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Sacramento Bee Columnist Daniel Weintraub

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May 19, 2003

Fatal police chases

Police chases that kill innocent bystanders have long been an interest of mine, since I watched the Legislature in 1987 pass a law all but immunizing government agencies from lawsuits in such cases. I thought at the time that the law, which requires police departments to have policies on high-speed chases, but doesn't require their officers to follow the policies, might open the door to more fatalities. That seems to be what happened. Now my colleague Aurelio Rojas at the Sacramento Bee reports that state Sen. Gloria Romero is pushing a bill to require police agencies to show their chase guidelines were followed if they want to escape liability in the courtroom. The cops say this will inevitably lead them to discourage officers from beginning a chase in certain circumstances. I'm not sure if that is true. But I still think the better solution could be found on middle ground. Establish a fund that could be used to compensate the families of the victims without litigation. It won't necessarily reduce the deaths. But neither would it hinder legitimate police work or encourage questionable lawsuits. It would simply recognize that one price society pays for public safety is the injury or death of innocent bystanders. And when that happens, all of society, not just the victim's family, should share in that burden.