Sacramento police’s high chase rates cause harm, injury instead of preventing it

The same law enforcement officers sworn to protect Sacramento’s streets and neighborhoods are making them more dangerous year after year.

This is the sobering finding of a Bee investigation that showed that the Sacramento Police Department initiated the highest rate of police car chases of any department in the largest cities in California.

In all, Sacramento cops were involved in 722 chases between 2018 and 2021, a rate of about 10 vehicle pursuits per 1,000 crimes. That’s nearly double the rate of the Los Angeles Police Department.

Too often, police-initiated chases led to injury and even death through collision. In May, the parents of eight-year-old Cathy Nguyen were driving to have coffee and sandwiches in Sacramento’s Little Saigon neighborhood when they were struck and killed by a car being pursued by Sacramento Police.

“She puts on a brave face, but the girl sadly knows what happened to her parents,” Cathy’s grandmother, Phuong Hoang, said in Vietnamese. “There are some nights I wake up to her crying, and I have to go across the hallway to comfort her.”

A 3,000-pound car traveling at high speed in urban neighborhoods is a weapon of destruction.

Of the 722 chases documented in the investigation, 69 resulted in collisions in which there was at least one injury.

Those who suffer the death or injury of a loved one during these chases cannot sue the officers directly, even if it was clear the pursuit violated department policy.

That’s because law enforcement agencies in California cannot be held liable for the harm they cause by instigating these chases — thanks to outdated laws and influential police unions with considerable money and influence at the state Capitol.

Nor do Sacramento officers and deputies need to seek approval from their superiors to begin a pursuit — a stipulation that other law enforcement agencies across the U.S. have put in place with success, and has led to greater police accountability and fewer car chases.

But not in California.

Here, state law only requires a law enforcement agency to have a pursuit policy, and to ensure that all officers are trained to follow it. Because police agencies themselves are immune from litigation, cities and counties pay sizable judgments in wrongful death suits.

In the aftermath of tragedies, police departments often lack transparency in how or whether they discipline officers. Meanwhile, in Sacramento, a citizen’s police commission has been seen as toothless.

Both the Sacramento Police Department and the city of Sacramento should immediately order a thorough review of the department’s pursuit policy, which doesn’t make clear when an officer should engage in a chase. The Sacramento Sheriff’s Department should do so as well, but is not subject to an order by the county Board of Supervisors, because the Sheriff is an elected position.

Officers should initiate fewer chases over low-level infractions. Clearly, these are difficult decisions and departments are facing pressure from business and community leaders over property crimes.

But Sacramento officials cannot ignore the survivors of those killed or injured in police chases; Johnny and Cathy Nguyen, 5 and 8, must now grow up without their parents.

This tragic case, and the sheer volume of police chases in Sacramento, cry out for better policies that will make our streets safer while limiting incidents where peace officers cause harm instead of preventing it.