Watchdog calls changes to pursuit policy ‘a joke’
The Lawrence Police Department’s revised vehicle-pursuit policy is a “joke,” the leader of a national watchdog group said Wednesday.
The new policy — unveiled Tuesday in the wake of a bystander’s death Aug. 26 after a high-speed chase — is short on specifics and leaves too much room for officers to make adrenaline-clouded judgment calls, said Jim Phillips, founder of www.pursuitwatch.org, which monitors police pursuits nationwide.
The central change of the new policy is that officers now must end a chase if safety concerns “outweigh” the necessity of the chase. The old policy said officers must end a chase if safety concerns “clearly override” the necessity.
Phillips, whose daughter was killed in a police pursuit in 2001, said he didn’t think that was a meaningful change.
“The policy is embarrassing,” he said.
But a Lawrence Police spokesman questioned whether Phillips, of Orlando, Fla., was qualified to criticize, in part because some items not spelled out in the policy are covered in police training.
“He doesn’t know our training, so he can only make an educated guess,” Lt. David Cobb said.
The department’s pursuit policy came under review after the death of Judith Vellucci, a 56-year-old Lawrence woman. She was killed when her car was struck at 31st Street and Nieder Road by a vehicle driven by Nam Ouk Cho, 20, of Lee’s Summit, Mo.
Police said the crash came shortly after officers ended their high-speed pursuit of Cho’s vehicle.
Phillips complained the new policy did not list specific factors — such as traffic density, presence of pedestrians, weather and the nature of the offense — officers must consider before giving chase. Many other area departments’ policies list these factors, and they’re covered in training at the state police academy, the Kansas Law Enforcement Training Center in Hutchinson.
Lawrence Police Chief Ron Olin downplayed the importance of listing specific factors in a policy.
“Who you hire, how you train them, how you practice on the street and how they’re supervised is more important than a list of factors on a piece of paper that nobody can memorize and that may not be clearly understood by everybody,” he said.
Instead of spelling those factors out, the LPD’s policy says in general terms that officers may continue a pursuit when they think the fleeing person poses a “clear and immediate threat” and the need for apprehension outweighs the danger created by the fleeing suspect.
That language is similar to that used in training at the Kansas Law Enforcement Training Center, where recruits learn a pursuit may be warranted if an offense “involves a clear and immediate threat to the safety of other motorists or pedestrians.” Lawrence officers are trained at the academy.
Police have argued that what Cho was doing before police tried to stop him was dangerous enough to warrant a pursuit. He had been spotted driving in oncoming lanes of traffic on Massachusetts Street before police tried to pull him over on westbound Ninth Street.
Cho remains in the Douglas County Jail, awaiting trial on a second-degree murder charge in Vellucci’s death.
Police revise high-speed chase policy (12-03-03)
6News video: New chase policy unveiled, Wal-Mart discussed at commission| Douglas County has denied the Journal-World’s claim that police dispatch recordings are open records that should be available to the public.County officials made the argument in a formal response filed Tuesday to a lawsuit by the newspaper after a Lawrence Police pursuit this summer ended in the death of a bystander.The newspaper filed suit after the city and county refused to release dispatch recordings of the pursuit on grounds they’re not public records, but part of a criminal investigation.The county’s formal response, filed in Douglas County District Court, reiterated the position that the public had no right to hear the recordings. A similar response was filed in October by city officials. The newspaper’s suit names both governments.The recording was released after it had been played at a courtroom hearing weeks after the crash. The public airing of the tape did not satisfy the newspaper’s lawsuit, which asks a judge to find that officials did not comply with the Kansas Open Records Act. The act is the state law meant to keep government meetings and records open to the public. |
City Government
Trial over Lawrence’s housing nondiscrimination ordinance canceled; landlords had sued over source of income, immigration status protections
City of Lawrence ‘assessing options’ in the wake of racist and antisemitic hate speech shared at recent commission meeting
City of Lawrence campsite reporting form has received 230 reports since October; only 57 campsites confirmed
City Commission meeting interrupted by racist, antisemitic hate speech
Lawrence City Commission set for light agenda this week
