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Departments Review Policies in Wake of Fatal High-Speed Chase

An attorney for the family of a Maine teenager killed during a high-speed police chase in December plans to file suit against the officer involved and the town of Rockport for negligence, according to the Bangor Daily News. A second teen was also killed in that accident.

When it comes to engaging in high-speed chases, law enforcement agencies take different approaches. They may make for exciting scenes in film and on TV, but in reality, chases are one of the riskiest parts of a police officer’s job.

“Pursuit is very high risk because you’re in a reactive mode,” says Jason Moen, deputy chief of the Auburn Police Department. “You’re reacting to what that operator is doing.”

He says his department has had a decade-long policy restricting when officers should engage in a high-speed pursuit.

“We don’t usually chase a motor vehicle unless there is a serious felony crime involved, or suspected operating under the influence,” Moen says.

Minor offenses, he says, like traffic violations and other lower-class crimes, are a no-go for chases.

The policy is based on a model policy issued by the Maine Chiefs of Police Association. Executive Director Bob Schwartz says the association sends the model, which is approved by the trustees of the Maine Criminal Justice Academy, to all police departments.

“The department is free to look at it and work it any way they wish, but they must have a mandatory policy on high-speed pursuits,” he says.

The policy is multiple pages long, but Sagadahoc County Sheriff Joel Merry, the president of the Maine Sheriff’s Association, says the main rule of thumb is to pursue a vehicle only if a person is a danger to themselves or others, or has committed a serious crime.

“The situation of a kidnap, or someone who’s fleeing from a robbery or rape,” he says. “A felony charge.”

Merry says that across the board, Maine’s sheriffs’ offices and police departments have adopted the model policy as a baseline, and some have even stricter policies.

Concerns over high-speed police chases have persisted for decades. Last year, a USA Today analysis found that more than 5,000 bystanders and passengers have been killed in police car chases in the US since 1979, and tens of thousands more were injured.

Merry says policies should be reviewed constantly, but the challenge is that each real-world situation must still be judged on its own set of factors.

“I mean, road conditions could be taken into account, time of day, neighborhood, presence of other vehicles, and again, the severity of the crime for which the person is fleeing,” he says.

Schwartz says that when he was the police chief in South Portland, the policy was that at any time, a supervisor could call off a police officer from a high-speed chase.

“You’re chasing somebody and they kind of get wrapped up in the situation,” he says. “Someone with a clear head has got to be able to call it off.”

In the case of the Rockport police officer pursuing the speeding teen last December that ended in a fatal crash, Rockport police chief Mark Kelley said in an email that his department reviews its pursuit policies annually. He says changes are implemented when they’re necessary for the betterment of not only the public but the officers as well.