The Las Vegas Review Journal reports that “Last year, more police in America died in traffic crashes, 44, than from gunshots, 39, according to the National Law Enforcement Memorial Fund, which tracks officer deaths. That trend has continued through the first half of this year, with traffic deaths outpacing shooting deaths 35 to 22. For the 12th year in a row, traffic-related incidents remain the leading cause of death for law enforcement officers.” The obvious if highly ironic answer: slow down. “In the past year, the Dallas Police Department and the Illinois State Police revamped their driving policies to include limits on how fast their officers can drive. Both moves were prompted by officer-caused crashes that killed civilians. The Metropolitan Police Department could soon follow suit once it completes a review of its driving policies that was ordered by Sheriff Doug Gillespie when officer James Manor, 28, died in a crash in May. Manor, who was responding to a domestic dispute call, was driving at a speed of 109 mph without lights and sirens on Flamingo Road when a pickup turned into his path. He was not wearing a seat belt and died a short time after the crash. Police have not released details of Wednesday’s deadly crash as they continue their investigation, but it appears that speed was a factor.”
It’s odd not to say a disgrace that officer safety has created this sea change in police pursuit policy, when high-speed police chases have killed hundreds of innocent civilians. Not to mention the felons themselves, of course.
The Illinois State Police changed its policy in November, one year after one of its troopers crossed the median on an interstate and crashed into an oncoming car, killing two teenage sisters.
The trooper was traveling 126 mph in his police cruiser on the way to an accident scene that had already been resolved. He was reportedly multitasking, talking on a cell phone and a shoulder radio at the same time.
The state police’s new policy created a four-tier system for how officers can respond to calls, including how fast they can drive and when they can use lights and sirens. Under the policy, troopers must notify supervisors if they intend to drive more than 20 mph over the speed limit, and supervisors must monitor the incident and intervene if necessary.
Studies out of England have show that such “supervision” does little to reduce the risks during police pursuits. But I bet the insurance industry likes the idea, plenty.
Another reminder to alway, always wear a seatbelt. A badge and a gun will not protect your life in a wreck.
Why don’t officers get a special training in high-speed driving? Jack Baruth might help…
@herb: they do get training in high speed driving. However, it’s usually in a fairly sterile environment and it’s not useful when you’re doing a buck on Flamingo Blvd and all of the traffic that comes with that without lights and sirens. Joe Citizen doesn’t expect some car to be blasting down the road at 100+.
I have this mental image of the chasing cop in the video above watching the truck crash into that telephone pole and immediately saying “Dispatch, we’re code four.”
Off duty cops here in So Fla routinely are the fastest drivers on the highways —you know they re off duty b/c they are driving city police cars (“Tamarac”, “Miami Beach”, “Doral”, “Hollywood”, etc.) outside of their jurisdiction. With no lights.
Driver training for police is in inverse proportion to the size of the force. I suspect that CHP troopers get some pretty good (if infrequent) training, while the cops here in my hometown have maybe once in their life, when they were at the county “academy,” gotten a morning of steer-into-the-skid instruction on a skidpad. the rest of their driver education comes from TV cop shows…
We lost a local cop awhile ago who was so overexcited about cutting off a speeder that was reported to be coming his way that he slid fully into the intersection where he tried to stop at the T juncture and got T-boned by the speeder into his driver-side door. He obviously had no more idea about what constituted effective braking than does the average commuter.
Police officers on duty and off duty routinely violate traffic laws and they are not as good at driving as many of them seem to think they are.
The laws are supposed to be for everyone, including those tasked with enforcing the laws.
109 mph on a surface road and “it appears that speed was a factor”? How weasely can you get? If a civilian hit another vehicle at 109 mph I doubt that the sheriff would say only that “it appears that speed was a factor”.
John Horner :
October 15th, 2009 at 10:58 am
Police officers on duty and off duty routinely violate traffic laws and they are not as good at driving as many of them seem to think they are.
The laws are supposed to be for everyone, including those tasked with enforcing the laws.
All very true but:
1) The chance of a cop being prosecuted for driving violations is very low
2) The repair costs for patrol cars don’t come out of the cop’s pocket
So why not do a high speed chase every once in a while? It can add a lot of excitement to anotherwise dull day!
I have a brother-in-law who is a fireman(48 years old) and he drives like a fool all the time. I won’t even get in a car with him anymore.
He has all kinds of decals and shields on his car and truck. Cops never give him tickets once he shows them his ID(badge).
Not to mention the felons themselves, of course.
They’re not felons until they’ve been tried and convicted in a court of law.
I know it doesn’t actually work that way and that cops can and will taser (punish) grandmothers by the side of the road to punish them for being mouthy — but let’s at least try to keep the mores of our society going a little longer here.
I’d be more interested to know how many civilians have been killed than how many cops. Locally, I can only remember two accidents involving police officers in the past ten years that involved fatalities. In both cases, it was the civilian that suffered the fatality. It’s one thing when a police officer is chasing a suspected (that’s for you Luke42) felon and is traveling twice the posted limit, it is quite another thing when that officer is rushing to the scene of an accident or going after a speeder.
56BelAire:
I know what you are talking about. I had a roommate in college that was an EMT while going to the vetrinary school and he never got a speeding ticket, because he would just show his ID and if needed make up a story about why he was in a hurry. I will say that I had no problem riding in his car while he was driving, but then he was also a licensed race car driver with several years of track experience (modifieds I believe), so he was probably a bit better at driving at high speeds than your typical EMT or fireman.
It’s odd not to say a disgrace that officer safety has created this sea change in police pursuit policy, when high-speed police chases have killed hundreds of innocent civilians.
That’s interesting wording, following the comma. The Newspaper is solid in many ways – but every now and then their anti-cop bias shines.
Writing, “reckless driving and it’s enforcement kill thousands of innocent civilians”, or “alleged reckless drivers cause hundreds of deaths while fleeing” wouldn’t work. Gotta focus on the cops…
Yes, some cops do abuse their authority.
Yes, some cops drive like idiots.
Yes, a cop 20mph over the limit should always have his gumballs and siren going.
Yes, discretion and common sense should be used before getting into a high speed chase.
But let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater. There are sociopaths on the road who need to be apprehended, tried and jailed.
Driving 109 (or more) on Flamingo is sociopathic behavior. The good guys can’t act like bad guys and still be good guys. get it?
I guess Darwin got another one.
Yes, some cops do abuse their authority.
Yes, some cops drive like idiots.
Yes, a cop 20mph over the limit should always have his gumballs and siren going.
Yes, discretion and common sense should be used before getting into a high speed chase.
But let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater. There are sociopaths on the road who need to be apprehended, tried and jailed.
Sorry, wrong answer. I don’t know what line of work you come from, but where I come from when someone majorly fucks up, and let there be no doubt that killing people IS majorly fucking up, there is remediation to make sure that shit never happens again. And I am only talking about killing computer systems, messing with human life is hopefully on a higher level.
I find your “you win some you lose some” attitude, ihatetrees, to be pretty callous, hopefully you don’t live anywhere near me with that sort of disregard for life.
Yes there are those out there that need to be apprehended, but they don’t *need* to be chased down by single officer in one cruiser, certainly not while he is talking on his cell phone and unbuckling his seatbelt.
The town where I grew up instituted a “no chasing” policy for their police force more than 10 years ago. There aren’t sociopaths running all over town. As a Sargent there told me, with all of the ways to identify and track someone down today, chasing them in a car is fairly useless. Even when they are an immediate threat (which is the only excuse to give chase) you make them less of threat by not giving chase, kind of a paradox there.
So much of what an officer can do is often an emotional reaction rather than a logical decision. A man or woman of the law should be in better control of their emotions than to let them run so wild they can’t stop themself from killing innocent people.
But let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater. There are sociopaths on the road who need to be apprehended, tried and jailed.
Are you sure there’s really a baby in that bathwater? There are sociopaths on the road who have badges and hide behind them.
Once upon a time, I was a competitive pin and plate shooter. Never lost to a cop. I lost to beer-bellied OCD sufferers who mumbled into their beards and watched Rambo every night.
Cops can’t shoot for the same reason they can’t drive: they just don’t care that much. It’s part of the job, just like TPS reports.
Think about the most menial, annoying thing you do at work. For a cop, guns and cars fit into that category. What they really like, if NWA’s documentary track “F*** Tha Police Part 2 (Sa Prize)” can be believed, is forcing women of color into acts of involuntary fellatio.
Like clock-work on this site, the anti-law enforcement trolls come up for air. I thought Baruth was above that. Clearly not!
For those who labor under the illusion that law enforcement exists “To Serve and Protect”:
http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=54162036