1 Officer Dead, 3 Injured In SFPD Crash - Witnesses: Both Cars Had Lights, Sirens On

KSBW ^

[chance33_98]

1 Officer Dead, 3 Injured In SFPD Crash
Witnesses: Both Cars Had Lights, Sirens On

POSTED: 9:39 a.m. PDT June 13, 2002 UPDATED: 9:47 a.m. PDT June 13, 2002

SAN FRANCISCO -- One police officer was killed and three others injured, one critically, when two patrol cars collided in an intersection late Wednesday as they sped to the scene of an arrest.

One officer was listed in critical condition Thursday and the other two were in fair condition at San Francisco General Hospital.

Witnesses told investigators both cars entered the Mission District intersection with roof lights on and sirens blaring. The impact flipped one car onto its roof and left the other crumpled on a sidewalk.

Authorities said the officers were going to assist in the arrest of Monte Haney, 29. Haney was arrested after allegedly attacking his girlfriend, who was stabbed with a cleaver and had an eye gouged out.

Names of the officers were not released.

[chance33_98]

Maybe someone should tell them that they should slow down or pull over when they hear sirens coming...

[SoCal Pubbie]

In my neck of the woods police and fire trucks slow down at intersections before going through to make sure they're not plowing into someone.

[Reeses]

Relatively low tech transponders could be used to solve this problem, keep code 3 vehicles away from each other, as well as alert deaf people, and maybe turn all stop lights in the immediate area to red.

[ladyinred]

This doesn't surprise me considering this happened in San Francisco. If you have ever driven there, you would understand. How terrible this is for the police department.

[brityank]

Most major intersections around here have sensors on the lights, and turn green for the approaching emergency vehicles. That gets the traffic out of the way and lets them through more safely, but they also slow up before blowing through the intersection.

[Criminal Number 18F]

I've said it before, a high speed chase way too frequently ends with someone dead or crippled (or both, which this case might be). And it's pretty much fate whether the victims are game players (cops or criminals) or spectators (innocent bystanders).

At first blush it seems like this guy was a good candidate for a high speed chase: he is charged with pretty brutal crimes. But there are some arguments for not chasing:

• his identity was known. He could run, but he couldn't hide.The good-ol-boy way to say it is, "You can outrun the police car but you can't outrun the police radio."
• domestic crimes are usually textbook "crimes of passion." The creeps that commit them are in a highly agitated state, but having committed the crime, the agitation quickly deflates. The scrote who slashes his woman (this jerk, or OJ for that matter), or shoots his parents (the Menendez brothers), or clubs the girl next door (Skakel), is probably not going to immediately duplicate the crime.

What this means is that if they let Jerkface go and not have a high-speed car chase, they would have had him behind bars sooner or later anyhow, without further danger to the public. Proof is at hand -- even though these officers were out of the chase, the PD had no problem bagging the guy.

Because someone in SFPD didn't take a minute to think, a family now has forever to grieve. And all over some subhuman dreg who abuses his woman. Isn't that a pity?

d.o.l.

Criminal Number 18F

[SoCal Pubbie]

I have driven in San Fransciso, and I don't understand.

[RISU]

He was right, dead right...

As he rolled along.

But he is just as dead now...

As if he'd been wrong.

[Reeses]

turn green for the approaching emergency vehicles.

Turning green is better for many intersections but turning red in all directions has advantages. It's more simple, the transmitters just have to say 'here I am' and not be directional. Turn green systems require microcomputers to do authentication, else lots of happy drivers will buy black market devices. If everything is red, the emergency vehicle can go the wrong way down the left to get past stopped vehicles. Turn green is more sophisticated but I think may be more expensive.