You misunderstand. I'm not happy they've got an 80% chance of getting hurt, and I certainly don't want anyone to get hurt. But I cannot spend my time worrying about the consequences of the choices others make, I have enough of my own to worry about. You seem to be taking these poor decisions these individuals are making and imposing blame on a group of people who are not responsible for them.

When you see blue lights, stop. It's a simple thing every driver knows. If you fail to do so, and it leads to serious injury for you, why should I, or the police officer attempting to get you to stop your car like everyone else does, feel the blame?

There is a big difference between "feeling the blame" and caring that a person is seriously injured because of a momentary lapse in judgment. I don't blame myself when a person dies of lung cancer, that doesn't mean I don't think it's a terrible thing.

Which is essentially the point. The whole argument I was replying to with that quote was one big emotional "WON'T SOMEBODY THINK OF THE CHILDREN!" Obviously I was being a bit of a smartass in my first reply to you. I do feel sorry for them. I hate to see anyone hurt. But do I support a public policy change that would impede public safety to stop what essentially amounts to Darwinism from occurring to people who want to run from the police? No. FWIW, I wouldn't support a policy that would save a few smokers from lung cancer if it impeded public safety to the level of making police attempting to stop someone on the road useless either.

You can't think this through clearly because you're too emotionally invested. I'd suggest everyone ignore you completely on this topic.

I'm just stating opinions. Everyone pretty much ignores me on this stuff or trolls me anyway.

I have a few posters I actually have decent discussion with on this type thing, in general I just feed the trolls.

Yeah, that 11 year old girl who got killed when her Mom's car was t-boned at the intersection definitely needed to be removed from the gene pool. It's for the better, really.

Neblis, didn't you vote for this guy??
Source

Ok, you want a legitimate discussion to your "WON'T SOMEBODY THINK OF THE CHILDREN?!?!?!" argument, here it is, in two quick points:

Firstly in the statistics from the study I posted, 0.7% of all chases studied resulted in fatalities. Slightly more than 1% (1.3% IIRC) resulted in injury (Not death) to bystanders.

Secondly, what you're suggesting is essentially stopping the ability of police to control traffic. I'm sure you have issues with the way that's done, hell I have issues with it, but I think pretty much everyone agrees the police need to have the ability to control traffic. You remove the ability to chase, you remove the ability to control traffic. These numbers only show the chases, they don't show the much much larger number of people who stopped because they knew the police would chase them if they didn't stop.

Chases are kind of a 1% thing, and I think it's a foolish position to take to assume if you stop chasing that that 99% would continue to stop. I feel extremely confident in saying the amount of fatalities caused by traffic accidents directly related to chases is drastically less than the amount of fatalities you're creating by completely removing police officers ability to control traffic.

while everyone else is a shining source of unbiased thought

There are degrees of bias.

I don't think a noticeable amount of people would begin running from flashing lights if they knew they wouldn't be chased. I'm sure they'd be worried their license plate was recorded (which it almost always would be).

The people who flee now are the ones who would still flee then. I don't see any reason to believe we'd see a significant increase in those who flee. I'm going to take a guess and say that you do think that number would skyrocket?

I can't see how you can justify this assertion. For the vast, vast majority of people the options will be to pull over and eat a ticket, or have the police show up at work tomorrow with a felony warrant.

I wouldn't use the term "skyrocket". It's a process. At first they'll go "oh, well they'll get my tag" but that becomes meaningless when they figure out with current technology I really can't prove who's behind the wheel of the car. No judge is going to let me attempt to arrest someone for a felony crime with that low amount of evidence. So, essentially you're left with they just get away. They'll slowly over a period of 2-4 years figure it out, then before you know it you've gone from "**** I've got a dimebag in my pocket" to "**** this, I'm late for work" etc.

I'm not of the opinion if this was nationally implemented tonight chaos would rule the roads. 5 years from now, that's a different story.

I don't forsee those felony warrants. See my rationale above.

Here is an article about this subject http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/...e-deaths_N.htm It claims at least a third of the people killed in chases are bystanders (the reason I say at least is at the top of the article it says a third and further down it says that bystanders are under counted). This sounds reasonable perhaps someone can tell us what exactly the difference probable cause and reasonable suspicion is.

To put it most simply that means you must have enough evidence to arrest prior to the chase starting.

I'll fully explain PC v ARS in a bit. On my phone ATM.

From Wikipedia - Reasonable suspicion is a legal standard of proof in United States law that is less than probable cause, the legal standard for arrests and warrants, but more than an "inchoate and unparticularized suspicion or 'hunch' ";[1] it must be based on "specific and articulable facts", "taken together with rational inferences from those facts.

This precedent is all drawn from Terry v Ohio.

Probable Cause - The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
"Probable" in this case may relate to actual statistical probability, or to a general standard of common behavior and customs.

Probable Cause was defined by the SCOTUS to mean ruling that a "substantial chance" or "fair probability" of criminal activity could establish probable cause. A better-than-even chance in Illinois v Gates.

Probable Cause means a judge will sign an arrest warrant. It's an insanely high standard to expect a traffic cop to meet without any investigation.

ARS is the standard for executing a traffic stop BTW, which makes this seem very counterintuitive.

You're going to attempt a traffic stop because of reason x. As you signal the vehicle to stop, the driver displays further criminal activity, which rather than lowers your standards to seize him, raises them.

I'll grant you that a non-zero amount of people would flee who otherwise wouldn't if they knew the cop couldn't chase them.

But I'm more than happy to trade them for the lives of innocent civilians. Violent felons will run now and run then. Some dude who wants to risk years in jail to get out of a speeding ticket? Meh, who gives a ****?

I'd like for you to explain how we reach this conclusion. This is the heart of the issue. When someone can show me how to successfully accomplish the quoted, within the parameters you guys are seeking, I'll concede the point.

I have repeatedly stated, answered only with a handwave or completely ignored, that the issue I have is being able to provide strong enough consequences to deter most from running. I've shown, I believe successfully and logically, the fatal flaw with the "Just Get The Tag" argument.

If you see holes in my logic or another way, I'm open to it.

As it stands right now, I fail to see where the hypothetical speeder is really risking much of anything at all, to receive his reward of no speeding ticket.

People tend to obey the law. And even if they don't, if an ax murderer flees and is never heard from again, how bad of a thing is that? I mean a big part of why we want to put him in jail is to make sure he is never heard from again.

There is data that I am sure is available somewhere that would be useful to this discussion. What percentage of people that flee turn out to be wanted for a violent felony and what has happened to the number of people fleeing in places where they have restricted the criteria for a police chase.

we lock ax murderers up so someone can see and hear him every hour on the hour every day. Not so no one hears from them again.

I would say it's a pretty bad thing if someone could murder people with an ax then just drive away really fast.

Cops would have to earn their pay though. Wont someone please think of all the new content for csi episodes, true crime novels, and hard working detectives instead of the lazy police officers who would rather not get out of their car seats and just chase him down?

This. It's absurd that dblbarrel is still pushing this "we'll never see them again" baloney. of course some people are going to flee. But the vast majority of them are dumb and have limited resources and aren't going to be able to just vanish into thin air.

This