As tragic as this is , it's amazing to hear the number of people to morning call in shows questioning the actions of the police. Unfortunately, some idiot decided to drive drunk, leave the scene of a traffic stop, drive the wrong way down ninth street, and speed through barricades. I think he shoulders 100% of the blame. Yet some still question the actions of the officer who pulled him over. It's really sad how the absence of common sense has become so prevalent and normal.
What exactly were the complaints? Was the cop car chasing the Prius at a high rate of speed? The Link
Both on KLBJ and comment of Statesman there were numerous people questioning the decision of the police to engage in a chase. A real chase never materialized. The driver accelerated immediately in order to avoid arrest. But, there are those who seem to immediately attempt to shift the blame toward the police.
Was it indeed a Prius? I have not read or heard that anywhere. Details are very sketchy in Harris County. Only the injury count, Toyota, drive was black, car reported stolen from Fort Hood. If you're going to steal a car, why a Prius? If you're going to run from police, why a Prius? Are they sure this guy was drunk or is he just gallactically stupid?
Slightly off-topic, but here goes: The problem is not with police chases. The problem is with criminals fleeing.
You are correct, the problem is with the criminal fleeing and crashing through the barricade but we all know everyone will sue and it will cost the city of Austin and the Austin taxpayers millions of dollars. which could also change the way events are staged in downtown does anyone think these people should sue the city for what this drunk/POS did?
Looks like the car was reported stolen from by a soldier in Killeen. The idiot that ran was only 21 but had several brushes with the law. The cops did nothing wrong in this situation, but Ill play devils advocate for the sake of discussion on police chases. We know that there are a number of people out there that will run instead of stopping when an officer tries to pull them over. They are idiots, but we know that idiots are out there. Thats why we have cops in the first place. We lose a lot of innocent lives each year due to police chases. The victims, as in this case, usually have nothing to do with the chase. Once we have the tags, why not wait and catch up with them later? Is it really worth it to put so many innocent lives in danger over non-violent offenders? You could make running from the cops a much more severe offense than the non-violent offense the person is trying to get away from and let them rot in jail without risking lives.
6721, You are correct that multiple lawsuits will be forthcoming. The city is self insured, will fight the lawsuit, likely lose to some lawyer, who will take time from his appointed spot riding the back of a city ambulances. Sue the city and win? WHOOPIE! Collect what? The city is judgement proof and will never pay. Nobody wins, but if it helps you any, the liberals will have a serious quandary - support the ambulance chasers as they always do or scream at them for suing their elected appointees? Again, nobody wins. Who gets to pay for the trial? SXSW? City? Bar that over served him? The guy who let his car be stolen? Eisenhower for founding the Interstate HWY System, which allowed this cretin to get to Austin so quickly? The DPS for not finding and stopping the stolen car before it got to Austin? That's enough to give Jim Adler a meltdown.
Sabre I think you are right but I did hear today that the city of Santa Barbara paid millions to the people involved in that runaway car that went through the barricade at a farmer's market. They used that the city didn't do a good enough job of protecting them.
I'm in agreement that some morally bankrupt fool(s) will initiate a lawsuit. Other than that, I haven't much to say about it. I'm a pretty firm advocate of personal responsibility and vehemently opposed to blame-shifting. Concerning the above post regarding chases; at times the cops may have to back off. But, in general, allowing the evasion and relying on later arrest lead to other problems. For instance, there could be a question of who was behind the wheel, etc . . . So, far the most part, let the officers do their job and when unfortunate events such as this morning occur, lay the blame squarely on the perpetrator. And, yes, it would be a good idea to significantly increase the criminal penalties for running from officers.
There a problems with not chasing such as not seeing exaclty who is behind the wheel, but they seem minor compared to putting uninvolved citizen's lives at risk 100% of the time. Almost as many cops die each year in car crashes as being shot. We could make their job much safer by not chasing non-violent criminals. I'm not 100% sold on not chasing, but I think we need to take a closer look at what is going on and possibly change policies. It would not have changed anything last night but it could have in many other cases. In the other high profile chase situation in Austin where a man was killed, the suspect was in a stolen car. If you let him go, you probably never catch him because you dont know the identity of the driver. But, he was driving insanely through heavy traffic. Its a hard decision to make but that time it got an innocent person killed. I dont blame the cops in any of these situations, but if we know people are going to run, we can make an educated decision on how we handle that. Chasing every time, no matter the traffic conditions may not be the answer.
The city should spend a few more dollars to put up the removable concrete barriers like you see in highway construction instead of the flimsy orange and white wooden ones on all streets that are closed for foot traffic.
Whoever sues the city should definitely put Art Acevedo on the stand. He always sounds like a prick. I guess it was a few weeks ago where he took the offensive on TV against the jaywalking jogger with headphones: I bet the whole city of Austin wanted to piss on him after his verbal attacks during that incident.
peiple that call rdio talk shows are usually pretty stupid and often cannot any specifics to back up their views.
Any time a police chase ends with a crash, people are going to question the necessity of the chase. In this case, the police did not really chase the guy, at least not until he ran through the barricades set up to protect pedestrians. The initial traffic stop resulted in the perp weaving through a crowded gas station. That officer did not follow, because his car was held back by the traffic in the station, while the suspect made it through and turned the wrong way on a one-way street, ninth, I believe. Then when the guy ran through the barricades on Red River, an officer did chase him, but the suspect was plowing through victims by then. So this doesn't really fit the high speed chase scenario that can be questioned by some people when a crash occurs. The unfortunate part of this story is the perp took off on his rampage, according to him, due to having warrants out for his arrest, and he was afraid of going to jail. I don't know if his alcohol level contributed or if he would have felt desperate enough to take off whether he had been drinking or not, the next time an officer pulled him over. It just happened to be in a very bad place and time, a very sad tragedy. The police have no way of knowing if a guy in a routine traffic stop is going to go beserk and pull a gun or take off like this case. The suspect used a motor vehicle as a weapon, and killed three people, and one more may not make it. I don't really care if he was drinking or not, I care about what happened, and he is a murderer in my book. He's no different than someone opening fire with a gun in a movie theatre, or something like that. The car was a Honda, btw. Supposedly it belonged to a friend, and the friend reported it stolen. I haven't seen anything else about it being stolen, so I wonder if the friend reported it stolen after the incident, to avoid liability. It looks like the city is already making plans to install retractable stout metal posts to be barriers for future festivals, and studying some other ways to protect pedestrians.
