O.C. Incidents Bring Up Police Role in Pursuits

All evolved from relatively minor crimes, and all ended in tragedy.

Three high-speed chases--provoked by a stolen car, stolen camera equipment and a traffic violation--have claimed five lives in Orange County since early December, raising questions about the role of law enforcement in instigating and prolonging such pursuits.

Most agencies in the county have developed chase policies that take into account weather; traffic speeds; severity of the crime; terrain of the surrounding area and how familiar officers are with it; and whether a helicopter can take over the pursuit.

But most important, said Fullerton Police Chief Patrick McKinley, whose department was involved in one of the recent Orange County chases, is the officers’ judgment.

“Number one, we try to minimize the danger the pursuit causes,” McKinley said. “We try to limit the number of vehicles involved in pursuit, and we ask the officer to constantly evaluate the necessity of continuing the pursuit.”

Even so, whether police involved in a tragic chase were following policy may be irrelevant in the public’s mind.

“It doesn’t matter whether the world’s worst ax murderer is driving the getaway car, or it’s somebody else. If it ends in tragedy, you’ll have a debate--and that’s exactly what’s happening in Orange County,” said Mike DiMiceli of the state Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training, which recently developed high-speed pursuit guidelines for California police.

Perhaps more than any other corner of America, Southern California is all too familiar with the perils of such chases. In 1992, Border Patrol agents pursued a van carrying 13 suspected illegal immigrants along Interstate 15 from San Diego County to Temecula.

Traveling in excess of 100 mph, the suspects’ stolen Chevrolet Suburban crashed into a car and jumped a curb in front of a high school, killing five people--none of whom were participating in the chase.

The Border Patrol later revised its policy to discourage agents from engaging in high-speed pursuits of suspects whose immigration status is the only matter in question.

The incident also led to revisions in the California Penal Code that now emphasize the “importance of vehicular safety and the protection of public safety at all times.”

The changes, which became effective in January 1994, have led to soul-searching on the part of law enforcement agencies and drawn into sharp relief the three recent incidents in Orange County--evidence that despite policies, deaths are bound to occur.

The most recent fatal chase happened early Thursday, when two suspected car thieves who led Fullerton police on a high-speed chase died after their car struck a light pole, split in half and exploded.

Another occurred New Year’s Eve, when a Jeep driven by top-ranked boxer Ernie Magdaleno, 33, collided with a fleeing car, whose 19-year-old driver, John Kenneth Bandola, was suspected of stealing photographic equipment. The crash in Fountain Valley killed the teenage suspect and the boxer and critically injured the suspect’s companion, Dawn Kazamecki, 20.

Earlier last month, Jeffrey Novak, 38, of Fullerton failed to pull over for Costa Mesa police, who sought him on a traffic violation. He died in Anaheim when his car slammed head-on into a cement wall after a chase.

Many in law enforcement say that despite such tragic endings, high-speed pursuits are a necessary evil.

California Highway Patrol Commissioner Maury Hannigan calls high-speed pursuits “a critical law enforcement tool. Without the authority to pursue, we submit to the criminal. Society throws in the towel.”

Hannigan blames the news media for trumpeting the pitfalls of high-speed chases: “Media replay that theme, exploiting the perception that most police pursuits start with a minor traffic violation. Over time, the concept of pursuits has become the equivalent of killing a mosquito with a sledgehammer.”

Based on data from 1993 alone, Hannigan notes that of an estimated 9 million vehicle stops by all police agencies, 7,781 culminated in pursuits, less than one-tenth of 1%. Thirty pursuits ended in fatal collisions, in which 38 people died. Eight of those killed were not involved in the pursuit, thus, Hannigan said, “their tragic deaths inevitably impart a sense of a terrible injustice.”

And it’s precisely those people that law enforcement should worry about the most, critics say.

Each of the Orange County incidents could have been avoided had local law enforcement agencies followed a simple rule, according to Geoffrey Alpert, a criminologist at the University of South Carolina and one of the nation’s foremost critics on high-speed chases.

If the crime involves only property and is not a “violent felony,” don’t chase at high speeds.

“I recommend high-speed pursuits only for violent felonies, and even then, feel the compulsion to issue a warning against giving cops this unbridled discretion,” said Alpert, whose expert testimony before Congress led to chase reforms within the Border Patrol. “The chances of a wreck [in a high-speed chase] are just incredibly high--even if you’re chasing an ax murderer.”

Alpert calls it a matter of “balancing public safety and law enforcement. . . . You can’t let people have a leisurely escape simply because they choose to run away. On the other hand, you’ve got to protect public safety. ‘To protect and serve’ doesn’t always mean you catch the bad guy while going 100 mph.”

The attitudes of law enforcement officers toward high-speed chases have changed dramatically in the last 10 years, Alpert said, with more recent graduates of police academies having a “far greater sensitivity” to the argument for not giving chase.

“Back in the early ‘80s when I brought this up, cops looked at me like, ‘What kind of Commie pinko are you?’ ” Alpert said. “But that’s given way to some very reasoned, thoughtful attitudes among police administrators.”

Alpert credits the media with influencing the change, but litigation and recent court decisions also have made an impact.

The Gardena Police Department altered its policy on high-speed chases after a 1993 decision by a state appellate court that allowed the son of an innocent motorist who died in a 1988 chase to sue the city.

Noting the rash of deadly high-speed pursuits in Southern California, the 2nd District Court of Appeals ruled that state law does not shield Gardena from such lawsuits because the city’s policy on police chases was unclear.

That case and revisions to the state penal code have forced law enforcement agencies to develop their own guidelines, using those of the state Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training.

Sgt. Ron Gillett of the Fullerton Police Department said the issue of high-speed pursuits has not made police work any easier.

“It’s hard to express this, but it’s often a matter of what it is society wants,” Gillett said. “Does society want criminals apprehended, or do they want police not to chase people? So many people in society are big on the blame game. The focus ought to be on the conduct of criminals, not the officers who pursue them.”

Indeed, Fullerton police squarely lay the blame for Thursday’s crash on the suspects.

Officers backed off the pursuit before the suspects’ car crashed. The chase lasted between one and two minutes, Police Chief McKinley said, with the suspects exceeding 110 mph.

“What I would like to see,” McKinley said, “are some really harsh penalties for the people who do flee from us. I think automatic prison time would be a good start.”

Authorities say that contrary to popular opinion, the suspects they decide to chase often are wanted for serious crimes, even if a traffic infraction may be the impetus for the pursuit.

CHP Commissioner Hannigan said, based on data from 1993, only 51% of California pursuits began when a traffic violator fled the scene. About 49% were triggered by felony or misdemeanor violations.

He also notes that, of those apprehended after a pursuit, 97.3% were charged with a felony or a misdemeanor and only 2.5% with a traffic infraction or something less.

“Obviously, many of those running from a traffic ticket are attempting to avoid capture for something more serious,” Hannigan wrote in a recent article on the subject.

Still, Hannigan said, “the search for cause typically settles on police because ‘they started it.’ If the fatal victim was a bystander, the bereaved family understandably challenges police to give up pursuits ‘so this won’t happen again.’ ”

But Alpert, the criminologist, tells the story of an Oklahoma police chief who happened upon a fatal car wreck that occurred when one of his officers ran a stop sign while pursuing a motorcycle for speeding.

“The cop was crying,” Alpert said, “and the police chief began to console him--until he found that the victims the cop had killed while running the stop sign were the wife and daughter of the police chief himself. Almost overnight, that man became a wonderful spokesperson for taking a critical look at the pitfalls of high-speed chases, which have claimed the lives of too many innocent people, and, for that matter, too many others as well.”