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It's 3:47 AM on a Tuesday morning. A white sedan is pulled over for an expired registration, but when the acting officer exits his cruiser, the perpetrator restarts his car and jets off. Soon, the chase is on: sirens blare and tires screech as the pursuit ramps up. Other officers join the chase, slinging around suburban corners and flying through stop signs. Suddenly, a young Jane Redfield who was working the late shift at a neighborhood Applebee's pulls through an intersection, only to be T-boned by a police interceptor moving at more than 55 mph. She is killed instantly as her spine shatters in seven locations. Later that day, the original suspect is caught. He was an eighty year old man who was simply scared he could lose his independence if his license was revoked. Turns out he was also Jane's grandfather.

Stories like Jane's are sadly all too common. Sure, it doesn't always involve this level of cosmic irony, nor is the suspect of the police chase usually as "innocent". Still, the police are at fault for these injuries and deaths, because they choose to pursue the suspect, even knowing they are putting the lives of thousands of other civilians at risk. Whatever happened to "Protect and Serve"?

There is no reason for law enforcement policies to include dangerous police chases. Once a suspect is pulled over or the vehicle is identified, the police have all the data they need to perform an extensive investigation. Except in the cases of the most violent criminals, chasing a suspect's car is almost certainly more dangerous than letting him or her go for the time being. What is the point of hunting down a perpetrator who would not have harmed anyone else, if doing so endangers the rest of the community?

If police are really interested in protecting the community from those who flee them, law enforcement specialists should focus their efforts on designing tools and weapons that disable suspect vehicles. When police have a viable means to actually stop a moving car, instead of just ramming it into guardrails at dangerous speeds, the streets will be a safer place for all citizens.

Learn more about this author, Jon Tran.
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