-4-Cops’ program wasn’t gutted….
I do not agree that deadly force is necessary in a situation like this. If the person was armed and dangerous and likely to harm others, that’s different.
The perp was armed and dangerous. A car is a lethal weapon. He had already used it to shove at least one cop car out of the way.
Would have letting him go be reasonable? Probably. But that’s not relevant to the court ruling.j
Decision aside, here’s one little tidbit. Back in the early 90’s, when I was still pushing a patrol car around Palm Beach County, one of our larger cities adopted a NO-pursuit policy. In other words, you were not allowed to pursue unless authorized by a supervisor. And that rarely happened.
Guess who experienced a whole bunch of felonies with the suspects quickly fleeing south on the Interstate?
In the county, we had NO pursuit policy – in other words, we could do whatever we thought was appropriate, but your pursuit could be cancelled by a supervisor. If your supervisor knew you were an idiot rookie, you had some ‘splaining to do on the radio if you wanted to keep going. If he trusted you, it was usually brief – and you rarely got cancelled.
We’d actually get calls from the city asking us to pursue their suspects.
Pursuits, just like shootings, suck. Once you had one, you realized how horrific it *might* turn out, and it wasn’t the glamorous event TV has turned it into.
“It’s not the kill… it’s the thrill of the chase” — Deep Purple
Wihtout knowing all of the facts, I would say both the officer and the suspect are at fault. In this case, since the only injury was apparently to the suspect, I agree that the police and the officer are not liable criminally or civilly. Now if a bystander was injured or killed, I would say both the officer and the suspect may be responsible. What does this mean? I think that police need to exercise good judgement and proper caition while in pursuit. Yes, they can use their radios. Yes, planes or helicopters are available in SOME (not all or even most) jurisdictions, and yes, spike strips can be set up. The problem is the officer still needs to maintain contact with the vehicle while all of this is being done. As others have pointed out, eliminating police pursuit would eliminate most of the motivation for pulling over when a cop hits his lights, especially if you are committing an actual crime (theft, drugs, etc.) where the vehicle is either not yours or you are willing to part with the vehicle and home (if you have one, and the address on the vehicle registration is accurate) rather than your freedom.
I did a ride-along with a Sheriff’s deputy a year ago, and he told me a story about a chase of a stolen bus. They got a second unit out ahead of the bad guy and laid down stop sticks. The bus hit the stop sticks and plowed along undeterred on six flat tires. They eventually corralled him, but only after adopting more aggressive tactics. Why, yes, he was using intoxicating chemicals; how’d you guess?
As “blautens” says above, a blanket no-pursuit policy just give the bad guys a license to run. In any pursuit situation, the cop has to make quick decisions on imperfect information, without the assistance of the gift of prophecy to know how it’s all gonna turn out. I see no reason to allow the person who created the problem a way to get even with the cops in civil court. The legal and moral responsibility should be fixed firmly on the fleeing idiot.
Oh, best car chase? The Seven-Ups.
If there is continuous video proving a person fails to stop for police and exceeds legal speed limits by more than 10% while doing so then fleeing should be an automatic capital offense with no lesser punishment allowed. One does not “accidentally” lead police on a high speed chase just as one does not “accidentally” fail to stop within a reasonable distance.
The few responses I read were evenly split between sensible people and touchy, feely, don’t place blame on the party who deserves it people. The latter will likely become apoplectic at the thought of tough rules and penalties for those who deserve them. Any sympathy to the criminal who caused himself to become paraplegic is wasted. Any blame directed to the officer is misplaced.
Best chase scenes:
Bullitt has the best sound track, just the sound of those two muscle car engines.
Ronin is pretty good.
Death Proof has an awesome chase scene and some nice scenes in general, though I wouldn’t recommend the movie as a whole.
How about the Bourne movies? Good driving and cinematography, both.
The police may be responsible for damages to people not involved if it can be shown they used bad judgement, or were otherwise negligent. I am okay with that.
OTOH, the guy who ran is on his own. Somehow we need to get more of these cases thrown out at the beginning, not at the highest court. Only in cases where the police were really, really out of line should the criminal get damages.
The fact that the car did not hit any other cars is a good argument that the policeman in this case was protecting and serving rather than letting the chase go to a congested area.
I am having a really hard time feeling sorry for the kid. He should have just stopped and it would have been better for everyone. Hindsight is always 20/20 and perhaps in hindsight it would have been better to ram him in the parking lot, or some other place on the road, but the guy had plenty of time to stop before they rammed him.
Second thing I’m thinking: Don’t run if you’re in an ancient caddy that can’t actually outrun the police.
I just realized we are all forgetting one of the best chases ever. The Blues Brothers.
“Hmm, baby cribs. They really do have everything here.”
“Use of unnecessary violence in the apprehension of the Blues Brothers has been approved.”
Thanks for all the great discussion. A few things I would like to add for clarification.
In the video, the police officer requests permission to PIT the car. The officer decided against using a PIT at the last moment and instead used his push bumper to knock the car off the road. During oral argument, it was conceded that while a PIT might have been safer for the driver of the fleeing car, the officer decided against such a maneuver because he felt a PIT at that speed was too dangerous.
The decision in this case does not offer a bright line rule OKing use of deadly force in police chases. The Supreme Court is loath to ever offer such a bright line rule and its decisions are almost always fact specific. However, I have to say that the decision in this case would be a substantial hurtle for anyone trying to claim that an officer used unreasonable force to end a police chase.
The fleeing speeder did make contact with the second police car when it fled the parking lot. It is just very hard to see from the video.
The Supreme Court rendered its opinion on April 30th of last year. In terms of legal precedent, this is a very recent case.
For those interested, the entire video that was offered into evidence and watched by the Supreme Court can be viewed at: http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/video/scott_v_harris.rmvb
The edited version posted leaves out about 5 minutes of video showing the second police car on its way to join the pursuit and about 2 minutes of video after the crash. However, none of the video offered into evidence shows the 1st police car catching the teen speeding.
you’ll see clip after clip of local law enforcement employing a variety of tools, from helicopters… – quasimodo
Helicopters are very expensive to buy, maintain and operate. A minimum of two are required. The first is an air-taxi for local politicians and police brass.
Not only that but the amount of adrenaline pumping in the officer’s blood will force him to keep the chase up increasing the risk to everyone – Orian
I doubt this policeman’s blood pressure or adrenaline increased even one point. He sounded cool, collected and in control.
The event the court decided on happened in 2001. Police doctrine at the time was not as big on things like spike strips and Stop Sticks as they are now. – gakoenig
Deploying spike strips is dangerous. I’m surprised police unions allow members to use them. The felon sometimes aims his car at the policemen. Several policemen have been badly injured or killed.
Deploying spike strips is dangerous. I’m surprised police unions allow members to use them. The felon sometimes aims his car at the policemen. Several policemen have been badly injured or killed.
Proper deployment of Stop Sticks has officers:
1: Deploying them around corners or over hills where suspects will have little time to react.
2: With the officer standing beside appropriate cover (i.e. their police cruiser, a building, a tree, etc).
I don’t find this an acceptable risk. 1/3 of all deaths related to a chase are uninvolved? Wow! yeah, it’s only 1% of cases, but 33% of the people who die are unrelated? The primary duty of law enforcement should be to the health and welfare of the citizens…not to “upholding the law.”
I didn’t say whether it was acceptable or not. I was just pointing out that to say there is “case after case where innocent bystanders are killed” is an exaggeration.
If the primary duty is the health and welfare of the citizens, then why have police; just put doctors, nurses, and someone from the food stamp office in patrol cars.
I’m sorry, but upholding the law is EXACTLY what the police are supposed to do. Maybe a better statement is to “maintain public order”. Either way, they must enforce the law.
The second article you quote, goes on later to say, “Police pursuit records provide some frightening statistics[…]Innocent third parties who just happened to be in the way constitute 42 percent of persons killed or injured in police pursuits.[…]Further, I out of every 100 high-speed pursuits results in a fatality.”
So it’s 42 percent of deaths in 1 percent of the cases or 0.42%. Still a small number and clearly not “case after case”.
Once again, I am NOT making a pronouncement on the acceptability of innocent bystander deaths, I was simply pointing out the exaggeration made. I agree that one innocent death is too many, but you can’t just let people go when they break the law and not go after them.
Also, it has been pointed out that the young man struck a police cruiser early on, so that definitely raises the stakes.
The 0.42% should not be hurt but one has to remember it is because of the actions of the fleeing criminal. It is not the fault of the police and not due to any action of the police. It is solely and completely due to and the responsibility of the criminal. That is another reason all fleeing criminals should be executed if convicted.
The cop did a good job taking that guy out without hurting anyone else. That was a good end to the chase.
I don’t think cops should stop chasing fleeing cars, but they should increase the penalties for the drivers who do flee.
This decision only makes sense because no other innocent party what injured or killed during this action. If this driver or one of the pursuing officers had managed to hurt or kill anyone else not involved in this chase the Police department and the courts would all be singing a different song.
While every situation is different, high-speed chases are done at the decresion of the police. If you attempt to pursue a suspect at speeds above 100mph there is a very good chance that the suspect will just continue to raise the bar and increase the level of danger for EVERYONE within a given radius of said chase.
I personnally do NOT expect criminals to protect or even care about my safety or that of my family. I DO expect the police to care 100%. Law enforcement defeats it own purpose if the police manage to hurt or injury an innocent party in pursuit of a suspect. Think about it, what purpose is served by killing a innocent mother while trying to catch a another killer who is fleeing in a vehicle.
Now as a resident of a very crowded city it is a given that the majority of the people around here do not support police putting the rest of the general public at risk to catch a fleeing individual. It is just plain stupid.
If a cop decided to chase a suspect and that suspect loses control of their vehicle and runs up on the sidewalk striking innocent folks it is the cops that are at fault, not the suspect. It can be expected that a fleeing criminal will do many stupid and dangerous things to get away, why provoke him/her further?
When is it worth it?
How would you feel if you found out your wife was killed today because the cops decided it was oh so important to pursue a drug abusing crackhead that simply did want to spend a night in jail and not get high.
Best Chase scene ever? The Road Warrior.
There was also statistical evidence presented to the court stating that about 70% of suspects involved in high speed police chases slow down to reasonable speeds once the police stop pursuit.
Oh well then, that changes everything! Since only 3 out of 10 CRIMINALS are going to CONTINUE AT HIGH SPEED we should just NEVER HAVE POLICE CHASES AT ALL! Let’s just throw out all the laws and make it as simple as it possibly can be.
Alternatively, let’s impose penalties SO SEVERE, and see that they are carried out, that 99% of the people in the country would never consider violating existing laws.
The fleeing speeder did make contact with the second police car when it fled the parking lot.
By “did make contact with” you mean “used his car as a battering ram to shove.” This wasn’t just a scrape. The driver wasn’t “just speeding.” He had shown his willingness to use his car as a deadly weapon.
Now as a resident of a very crowded city it is a given that the majority of the people around here do not support police putting the rest of the general public at risk to catch a fleeing individual. It is just plain stupid.
Congratulations on living in such a fine city. Try not to force your values onto the rest of us.
Cops have guns, too. And each and every time they pull that trigger, there’s a chance that something could go very wrong. Guns don’t work like in cartoons. An innocent person can easily be killed by a stray shot or a ricochet.
Yet, we still let our cops have guns, and even let them fire them.
Alternatively, let’s impose penalties SO SEVERE, and see that they are carried out, that 99% of the people in the country would never consider violating existing laws.
Yeah, I had to laugh at that. That’s how we’ve fought our drug war. The legislative branch tries to pander to the public by passing laws with severe penalties, and then we overcrowd our prisons, and let people go early because there isn’t enough room.
How has that worked out?
Yes, but ldbricker’s solution doesn’t cause any clogging of the jails…”Run from the Cops get the Chair”.
Seems fair to me.
I still maintain that the police’s first duty is to the law-abiding citizenry. If someone’s standing between a cop and a criminal with a gun, does the officer take the shot? Of course not, if the risk of hitting a bystander is severe.
“health and welfare” don’t just mean food stamps and band-aids.
No, that’s not how we’ve fought the drug war. I’m talking about a true severe penalty, capital punishment with no alternative sentence and no lengthy delays and appeals. A maximum of 6 months to the appeal and a best 2 out of 3 before either execution or release. That should be the standard for any felony committed while in possession of a weapon, any felony committed while incarcerated, any escape from jail, any fleeing from police and perhaps a few other crimes. The only thing laughable is the fact that some would be so concerned about how mean that is. (/sarcasm)
common sense is not a prerequisite for becoming either a lawyer or a judge. and being an auto blog may i add running an auto company either.
Yeah, I had to laugh at that. That’s how we’ve fought our drug war. The legislative branch tries to pander to the public by passing laws with severe penalties, and then we overcrowd our prisons, and let people go early because there isn’t enough room.
How has that worked out?
The big difference is that almost everyone uses drugs in one form or another, and very few think that what they’re doing is wrong because they’re not directly hurting anyone else by doing it. A government can’t just define a way of thinking and living your own life as wrong without justification. Only the simplest of minds take their moral code directly from the government. Save the jails for real criminals; you know, the ones who actually harm others.
If I look at this from a more reasonable perspective – like that of a police officer who witnesses the revolving door of justice first hand, or even just a more caring mind who believes that all human life is worth preserving – I think I’d have to change my previous opinion on police chases. It’s definitely not worth risking innocent lives to chase someone down who will be on the streets again a short time later anyway.
It’s funny how people line up on one side or the other – “No Pursuit” or “They get what they deserve”.
Here’s an idea – allow the cops to do what’s reasonable under the circumstances. That would mean that in this particular case, it was reasonable to run the man off the road. In other cases it would mean giving up pursuit -even at the risk of the perp. getting away.
I do feel sorry for the 19 year old in the video. I don’t see why being in the wrong automatically negates any possibility of sympathy. That said, the police were reasonable in this case.
For a lot of people, I bet no-pursuit roughly translates into no-more-tickets unless you just lay down and let them hand it to you. Personally, if I knew there was a blanket no-pursuit rule, I’d run from speeding tickets _every_ time.
The big difference is that almost everyone uses drugs in one form or another, and very few think that what they’re doing is wrong because they’re not directly hurting anyone else by doing it.
I assume you mean illegal drugs. What is the source of your data? What do you mean by “almost everyone”? None of my friends use illegal drugs in any way. I question your assertion that “almost everyone” does it.
Also, just because something does not “directly hurt anyone else” doesn’t mean it’s okay to do.
A government can’t just define a way of thinking and living your own life as wrong without justification. Only the simplest of minds take their moral code directly from the government.
I agree that one’s morals shouldn’t come from the governement, but all laws are based on some moral code.
Save the jails for real criminals; you know, the ones who actually harm others.
The problem with that is that different people have different definitions for “harm”. I happen to agree that the punishments meted out for simple drug possession (especially marijuana) are often too severe, but I don’t know where the cutoff is. What drugs are okay?
Why damage a cop-car bumper when you can just shoot the guy?
How would you feel if you found out your wife was killed today because the cops decided it was oh so important to pursue a drug abusing crackhead that simply did want to spend a night in jail and not get high.
I’d want to kill the crack abusing drug head for committing first degree murder, because that is what he did. good try, but you’ll have to create a bigger weaker strawman argument next time.
The big difference is that almost everyone uses drugs in one form or another, and very few think that what they’re doing is wrong because they’re not directly hurting anyone else by doing it. A government can’t just define a way of thinking and living your own life as wrong without justification. Only the simplest of minds take their moral code directly from the government. Save the jails for real criminals; you know, the ones who actually harm others.
You mean like the mother who pimps out her teen and preteen daughters for money for her next fix? You mean like the lady high on marijuana who lets her baby daughter burn to death on a heating grate? Do you mean the pusher who offers your friend a good time in the form of a free line of coke; then you get to watch your friend spiral downward into theft, prostitution, and the gutter as she uses every drug under the sun? You’re right. Drugs don’t harm anybody but the ones taking them, and probably not even then. Afterall, Marijuana and LSD both provide a more enlightened view of the world, right?