Personal Injury Law

Should High Speed Police Chases Be Banned ?

The simple answer to the question posed is - No. Some police chases are necessary in order to protect the interests of the public. If someone through a violent act commits the crime of car jacking, is a cop killer or otherwise is attempting to escape law enforcement for the commission of a violent felony where the suspect clearly poses an imminent and present danger to the public, then under such circumstances, the dangers presented by police chases are warranted from a societal standpoint. It is a different case altogether, however, when the police are chasing a minor traffic offender at high speeds and at the same time are creating great danger to the public where the need to immediately apprehend the suspect is outweighed by the danger presented to the public by the chase itself. Most experts in this area do not advocate banning police pursuits altogether. In cases involving violent felonies, even if the chase itself poses dangers to innocent members of the motoring public, nonetheless, the suspect being pursued is dangerous and needs to be apprehended if possible in order to protect the public. Again, however, the situation is different when the suspect really does not need to be apprehended immediately, poses little danger to the public and yet the chase itself kills or seriously injuries innocent members of the motoring public under such circumstances.

Most enlightened police departments throughout the United States have restrictive pursuit policies which limit the ability of their officers to chase non-violent offenders. If someone has a missing taillight it would hardly be justifiable to chase them at high speeds approaching 100 miles per hour while approaching a congested area or a school zone. People are likely to be killed because it is foreseeable that serious injury or death will occur during a high speed police chase. The law enforcement community has long known that approximately 400 to 500 people per year are killed in police chases and many thousands injured across this country. Because it is foreseeable that serious injury or death can result from a high speed police pursuit, such foreseeable risks should be minimized if at all possible particularly when the fleeing suspect does not present an inherent danger to the public.

There are many police policies that do not restrict the activities of their officers but nonetheless allow them to exercise their ?discretion? as to whether they should continue a pursuit once initiated. Most such policies have language to the effect that if the danger to the public caused by the chase itself is greater than the danger presented by the suspect that the pursuit should be terminated. This is excellent policy language but the problem is it is difficult to implement and consequently the public is still being exposed under such policies to unnecessary risks of serious injury or death when non-violent traffic offenders are involved. It would seem that the better policy would be to have a restrictive policy that clearly spells out for officers what they can and cannot do in situation involving non-violent felonies. Nonetheless, until there is a uniform policy adopted by the law enforcement community restricting the rights of officers to expose the public to serious injury or death in situations involving non-violent felonies, at the very least, policies that provide discretion to its officers should be enforced and officers should not be permitted to expose the public to unnecessary risks of injury or death unless the need to immediately apprehend the suspect substantially outweighs the danger to the public presented by the chase itself.

Full post as published by Georgia Injury Lawyer Blog on March 22, 2009 (boomark / email).