"Court Backs Police in Chase That Hurt Driver" by LINDA GREENHOUSE
WASHINGTON, April 30 — The police did not violate a speeding driver’s rights by ramming his car and causing an accident that left him permanently paralyzed, the Supreme Court ruled on Monday by a vote of 8 to 1.
Hmmmmm!
Writing for the majority, Justice Antonin Scalia said that despite the fact that the 19-year-old driver was suspected of nothing more than speeding, the decision to force him off the road was reasonable in light of the need to protect pedestrians and other drivers from “a Hollywood-style car chase of the most frightening sort.”
Well, if they ain't chasin' him, then there ain't no "Hollywood-style car chase of the most frightening sort," is there, judge?
The justices took the unusual step — a first for the court — of posting on the court’s Web site the 15-minute video of the chase, recorded by a camera mounted on the squad car’s dashboard....
The constitutional issue in the case concerned the Fourth Amendment, which prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures. There was no dispute that Sheriff’s Deputy Timothy Scott “seized” Mr. Harris, in constitutional terms, when he rammed his car from behind, sending it down an embankment. The resulting accident left Mr. Harris a quadriplegic.
That means ALL FOUR LIMBS PARALYZED, readers.
The question, as in any Fourth Amendment case, was whether the seizure was “reasonable” under the circumstances....
So what were they?
Originally clocked at 73 miles an hour on a 55 m.p.h. four-lane road, Mr. Harris led the police on a 10-mile chase over two-lane roads at speeds of up to 83 m.p.h.... Mr. Harris argued that the police had his license number and could have avoided more danger by abandoning the chase....
They had his PLATE # (sigh)?!!
The appeals court said that a jury could find that the case was governed by a 1985 Supreme Court precedent on the use of deadly force by the police against a fleeing suspect and that the jury could reasonably find that the police behavior in this case was unreasonable....
Justice Scalia said the videotape demonstrated the danger posed by the efforts of the driver, Victor Harris, to elude the police on a narrow and winding Georgia road. Justice Scalia added that the federal appeals court in Atlanta... should have viewed the tape with more care rather than accept Mr. Harris’s version of how the chase proceeded.
Lecturing a lower court! What an ARROGANT SHIT!
Scalia: “[His] benign description of his actions during the chase, which gave the impression that he was 'attempting to pass his driving test' rather than fleeing the police, was 'blatantly contradicted by the record so that no reasonable jury could believe it.' [His] was a threat to the public, [and] posed 'an extreme danger to human life.'”
WTF you talking about, torture judge?
Weren't you ever a teen-aged boy who wanted to drive fast and ran from the cops?
Scalia: "The rule of the case is that 'a police officer’s attempt to terminate a dangerous high-speed car chase that threatens the lives of innocent bystanders does not violate the Fourth Amendment, even when it places the fleeing motorist at risk of serious injury or death.”
Scalia, in response to Harris's argument that police had his license number and could have avoided more danger by abandoning the chase:
"Such an outcome would give a 'perverse incentive' to fleeing motorists who would 'get away whenever they drive so recklessly that they put other people’s lives in danger. In any event, it was Mr. Harris 'who intentionally placed himself and the public in danger' and gave the police 'the choice between two evils' that they confronted.”
Yeah, BLAME the VICTIM and give the STATE "SECURITY" SERVICES carte blanche to RUN ANYONE off the ROAD!
Kid have any drugs or alcohol (answer is no)?!
It is obvious in the videotape that Deputy Scott and the other officers involved in the chase were taken aback by its devastating end. Worried voices can be heard calling to Mr. Harris and summoning an ambulance.
Oh, NOW THEY WORRY!! WTF?!
What has happened to OUR POLICE?!
Who destroyed Johnny Flatfoot?
The kid is PARALYZED FOR LIFE!!
The One Good Judge
Justice John Paul Stevens, the lone dissenter, said that to the contrary, jurors could well have concluded that the late-night chase endangered no pedestrians, since there were none, and no other motorists, since the police sirens warned other cars to pull off the road:
“The Court has usurped the jury’s fact-finding function. Whether a person’s actions have risen to a level warranting deadly force is a question of fact best reserved for a jury.”
FUCK Scalia!! THIS is what the tape showed?!
The kid is paralyzed over SPEEDING the STRIP late at night?
This is America, right?
Justice Stevens, with evident sarcasm, referring to the other justices:
“My colleagues on the jury. While Mr. Harris’s offense — speeding, refusing to stop and fleeing — was a serious one, it was not, however, a capital offense, or even an offense that justified the use of deadly force rather than an abandonment of the chase.”
Yup, pull over and take your fram..., I mean beat..., I mean fine and detention if you don't show your papers, or we'll KILL YA!!!
Yeeeeee-haaaaaaa!!!!
