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Jacksonville Sheriff Must Keep Roads Safe For The Public

By Eddie Farah

Jacksonville Sheriff John Rutherford is asking the public for patience as a criminal probe tries to uncover what exactly happened that led to a collision between an officer's car and an 86-year-old man driving a truck.

A much needed change in the police chase policy may result from the accident.

As if that wasn't enough, another officer was in an accident recently when she was distracted by her in-car laptop. In that case Officer Amanda Meyer's car rammed the back of a tank truck as she read her laptop. Meyer injured her arm.

We know from experience that one cannot be on a computer and drive safely. We tell kids not to text and drive and not to be on a cell phone and drive. Certainly there should be a policy for police officers as well.

As for the police chase, information is emerging that Officer Marcus Kilpatrick was traveling 98 in a 40mph zone and he had given chase to someone with tinted windows. The accident happened at 1 p.m. in an area heavily traveled. A witness say she saw Officer Kilpatrick go over and switch on his emergency light after the investigation in violation of policy that requires both lights and / or sirens when pursuing someone in an emergency situation.

Bottom line- officers are not supposed to put the public at risk, even when there is an emergency. Tinted windows hardly falls into that category. Ever since black box recorded him traveling at 98 mph, he has been off the streets and this now falls into a criminal probe.

As far as the policy for in car lap tops, there is simply no policy says Rutherford. That's because the 'Hot Keys' take just a second to press for dispatch information.

There is no doubt laptops will stay in the police vehicles. Let's hope the speeding policy does not stay on our roads. #

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Eddie Farah

Full post as published by Jacksonville Personal Injury Lawyer on March 05, 2009 (boomark / email).