Lethal weapon; when thousands die in high-speed police chases, who do we really need protecting from?

Washington Monthly, June, 1991 by Richard Shumate

It was Saturday night in a suburb of Los Angeles, and 19-year-old Doug Gray found himself with serious time on his hands. He had taken his date to the drive-in, but there was a lengthy wait until the movie began. So he did what many a doltish 19-year-old has done to impress a girl. He began doing doughnuts with his car.

Before long, a passing LAPD squad car spied Gray's vehicular gymnastics and turned into the drive-in to stop him. Panicked, Gray took off. And so did the LAPD. Neglecting to turn on their lights and siren, the officers followed Gray out of the lot and onto the crowded streets, caroming after the teenager.

Like Gray, 36-year-old Susan Tartakoff also planned to spend her Saturday night with a movie. She had picked up a few of her husband's favorites at the local video store and begun the short drive back home. She wouldn't get there for five months.

As Tartakoff proceeded through an intersection, Gray rammed into her at 90 miles per hour. Today, Tartakoff spends most of her time in rehab-"practicing standing, crawling, and other things," she says. She's paralyzed from the waist down.

This March, Americans were outraged to see the videotape of Los Angeles police officers beating Rodney King-an episode that began with a simple speeding violation. King was permanently injured, and four officers now face the possibility of lengthy prison sentences. The Tartakoff and King cases, six years apart, may seem at first to have nothing in common. But only at first. Rodney King and Susan Tartakoff are both casualties of a time-honored police tradition: the high-speed chase.

According to a study by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), two of every five high-speed police chases in the U.S. end in property damage. One in four ends in injury. And far, far too many end in death: An average of 287 people died as a result of police pursuit every year during the eighties. Mind you, most of the bad guys being pursued aren't rapacious, gun-toting thugs. The vast majority of high-speed chases begin with a minor traffic violation and escalate into emotion-filled, fuel-injected duels.

To the officers chasing two Augusta, Georgia, teenagers down country roads last year, it didn't seem to matter that the kids' crime was swiping $9.21 worth of gas. They had to be caught and punished-or killed, which is what happened first. Of course, those teenagers did break the law. The 68year-old Augusta man who was hit and killed after a high-speed pursuit the same weekend didn't. He was just standing on the comer.

Standing on the corner-that's exactly what pregnant Regina Morton was doing when she got hit and thrown by a car being chased across Chicago's South Side. Her 54-year-old neighbor Hugh Santee, on the other hand, was a more challenging target: He was trying to cross the street. Santee died after being hit twice, first by a speeding Cadillac and then by the Chicago police. Washington's6- Reginald Baker was also taking a stroll when a stolen Nissan Pathfinder plowed into him last month, D.C. police cars fast behind him. The Nissan kept going, the police kept chasing. Minutes later, just as the police gave up and flipped off their sirens, the Nissan barrelled into seven-year-old James Gripper and his aunt. Both were thrown and killed.

Nor is the casualty count of American police chases restricted to suspects and innocent bystanders. An American police officer is more likely to die from a chase than from a bullet. But at 100 miles an hour, statistics don't make much of an impression on the average American cop.

When a criminal throws down the gauntlet, asking a cop not to chase flies in the face of police culture, not to mention society's romantic expectations. Mel Gibson and Clint Eastwood never stop to ponder the consequences of chasing. Although the philosopher Seneca wisely mused that "hesitation is the best cure for anger," Smokey always went after the Bandit. Perhaps that's why, despite the astounding frequency of police crashes, American police departments are remarkably indifferent to the casualties they leave in their wake. Few departments even keep records of the resulting human and property cost. Most don't teach their officers how to cope with the stress of high-speed chases. And only a few renegade departments have begun to amend a decades-old policy of catch-at-any-cost. For the rest of the police departments across America, the chase is always on, regardless of whether the pursued has a broken taillight or a corpse hanging out of his trunk.

To the average U.S. police officer, real life looks a lot less volatile than a Lethal Weapon sequel. According to Geoffrey Alpert, a University of South Carolina criminology professor and author of the book Police Pursuit Driving, 99 times out of 100, drivers pull over when an officer flashes his lights. But when it comes to the one who doesn't, the emotions that kick in can make even a veteran officer forget the basics of Policing 101.

Cruisin' for a bruisin'

Bruce Cabral spent 23 years as a New York cop before becoming director of driving instruction at Georgia's police academy. "For weeks, you're driving 45 or 50 miles per hour, going to calls," he says. "Then, suddenly, you're driving 100 miles per hour. Your knees are shaking, and your hands are shaking-not because you're scared but because you're all pumped up." And to make matters worse, you've got tunnel vision. "The faster you drive," Cabral says, " the less you see."