I know I've been posting a lot of links lately, and today will be no different. Yesterday, it was argued in front of the Supreme Court if a ramming of a speeding individual by a police officer was considered unconstitutional.
Basically a 19 year old was speed, refused to pull over, struck a police vehicle in a parking lot, then sped away at 90 mph. The officer which was struck then proceeded to ram the rear of the fleeing vehicle casuing the kid to lose control of his car and crash into an embankment. The kid was paralyzed in the accident.
Of course the now crippled guy is suing saying that the police used excessive force to capture him. What the hell? I think if a person is driving recklessly at 90mph I'd want the police to stop his ass no matter what. Added to the fact that he already demonstrated his willingness to endager lives by striking the police vehicle I'd say that the officer had ever right to take whatever steps were necessary to stop the kid from potentially hurting someone else. Should a cop just let a person go and arrest them later? This sort of question is a tough one to answer. What if there was hostage in the car, the speeding vehicle was fleeing the scene of another crime, it was a terrorist planning on destroying the world? Of course some of those are stupid ideas but never-the-less they are possible. How would the public react if an officer was told not to persue a speeding individual and it was later found out that this person had killed/raped/whatever some innocent bystander? Not very well I'd imagine.
Anyways, just some food for thought I suppose. I doubt the Supreme Court will deem the officer's actions uncoinstitutional in light of the evidence against the fleeing suspect. It would be different if such force was used on a unarmed individual, but I think a car is considered a weapon in some cases (I believe striking an officer's vehicle with your own car while fleeing is considered assault with a deadly weapon.. not sure though). A guy running on foot is slightly less dangerous than a car going 90. Well.. perhaps if the man was really big and running through a room full of babies, and the man would have to be wearing golf shoes.
Ok, that is all I got. I'm curious to hear from the legal individuals who read this blog.
Later
Edit: Transcripts of the oral arguments. I found them interesting.
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3 comments:
i'm not legal. but i'm interested. i don't think it was unconstitutional. and not being legal, i just assume that the Supreme Court works on an open voting system.
From the oral arguments it seems that they are just trying to determine the constitutionality of it. So this means they aren't overturning a lower courts decision. In the oral arguments it was interesting since after watching the dashboard camera tapes certian judges found the kid's driving to be quite reckless but then are asked to ignore those facts in lieu of the more serious question of constitutional rights... I don't know how they'll be able to serperate themselves from that.
ok, i just saw this entry today, now i get to go read stuff, i'll give you my opinion if i ever actually create one
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