Friday, May 10, 2013

Under the heading of 'Stupidity Involving Badges', you can't get much worse

than this:
Two DeLand police officers got behind the car as it headed west on Beresford Avenue. Brown did not stop and made a left turn on South Delaware Avenue, a dead-end street that ends near an empty lot. Brown stopped the car and ran from it, as one DeLand patrol car stopped behind Brown's Toyota Camry. The other patrol car, driven by Officer Harris, drove past on the left of the other stopped patrol car and struck Brown, who was running, with the right front, Montes said.

Harris then ran over Brown, killing him on the spot, Montes said.
And what heinous crime had Brown committed, worth pursuit and this?

He wasn't wearing his seat belt.

They started chasing him in the first place BECAUSE HE WASN'T WEARING HIS SEAT BELT.

I don't think I can swear well enough to cover the levels of unnecessary, stupid and disgusting involved in this.

2 comments:

Bob said...

Remember back when they first instituted seat belt laws, they solemnly promised that they'd never (never ever) make a traffic stop just because someone wasn't wearing a seat belt?

Keith said...

When seat belt laws were brought in in Britain, there was a net reduction in road deaths attrributed to it.

The details within that consisted of a large increase in pedestrians (those not in control of a car - and were usually in no way responsible for what was happening!) being killed and of course a proportionate increase in those being maimed,

however there were a larger number of those in cars who didn't die - those who arguably had a choice in the matter

now the cops are formalizing the finding that seat belt laws kill pedestrians.

as an interesting aside - the british seat belt laws were fronted by the BBC's serial predatory paedophile Jimmy Saville - yet another reason to despise his memory.