High-Speed Police Chases (line-length reformatted)

[NanoByte]

This thread continues the thread of the same name (http://www.straightdope.com/ubb/Forum3/HTML/004275.html), in which I stupidly forced extremely long lines by printing full URLs as is, which were wider than the width one may or even can set one's browser.

I'm sorry!
¡Lo siento muchísimo!
Verzeihen Sie!
Pardon!
Scusi!
Neem me niet kwalijk!
<font face="symbol" size=1>P</font>poc<font size=1>T|/|T</font>e!

Ray

[TBone2]

Sorry, Nano, I just can't see what you want to call "HSC's" as a widespread public menace.

I live in Ohio. We have big cities. We don't talk much about "HSC's." We talk a lot more about "BAD's."

"BAD" stands for big-ass deer. "You wouldn't believe the size of that BAD that bounced his stupid self off the front end of my truck last night!!"

This sort of incident was REPORTED TO AUTHORITIES 25,000 times last year in Ohio alone. We may assume that many of these were reported ONLY for the sake of the insurance adjuster. We may further assume that MANY MORE deer were WHACKED by motor vehicles, and not reported to the authorities.

Call me cynical.

------------------
I don't know why fortune smiles on some and lets the rest go free...

T

[Rmat]

Apology accepted, Nano. Here's the deal:

1. Trying to apprehend suspects is dangerous.

2. Sometimes electing NOT to apprehend suspects is even more dangerous.

3. Sometimes the police do #1 and innocent persons get hurt (during the chase).

4. Sometimes the police do #2 and innocent persons get hurt (at the hands of the unapprehended suspect).

5. Police, lacking the powers of clairvoyance, can't always know whether innocent people will be injured if they do #1 or #2, but they exercise the their best judgment.

6. Whether they do #1 or #2, if an innocent person gets hurt, he or she will sue the police, insisting that the only reasonable course for the police to have pursued was whatever it is they did not do.

7. The propriety of one course or the other in a variety of situations is a matter of continuous study by police departments, which obviously have no interest in or desire to hurt innocent persons.

8. However, given the virtually unlimited number of relevant factors that can affect what might be deemed the most appropriate police response (time of day, day of week, degree of traffic congestion, frequency of crosswalks, ability of set up perimeter or establish a roadblock, perceived level of desperation of suspect, etc., etc., etc.), it is not possible to develop a protocol applicable to every conceivable circumstance. Some departments will try to develop general guidelines nonetheless; other departments will resist strict protocols in the belief that any "rules" for appropriate response will be fraught with so many exceptions, that the better course is to allow seasoned and experienced officers to respond to each situation in whatever manner appears most prudent under the circumstances. In either event, it is only a matter of time that someone will get hurt anyway, in which case the injured person will sue and find fault with the poice department for either (1) failing to develop a protocol or (2) devloping a flawed and inadequate protocol.

[NanoByte]

I received considerable statistics on HSC from the National Highway Traffic Safety Association (NHTSA) / National Center for Statistics and Analysis (NCSA). They sent data on fatalities from HSC by state and year for 1990 through 1998, the only years I asked for. They apparently have same for earlier years. Besides by state and year, the data is broken down by the categorical position of a fatality in the HSC incident, i.e., by whether the person had been 1) in the police vehicle, 2) the chased vehicle, 3) in a vehicle not either of those, or 4) not in a vehicle. The 1990 data does not list item 1. I don't know whether this means there were no such fatalities in that year, or whether there were some but they were not reported. No data of any type is given for a few different states in different years. Likewise, I don't know if they had no fatalities in those years or they just didn't report those they had.

Of course, this data doesn't shed light on numerous facets of the chases one would like to know in order to evaluate them and their justifiability. We do not know from them:

A. The history of past or present criminality/dangerousness of the fugitive driver known at initiation of the chase.
B. Same found out later.
C. Same committed during the chase.
D. Same committed later, whether to be considered as in the normal course of the fugitive's life or resultant from the chase per se or thereafter consequent of the chase experience
E. All of the above for any passengers in the fugitive's vehicle. Some could even have been hostages.
F. What degree of culpability any of such passengers had in initiation or continuation of the chase.
G. All of the above as to any of the other fatalities accounted for, including those in the police vehicle, which could've included persons in custody.
H. Which chases were initiated only upon permission of designated at-station personnel.
I. Which were later so permitted after begun.
J. What the much large numbers of serious injuries were in these chases.
K. Numerous other facets I've thought of and forgotten, or that I haven't thought of.

Anyhow, I'll list a few of the data here:

The all-US totals in the 4 categories are, by year:

Category --> 1 . . . 2 . . . 3 . . . 4 . all cats .*

1990 . . . no rec. 266 . . .46 . . . 5 . . 317
1991 . . . . 4 . . 252 . . .46 . . . 5 . . 307
1992 . . . . 1 . . 224 . . .66 . . . 7 . . 298
1993 . . . . 1 . . 284 . . .57 . . . 5 . . 347 . .307
1994 . . . . 3 . . 284 . . .93 . . .12 . . 392 . .347
1995 . . . .10 . . 249 . . 117 . . .10 . . 386 . .386
1996 . . . . 5 . . 267 . . 109 . . . 9 . . 390 . .390
1997 . . . . 1 . . 193 . . 100 . . .11 . . 305 . .306
1998 . . . . 2 . . 198 . . 100 . . .14 . . 314

*All-state, all-category figures I reported before, from the NHTSA Website. Dunno why the disparities.

You may note that '94-'96 were particularly bloody years, and that '95 was not even a very happy scene for the cops, assuming they might be interested in something more than the glory of the chase (otherwise, by the number of them that reached the ultimate glory, it might be considered a great year).

Now, as to these national figures, we could make some quite crude assumptions in order to come up with a sort of figure of merit for each of these yearly chase records -- in a non-due-process police-ocracy. Assume:

a. All fatalities in catgory 2 were "Bad Guys" (B), and all in categories 1, 3 and 4 were "Good Guys" (G).
b. The appropriate HSC figure of merit is B/(B+G) expressed in percent.

Then, from the above figures, we have these percentages:

1990 . . 84
1991 . . 82
1992 . . 75
1993 . . 65
1994 . . 72
1995 . . 65
1996 . . 68
1997 . . 63
1998 . . 63

If selection of kill by law enforcement is the measure of justice, the US, as a whole, is exactly going in the right direction, I'd say. Either the cops are getting worse or the increased traffic (and maybe road improvements) is getting to them.

Now, let's look at some states' records, say the 5 high-population ones and 4 more from different regions of the US, checking only for the 2 years, 1990 and 1998:

Category --> 1 . . 2. . 3 . .4 all cats . . . . . . . .1 . .2. . 3 . .4 all cats
State
. | Pop (millions)
. v |
. . . v
. . . . . . . . . 1990 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1998
Hi-Pop States:
CA . 29.8 .no rec. 51 . 10 . .0 . 61 _ _ _ CA . 32.7 . .0 . 18 . .6 . .5 . 29
FL . 12.9 .no rec. .8 . .0 . .0 . .8 _ _ _ FL . 14.9 . .1 . 14 . .5 . .0 . 20
IL . 11.4 .no rec. .5 . .2 . .1 . .8 _ _ _ IL . 12.0 . .0 . .9 . .7 . .0 . 16
NY . 18.0 .no rec. .4 . .2 . .1 . .7 _ _ _ NY . 18.2 . .0 . .0 . .2 . .0 . .2
TX . 17.0 .no rec. 29 . .7 . .0 . 36 _ _ _ TX . 19.8 . .0 . 15 . .3 . .1 . 19

By region:
GA . .6.5 .no rec. 22 . .5 . .0 . 27 _ _ _ GA . .7.6 . .0 . .9 . .0 . .0 . .9
MT . .0.8 .no rec. .1 . .0 . .0 . .1 _ _ _ MT . .0.8 . .0 . .2 . .1 . .0 . .3
IA . .2.8 .no rec. .3 . .0 . .0 . .3 _ _ _ IA . .2.9 . .0 . .1 . .0 . .0 . .1
ME . .1.2 .no rec. .1 . .0 . .0 . .1 _ _ _ ME . .1.2 . .0 . .1 . .3 . .0 . .4

Normalizing only the total fatalities wrt population (using 1997 pop for 1998 data), we get (deaths/million):

Relative total fatalities
-------------------------
State . 1990 . .1998

CA . . . 1.7 . . 0.9
FL . . . 0.6 . . 1.3
IL . . . 0.4 . . 1.3
NY . . . 0.2 . . 0.1
TX . . . 1.7 . . 1.0

GA . . . 3.4 . . 1.2
MT . . . 1.3 . . 0.4
IA . . . 1.1 . . 0.3
ME . . . 0.8 . . 3.3

Maybe later I'll fill in the other years to see if there are any trends in these states and to better compare each to the others. Any state comparisons, populous-vs.-lo-pop state comparisons, regional comparisons and improvements/worsenings for a given state, that are drawn from only these two years, would probably be very noisy. But, on the face of it, one might say that:

I. CA & TX were quite bad but both about halved their problems.
II. FL & IL were quite good but both about doubled their problems.
III. NY was exceptionally good and then about halved that still.
IV. The South(east) was about twice as bad as CA & TX, but then cut their problems by about 1/3.
V. The Midwest and Mountain states were mediocre, but then cut their problems by about 1/3.
VI. Maine, representing New England, was pretty good, but went all to hell.

But actually, the kills in the last 3 states above were numerically too small to determine anything significant.

So you who wanted more statistics wade in these for a while. The full set of statistics for all states reporting, for the years 1990-1998, were faxed (via eFax) to me by NHTSA on request. I have the result in an EFX file (227 KB), which I can't convert to any other format, but an eFax viewer (and eFax service if you want it) is available on the Web. I can send this file attached to an e-mail message to whomever should want it, or anyone can get it, or other years of such data, directly from [url=http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/]NHTSA (http://www.efax.com/]free[/url) (Lyn Cianflocco, NRD-31, Ph: (202) 366-4198, (800) 934-8517 or e-mail via webmaster@nhtsa.dot.gov ).

Ray (not a statistician)

[NanoByte]

Damn UBB code! The URL hyperlink thing doesn't work with a '/' after the domain extension. The last paragraph of my preceding post should've been:

So you who wanted more statistics wade in these for a while. The full set of statistics for all states reporting, for the years 1990-1998, were faxed (via eFax) to me by NHTSA on request. I have the result in an EFX file (227 KB), which I can't convert to any other format, but an eFax viewer (and eFax service if you want it) is available on the Web. I can send this file attached to an e-mail message to whomever should want it, or anyone can get it, or other years of such data, directly from [url=http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov]NHTSA (http://www.efax.com]free[/url) (Lyn Cianflocco, NRD-31, Ph: (202) 366-4198, (800) 934-8517 or e-mail via webmaster@nhtsa.dot.gov ).

Ray

[NanoByte]

What the hell? So much for the UBB URL-hyperlink thing. This is what I was trying to say:

So you who wanted more statistics wade in these for a while. The full set of statistics for all states reporting, for the years 1990-1998, were faxed (via eFax) to me by NHTSA on request. I have the result in an EFX file (227 KB), which I can't convert to any other format, but an eFax viewer (and eFax service if you want it) is available free at:
http://www.efax.com

on the Web. I can send this file attached to an e-mail message to whomever should want it, or anyone can get it, or other years of such data, directly from NHTSA at:
http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov

(Lyn Cianflocco, NRD-31, Ph: (202) 366-4198, (800) 934-8517 or e-mail via webmaster@nhtsa.dot.gov ).

Ray

[NanoByte]

Can anyone here explain why the UBB hyperlinks don't work in most of this? However I do it, the first problem seems to be that the ']' after '[/url' gets chopped off.

Ray

[funneefarmer]

Ray, you wouldn't happen to have the stats handy for the number of police per million population for those specific states would you ? I've heard that here in NY that number is higher than most states. If that is true it might explain why NY has such good numbers. After all the more cops, the better chance there is to cut off a high speed pursuit earlier. You would have to take into consideration the various agencies of course, state police, sheriffs, village and city departments etc.

[funneefarmer]

Found my own answer, note you'll need Adobe Acrobat for this site. This site covers the rate of officers per 10,000 population for 1994. I took these numbers from total police protection but the table includes other justice system payroll as well. The main site also has a great other statistics on the Justice system as well.
http://cscmosaic.albany.edu/sourcebook/1995/pdf/t119.pdf

State... Total Police protection per 10,000 pop.

CA ... 27.8
FL ... 34.7
IL ... 36.7
NY ... 39.8
TX ... 29.4

GA ... 27.3
MT ... 24.7
IA ... 21.7
ME ... 23.1

Note these are 1994 numbers. NY did have the highest per capita rate of the states but Dist. of Columbia had the highestrate overall with 89.2 per 10,000.

Also note that there does seem to be some correlation between these numbers and Nano's relative total fatalities in at least the high population states.

[NanoByte]

http://www.tsoft.net/~raych/All_Deaths.jpg

I have charted up here the population-normalized numbers of fatalities, in whatever chase role, that resulted from HSCs in the 5 most-populated US states for all the years from 1990 through 1998. The absolute numbers of deaths were taken from the NHTSA data I received from that federal agency, while the estimated state populations (1990 by full census) were obtained here:

www.empire.state.ny.us/nysdc/ftp/StateCountyPopests/stpopes7.htm (http://www.empire.state.ny.us/nysdc/ftp/StateCountyPopests/stpopes7.htm)

I just noted that the scale graduations in my chart are pretty messed up (done with XYez). The data are straight-line connected, so that each years' accounting is actually at a point of change in slope.

I didn't plot any of the data for the other states, since that numbers are too low to attribute much differential significance to them, either by year or by state. The numbers of other than fugitive-vehicle kills were also not charted, in the case of the 5 states chosen above, because those figures are also insufficiently large to show real differential significance in a chart.

Several things stand out in the above chart, none of which I understand. First, NY has continuously had very low figures, with even lower ones in the last 2 years charted. FL and IL started out in 1990 at less than twice NY's value, but then shot up each year, to a value of about 4 and 6 times as much, respectively, in the infamous year of 1994 -- thereafter dropping to about 2.5 and 3 times as much, respectively, in 1997 -- after which they started going up again. TX and CA started at about 4 times NY's value, CA going up the next year just a bit, while both went down a little between the start and 1994, peaking up to about their starting level in that same bad year of 1994. Thereafter they both went down to about twice NY's original value, but NY had dropped in the last two years to an incredibly low value (which probably isn't statistically significant). 1997 seemed to be a relatively low year for all these states.

So what planets were in alignment in 1994 and 1997? And why does NY have so much better figures? I don't know about funnyfarmer's theory about more police's fixing things up. His data, which includes much more than peace officers assigned to relevant duties apparently, shows only slightly less law-enforcement personnel employed in IL and FL. Probably police throughout NY act somewhat more conservatively than those in the other hi-pop states. Dunno.

Ray (always plotting ;) )

[NanoByte]

OK, I fixed up the scales of the chart.

Ray (now less fishy)

[funneefarmer]

Ranking the 5 states from most fatalities to least (1994) and comparing total police to sworn police, numbers from same chart.

State...Total police...Sworn police

IL... 36.7 ... 27.2
FL... 34.7 ... 23.2
TX... 29.4 ... 21.6
CA... 27.8 ... 19.5
NY... 39.8 ... 34.1

Well it does look like NY has good numbers. I guess you can't draw the conclusion that more cops per capita helps in lowering HSC fatalities, at least comparing these 5 states. Other than NY there seems to be the opposite correlation in this group.

I will note one curious point that is mostly off topic, the percentage of sworn police of the the total police number (sworn police/total police) is also higher in NY than the other four. Strikes me as odd but could just be how they compiled the data.

Comments on responses under this topic (in any of its threads) since my second-previous long post (12/13):

Little Nemo would like to substitute his own question in place of my OP:

"People's lives are placed at risk during high speed police chases of fleeing suspects. Does the need to apprehend these suspects justify the risk?"

He asks a different question. My OP, in bare-bones language, asked:

Why does North American society tolerate, to such an extreme extent, the practice by police of high-speed chase, . . .?

Maybe LN would need to be told the premise regarding risk. I certainly don't think others would. Then, his following proposed question is silly, in that it asks for a platitude. It asks only a 'yes'-'no' question as to the relationship of two generalities -- "need to apprehend" and "risk", both of which, of course, are variables over a wide range of magnitude, but he says to check one of two boxes:

[ ] Whatever the risk (i.e., circumstances), do not chase.

[ ] Whatever the risk (i.e., circumstances), chase.

I asked a 'why' question dealing with the extent of (official) use of chase (HSC). One, of course, may assume that such a 'why' question would call for more than one short conclusive answer.

One can knock my choice of words of embellishment, but they arise from the subject official social behavior of HSC, as it is used to an extent clearly at extreme moral variance from the generally established accepted social norm applicable to our societally internal interactions -- i.e., the present extent of use of HSC, where innocents and fugitives of otherwise low danger and criminality in general are placed at high risk of death or serious injury, is societally self-destructive. It often goes beyond martial law, into a vendetta sort of thing, where the goal extends out to 'death anywhere in the vicinity of the target'.

RB9454:

Well, if you're one of those who will chase a kid who ran a stop sign, right into perhaps your own mother, what risk do I stand when you have no job and are severely angry at persons like me who say things opposed to your exercising this sort of ad-hoc ethic? The lack of a badge ain't gonna stop ya.

Yet we have been so stripped of the tools necessary to do the job that a difficult job has now become virtually impossible.

I think you've either been misinstructed as to, or concluded on your own, what the job is, overall, that you are supposed to be doing. And it is clear to me, that police administrations and suppliers have not pursued enough such technology as would facilitate, not necessarily immediate apprehension of persons refusing to submit to field detention, but would do this timely, in terms of feasible prosecution or other (unlikely) resolution of the incident involving flight against the command of a peace officer, in almost all situations.

Before you trash the cops why don't you try being one...then come back and tell me what you think.

I lack the range of basic nature, innate talents and desire for such a job (and am now 68 and with one eye essentially blind). Certainly it would not be in society's interest for me to "try being one [police officer]." That however, does in no way disqualify me, and most persons so disqualified from the job you are leaving, from demanding -- as simply members of this society, or citizens in various niches thereof other than law enforcement -- that personnel of law enforcement agencies adhere to the same underlying basic ethics that our society is built upon. Tactical officers shold not call the strategic shots, and police administrators and police associations should not fend off the rest of society from involvemnet with their strategies and policies. A law enforcement officer is in a similar position to a soldier, and must have a chain of command within the outfit, but as well, police are not supposed to be fighting wars -- on dangerous drivers, on drug dealers, on violent assaulters and murders, or on anyone else. They have vastly less justification of acts approaching those of No Gun Ri. Cops charge others according as cars should be dangerous weapons. Do they claim cars must be otherwise when in the hands of cops? No one ever says I have to try being President of this country before I can criticize the President. What's so special when it comes to cops? The only thing I'd tend to grant is that only some details of high-speed chase policies might reasonably be withheld from public knowledge, in order that fugitives for the police not be able to fashion one-to-one maneuvers in their countering strategies.

DSYoungEsq:

First, obtain valid statistics as to how many police chases reach speeds significantly (say 20 mph) in excess of the local posted limit (hell, most drives exceed them by at least 10 mph).[quote]

Yes, 20 mph above the local limit sounds like a good criterion for labeling a chase as a HSC. I don't think any chases below that speed are reported as HSCs. All news reports that I've seen, where the max speed is stated, give a figure (however accurate) above that, but fairly often the speed isn't given. Also, say, at off hours, such as 4 a.m., 20 mph above the posted limit could perhaps not be considered a particularly dangerous speed. However, excessive speed of the fugitive is not the *only* consequence of the police chases; the types of people they chase are quite likely to try maneuvers that are outrageous even at reasonable speed, so that if the chase should involve a fugitive or that sort, the chase could be highly dangerous to bystanders (or innocent persons in the fugitive's car), even though the speed of the chase is not outrageous.

That stats the NHTSA sent me do not list speeds or any aspects of the chases other than the number of fatalities resultant. I have never seen a report of an expressly described low-speed chase where a death occurred. However, OJ-type chases aren't at all common. ;)

[quote]Second, find out what percentage of those chased turn out to be charged with felony offenses not related to the chase itself.

Again, NHTSA doesn't seem to supply that sort of information. Of course, they're not a law-enforcement organization. As to news reports of chases, I just recall such a high percentage of them as being initiated without police forehand knowledge of any crimes of any level having been committed by the fugitives, prior to their simple flight from detention, or at most, threatening police with their vehicle as a weapon. And most reported in the papers seem to involve persons who turn out not to have [b]any[b] criminal records above infractions. I think the safety of bystanders, at a time and in a place of congestion, in the case of a contemplated HSC, does not warrent chasing any kind of
criminal, unless there is knowledge that that criminal is quite likely to be headed directly on a course to kill or seriously maim several people (or possibly to do some other highly unusual public-threatening act, such as greatly compromising national security with secret information). A known fact that the fugitive(s) has/have just robbed a bank at gunpoint should not be a cause to create a great likelihood that a vehicle in a succeeding chase will kill or seriously injure an innocent bystander. And the more even only such fugitives are killed in such chases, the more this country can be seen as a police state that dispenses with due process (which is what I thought you esqs and wannabe-esqs were supposed to be into). And also, cops are lost in some of these chases, even other

[Rmat]

Nano prattles on about "ethical priorities and factual probabilities."

"Drivel" indeed, albeit not "disgusting boilerplate." Does Nano even know what "boilerplate" even means? Nano's posts could easily be 1/10 as long, and they still wouldn't make any sense.

TBone2:

I live in Ohio. We have big cities. We don't talk much about "HSC's." We talk a lot more about "BAD's."

"BAD" stands for big-ass deer. "You wouldn't believe the size of that BAD that bounced his stupid self off the front end of my truck last night!!"

This sort of incident was REPORTED TO AUTHORITIES 25,000 times last year in Ohio
alone.

Conclusion: Ohio is a very "BAD" place. So have a civil war between the species to find out which one should run OH. In CA, if the deer get too thick, we thin 'em out. It's just the mountain pussies we hang onto. . .to keep the number of joggers down. Pickup trucks are not an endangered species. If the BADs will get those nasty things off the highways (maybe along with the SUVs), so much the better. Alterntively, a bounty on cops could be offered to pickup drivers, and they could regularly try outrunning the latter. That might get rid of both errant pickups and gung-ho cops. ;-)

Monty (in GD):

In reference to this item in my post:

1. San Diego
HSC, death, 2/99
3 SDPD chased, >70 mph, 2 fugitive home robbers (victims bound) in Bronco, leaving scene of crime. W/ lights & siren, 1st ran light & broadsided woman in car. See (http://www.uniontrib.com/news/utarchives/cgi/idoc.cgi?445165+unix++www.uniontrib.com..80+Union-Tribune+Union-Tribune+Library+Library++%28james)
Trial of fugitives, 11/99
Both convicted of 1st deg murder, conspiracy to commit crime, felony evasion w/ serious injury or death, 2 counts robbery using gun. One fugitive also convicted of sexual battery.
[Obviously wasn't murder or even manslaughter -- the amplified felony evasion covered the flight phase -- but SD is an archconservative bastion] Cop who crashed cleared by DA.
Then-PD-Chief said cop should've driven more carefully, was primary cause of death.
See (http://www.uniontrib.com/news/utarchives/cgi/idoc.cgi?510344+unix++www.uniontrib.com..80+Union-Tribune+Union-Tribune+Library+Library++%28james)
Suit by husband of deceased expected, per trial article{/quote]

Monty said:

[quote]Nanobyte: you uttered an opinion above about "obviously wasn't murder" which is 100% incorrect as it's an opinion not based on facts.

URLs stating the facts are included above. My statement objected to referred to murder as commonly ethically recognized and as recognized in all English-based common law. It is unclear how legally anyone can otherwise, by statute in CA.US, convict, in this case, of murder.

CA Penal Code §187(a) (http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/displaycode?section=pen&group=00001-01000&file=187-199) says: "Murder is the unlawful killing of a human being, or a
fetus, with malice aforethought." (Limitations of this as to a fetus are thereafter stated.)

Clearly, in this case, People v. Lima and Le (in whatever order), in San Diego ---- wherein defendants were convicted of first-degree murder -- as a result of a police vehicle's colliding with the vehicle of, and killing, an innocent party, while chasing defendants, who were fleeding from police, after committing a home-invasion robbery ---- defendants could not have had "malice aforethought" in the death of the innocent party, as required by the above definition of 'murder'.

The, what Monty refers to, apparently, is:

CA Penal Code §189 (http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/displaycode?section=pen&group=00001-01000&file=187-199), which says: "All murder. . .which is committed in the perpetration of, or attempt to perpetrate. . .robbery. . .is murder of the
first degree. . . .

BUT. . .the conclusion of this codified statement is clearly predicated on the earlier codified definition of 'murder', which necessarily must include "malice aforethought", but which, in no way, could've occurred according to the undisputed facts of this case.

Furthermore, we can refer, as to this case, to:

CA Vehicle Code §2800.3 (http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/displaycode?section=veh&group=02001-03000&file=2800-2818), which says: "Whenever willful flight or attempt to elude a pursuing peace officer in violation of Section 2800.1 proximately causes death
or serious bodily injury to any person, the person driving the pursued vehicle, upon conviction, shall be punished by imprisonment in the state prison for three, four, or five years, by imprisonment in the county jail for not more than one year, or by a fine of not
less than two thousand dollars ($2,000) nor more than ten thousand dollars ($10,000), or by both that fine and imprisonment.
"For purposes of this section, "serious bodily injury" has the same
meaning as defined in paragraph (4) of subdivision (f) of Section
243 of the Penal Code."

Clearly, this code section, which is silent as to what open crime the fugitive may have committed, if any, is distinctly tailored to a flight from police, but says nothing about murder, and permits only a maximum sentence of five years in prison. So how is CA.US's so-called Provocative-Act Murder Rule/Theory/Doctrine (http://www.thereporter.com/Current/News/99/01/daily012499.html#Cases_spur_look_at_use_of_law_on_provocative_acts), which is what some CA prosecutors and Monty like to think of as established CA law? It may be further noted that all of the three cases mentioned in the article linked immediately above were incidents wherein the defendant provoked a death at the hand of a victim of the defendant's original crime in pursuit of self-defense. One case remains a conviction; one resulted in a conviction, but is scheduled for retrial due to a technicality; and one has not yet been tried.

I don't know what special statutes VA.US has at all related to this doctrine, but in v. Commonwealth of Virginia (http://www.courts.state.va.us/txtops/0786942.txt][i]Rivers[/i), that state refused to recognize this unique CA and MD principle and through out a lower court's conviction of second-degree murder based on this principle, in its Court of Appeals in 1995.

Monty says:

[quote]Fact of the matter is, in California, the law which designates which particular homicides (please remember that homicide just means "causing the death of a human" and murder means "unlawfully causing the death of a human") are considered murder and to what degree, an individual who, while engaged in a felony (such as "felony evading of police) is guilty of the crime of murder in the first degree if, although unknown to said person engaged in a felony, causes the death of another.

This is incomprehensible, due to its being an incomplete sentence (the predicate of "the law" here is not stated), although one can deduce that he is discussing CA Penal Code §189, which I have pertinently extracted above. This law does not say anthing about murder. The surrogate-murder stuff comes only out of the Provocative-Act Murder Doctrine, as mentioned.

This particular law has been used to good extent in California. The most recent I remember was the conviction of an armed robber whose partner was shot to death by the police when both he and his partner were shooting at the police. The convicted one was convicted of both armed robbery and 1st degree murder.

It may have been "used" unsuccessfully "to [a] good extent", but it has rarely been used successfully. The case he refers to is the San Diego case mentioned above. I believe that that case is the only case in CA.US that successfully used this doctrine, wherein a death charged as murder was caused by a HSC vehicle collision, rather than by a dedicated weapon, such as a gun or a knife.

Incidentally, but irrelevantly:

Amer Herit, 2nd Coll Ed:

homicide 1. The kil

[NanoByte]

I'm sorry for again fouling up the line wrap
in this series of threads, but I used the
proper UBB code, and it just plain doesn't
work for URLs that wrap several times in this form.

Ray

[NanoByte]

The UBB URL code also seems not to like the
UBB italics code within it:

The link that says "Commonwealth of Virginia" should be:

http://www.courts.state.va.us/txtops/0786942.txt

Ray

[Monty]

No, Nano; you appear to be the incomprehensible one. I merely left out "dictates" in the posting to which you refer above.

Homicide is any killing of a human being, such as an execution. Thus, the "cause of death" block on a death certificate for an executed convict having the word "homicide" listed.

Murder and manslaughter are both the unlawful killing of a human being.

Please reread your own statement above about "malice aforethought." The courts in this state (you might try to recall that this particular state hasn't always been English, gut that's another issue) have held that the act of driving drunk is malice aforethought.

You don't like it? Tough.

[NanoByte]

No, Nano; you appear to be the incomprehensible one. I merely left out
"dictates" in the posting to which you refer above.

So you put dictates in as verb of the predicate of 'law'; then what is the object
of 'dictates'? Why don't you try to diagram that silly sentence of yours! Even if you
fix it up to technically be English (or any other language), it's even more absurdly
complex than some of my overdone sentences. ;-)

Homicide is any killing of a human being, such as an execution. Thus, the "cause
of death" block on a death certificate for an executed convict having the word "homicide"
listed.

Well, technically, within law and considerably beyond it, apparently, you're
correct, but in under fairly formal situations, in some cases, the word appears
to be used to mean, I guess, 'suspected/alleged or adjudicated murder or manslaughter' -- as in: 'There have been 67
homicides in Oakland this year.' (Actual figure for 1999. Down from over 100 some years ago.) Therefore, I don't think you can
always neatly say 'homocide' means simply the
killing of a human being. And this quote is from the CA.US Penal Code index:

TITLE 8. OF CRIMES AGAINST THE PERSON
CHAPTER 1. HOMICIDE......187-199

This says homicide is a subset of the concept of crime.

Please reread your own statement above about "malice aforethought." The courts in
this state (you might try to recall that this particular state hasn't always been English,
gut that's another issue) have held that the act of driving drunk is malice
aforethought.

In the definition of 'murder', "malice aforethought" refers to foregoing malicious
thought directed toward the act of murder, as opposed to both 1) only instanteous emotional
reaction resulting in homocide and 2) foregoing malicious thought directed toward
some other act or no act at all. Thus it would, in somewhat of an extension of the
notion, be reasonable to argue that driving drunk involves pre-existing malice toward a
right of others to safety on the highway that one might drive on, but it should never count
as malice directed toward homicide; i.e., an accident resulting in death of another, that
is caused by a person who was driving while intoxicated, should result in enhancement of
the penalty against that driver because of his/her drunkenness, but it should never
raise the category of offense from criminal negligence, including manslaughter, to
intensional homicide, i.e. murder.

CA.US was never "English," as you imply. There may be some subtleties in CA
law that result from Spanish or Mexican heritage here, but I don' recognize any. We
basically follow English legal theory and practice in matters of law. I don't know
what any of this has to do with anything here. Are you people in Monterey getting
carried away with some heritage that existed there before you? Your name sounds pretty
Scottish to me.

You don't like it? Tough.

I don't like what? The statutory criminal law of CA in re this subject matter
looks OK to me. The statutory CA civil law in re the liability of authorities in HSCs
clearly violates the innocent public's constitutional right to life, and promotes
behavior on the part of peace officers in CA that verges on (malicious) murder, in the
interest of high-activity sport -- disguised as some kind of nonexistent right of
authorities to "get their man" "by any means" (the same past stance as Louis Farrakahn).

Yes, it's "tough". Those of us thoroughly outrage by this stance, and the actual
results thereof, ought to have more political power to do something about this. As
for you, perhaps someone ought to put your relatives out their as pedestrians in
crosswalks or as drivers in cross traffic, at the time these gung-ho official monkeys test
driving expertise. Tough?

Ray

[Rmat]

Before you flail and set out to change the law, Nano, you might want to learn what the law really is. Malice comes in two flavors: Express and implied.

[Monty]

Thanks, Rmat. Also, I find it extremely funny (ironic, even) that nano flailed into me over a mistake in grammar and then posts "out their."

My implication above is to the fact that California's courts go by the written law, not some supposed superiority of an unwritten code of common law.

[NanoByte]

Rmat:

I certainly know that malice can be either express or implied. This is covered in CA Penal Code 188 (http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/displaycode?section=pen&group=00001-01000&file=187-199), which says:

Such malice may be express or implied. It is express when there is manifested a deliberate intention unlawfully to take away the life of a fellow creature. It is implied, when no considerable provocation appears, or when the circumstances attending the killing show an abandoned and malignant heart. When it is shown that the killing resulted from the intentional doing of an act with express or implied malice as defined above, no other mental state need be shown to establish the mental state of malice aforethought. Neither an awareness of the obligation to act within the general body of laws regulating society nor acting despite such awareness is included within the definition of malice.

All that just has to do with proving a subjective "fact" in any given case; once either type of malice is "proven", which type has no bearing on the categorization of the type of crime being, or having been adjudicated, or codewise-explicitly on any penalties to be, or having been, imposed upon conviction. Thus that distinction does not bear on the issues we have discussed here.

What are your qualifications that make your impudnet, extremely limitedly contentful posts overriding on what I have posted here?

I'm going to correct, using HTML instead of UBB for the linking of the long URLs, the text of my prior two extensive posts, and repost them in yet another thread, in order to correct the lack of wrapping here.

Ray

[NanoByte]

Monty:

You too mutually admiring characters seem to post what ads up to next to zilch.

I apologize for the "out their". But can you really convince yourself of what you say in this sentence:

Also, I find it extremely funny (ironic, even) that nano flailed into me over a mistake in grammar and then posts "out their."

My mistake here was merely one of those annoying homonymic typos, of course, which couldn't possibly have caused you any difficulty in understanding what I was saying in the sentence in which it was used.

OTOH, although, I think I got the gist of what you were trying to get across in your outrageously complex and definitely incomplete sentence (and which your addition thereto still still did not complete),
certainly that mess-up of your greatly disrupted your communication to me and to anyone else here (most of whom no doubt gave up on the reading of it).

California's courts go by the written law, not some supposed superiority of an unwritten code of common law.

That is a gross falsehood going back to include 150 yr. of CA.US jurisprudence. If you believe that, just state -- on the one point I raised in respect to what we were
discussing, i.e., the Provocative-Act Murder Doctrine (http://thereporter.com/Current/News/99/01/daily012499.html#Cases_spur_look_at_use_of_law_on_provocative_acts) -- what code supports this doctrine (which wouldn't be called a 'doctrine'/'rule'/'theory' if it were codified as a statute). CA Penal Codes 187-189 do not support this theory, as you tried to claim. And in general, CA.US legal judgments are based on unwritten common more-or-less-English law in any instances where no CA.US or US statute covers the particular issue (or possibly an especially pertinent CA, UK, AU, etc. law). Ask any lawyer or judge.

I think it's about time to ignore your and Rmat's contentless, unbacked-up denials and directives., but I'm going to clean up my two extensive posts and repost them in a new thread where they'll wrap right, in case someone else wants to comment. I can't legitimately repost the posts of you two, but you two are, of course welcome to do so in the new thread.

Ray

[NanoByte]

Monty:

You too mutually admiring characters seem to post what ads up to next to zilch. I apologize for the "out their". But can you really convince yourself of what you say in this sentence:

Also, I find it extremely funny (ironic, even) that nano flailed into me over a mistake in grammar and then posts "out their."

My mistake here was merely one of those annoying homonymic typos, of course, which couldn't possibly have caused you any difficulty in understanding what I was saying in the sentence in which it was used.

OTOH, although, I think I got the gist of what you were trying to get across in your outrageously complex and definitely incomplete sentence (and which your addition thereto still still did not complete), certainly that mess-up of your greatly disrupted your communication to me and to anyone else here (most of whom no doubt gave up on the reading of it).

California's courts go by the written law, not some supposed superiority of an unwritten code of common law.

That is a gross falsehood going back to include 150 yr. of CA.US jurisprudence. If you believe that, just state -- on the one point I raised in respect to what we were discussing, i.e., the Provocative-Act Murder Doctrine -- what code supports this doctrine (which wouldn't be called a 'doctrine'/'rule'/'theory' if it were codified as a statute). CA Penal Codes 187-189 do not support this theory, as you tried to claim. And in general, CA.US legal judgments are based on unwritten common more-or-less-English law in any instances where no CA.US or US statute covers the particular issue (or possibly an especially pertinent CA, UK, AU, etc. law). Ask any lawyer or judge.

I think it's about time to ignore your and Rmat's contentless, unbacked-up denials and directives., but I'm going to clean up my two extensive posts and repost them in a new thread where they'll wrap right, in case someone else wants to comment. I can't legitimately repost the posts of you two, but you two are, of course welcome to do so in the new thread.

Ray

[NanoByte]

So I'm reposting the last four of my above posts (which are hard to read, due to their line lengths) here (http://www.straightdope.com/ubb/Forum3/HTML/004556.html).

Ray

[Monty]

Well, there's no doubt about Nano's stance on censorship now.

Nano: on what planet do you reside? The police officer can not know in advance what any one other person will do until that person actually does it.

[Rmat]

Honestly, Nano, you need to chill. You're getting hysterical, and that can't be good for your health. How can my post be at once "contentless" and yet "override what [you] have said"? You see, you're making no sense. Again. Your earlier posts uniformly betrayed no understanding of the distinction between implied and express malice. I simply pointed that out. You now reply by (1) confirming that my observation about the distinction is correct, (2) claiming that you knew it all along, and (3) denying that this distinction has any relevance to a discussion that you initiated and pursued on the patently erroneous assumption that there is no such thing as implied malice. You argue like a child. As for my qualifications, I, without knowing yours, am confident that they exceed your own. I would gladly disclose them if I thought doing so could somehow advance this dialogue. That seems unlikely. But I'll make you a deal: I'll send you my resume if I ever make a demonstrably incorrect statement about the law of homicide. So far, as you must acknowledge, that has not occurred.

[Monty]

P.S. Any police department which did not pursue a killer would be in for a lot more turmoil than what you've described so far, Nano.

Another thing is that your OP in the OT was decidedly prejudiced against the police in general, as was your asinine comment above, to wit: "they all say that."

[JamesCarroll]

What I wanna know is why NB is so hot for this topic. Its obvious from his own data that police don't seek out opportunities to hurt innocent people and the people who get hurt are mostly the fleeing. What was it NB that got your panties in such a twist? Or are you just one of those people who aren't happy unless they're miserable?