SYSK Selects: How Police Chases Work

it was a real eye opening experience to me. And I hope even if you've heard the episode before that you find it an eye opening Again, let's all just watch our eyes open. If you can do such a thing, I don't even know if that's possible. Welcome to Stuff You should know a production of I Heart Radios How Stuff Works, d do Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant, who's uh do you know? Someone on Twitter said that every time

Chuck Bryant giggles, a baby bunny is born. Yeah, and they be it to Wow. I love being responsible for all that joy in the world. You're doing it, man, so, I guess you just opened the show with you were being chased by a police car in Great Britain. Just you did a British Sorry, I guess it was yeah to do that. In the United States, we have different sounding sirens. Well, well in these days, it's all kinds of crazy, like beeps and whistles. It's like that's like

an American police cruiser today. Wow, this is getting off to a great start. Let's let's try to keep it on the track, all right, on the U E V O C track. Yeah, this is what this is in our long running law enforcement series. You know, it's unequaled by any other topic except for death. I think you think, I think death might have it beat. Okay, may be not, though, we'll find out. All right. Uh I let's go count them after this, Okay, Chuck. Have you ever been in

a police chase? Um? Have you ever been the object of pursuit in a police chase? Yeah? I was not driving. I was in a car one time when my friend decided to run from the cops. Wow, we lay it on us. Well, you know, it was just one of those things. We were in Athens and he made a very bad decision and uh, we got away with it,

no way. Yeah, we'll see. That's something that I find extremely interesting because I didn't realize until reading this article that, um, there are very few circumstances where a cop should feel justified or would be justified in chasing you. Right. But that said, there are almost no laws whatsoever restricting police chases.

It's this weird gray area. And I actually found there's activists online or saying, like say no to police chases, like restrict police chases, like create laws against police chases because these things are deadly and dangerous. Yeah. I think what about a hundred and forty innocent civilians were killed last year? Yeah, three about a person a day on average dies from a police chase, and about a third of those. But yeah, last hundred forty or just innocent bystanders.

Yeah that I mean that happened in Atlanta. That's happened in Atlanta a couple of times recently. One time the trainer for the Atlanta Braves his because he lost his wife to a cop smashing into her. And um, then again more recently there was another case. I think it was a kid or something, but it was like it was sort of in the news lately. Yeah, And I mean you get the impression that and cops died too, Like high speed pursuit is their high speed pursuing. That's

dangerous for everybody involved, including the cop. Um, but you get the impression that, like whatever the circumstances, is just just not pulling over for being for a for a cop trying to pull you over is reason enough to get the cops tackles raised enough to chase you. Yeah, right off the bat. I think that would be any cops instinct, is gun it not? Like, well, let me check into his record and call my supervisor and see if they allow this, which a lot of times this policy.

Now as we'll see, um, there are procedures in place to kind of try to tamp down that emotion of the primary departmental policy. Basically though, like you said, not law right, So well let's let's talk about this. Um Okay. When you go through the academy and you um get all your training, your gun training, you're hanging out with Tackleberry and you learn how to make cool sounds like machine guns says or like yeah huh yeah. Um, you spend about a week, probably a little less learning how

to drive the car. Yeah. Sadly only about two of those days are dedicated to high speed pursuit. Yeah, which apparently is an improvement over zero days, which is how it used to be. And like the forties and fifties. Yeah, I guess they just said good luck. Right, you should know how to drive fast, right. You know, if you're an old country sheriff, you probably ran moonshine exactly, or your cousin does at least. Um. But there there's a

lot to it. Um. In Ed grab Banowski, the grabster um points out that you know, in in a high speed pursuit, UH, cops car can be just as deadly as a cops gun, and they need to know how

to use it just as well and just as accurately. Um. Because not only do you not have to know how to drive, you have to know how to drive fast while you're also turning on the lights and the sirens and like calling in something and like all that other stuff has to be second nature to you so that you can focus on the driving while using just a minimal amount of your brain power on the other stuff. So part of the car training is just that how to run a police car stuff. Because it's not like

every other car. Right, and if you, um, if you are being trained to to drive in high speeds in pursuit of a suspect and they send you to Colorado, you can be reasonably assured that you're gonna come among the better trained police in the country because the Colorado State Police maintain a course, an Emergency Vehicles Operation course that is the cream of the crop. Did you see like the aerial view of it. Yeah, I mean they cover all the scenarios like UM on ramps and off ramps, um,

high speed turns, intersections. They've really got all laid out there and put you in a scenario where as close as you could get to like an active street. Right. It's like there's skid plates where the coefficient of friction is point one five compared Chuck to say, I'm just staying this off top of my head, a of coefficient of friction of like point nine five on a dry highway. Yeah, so that's slick. Yeah, that is slick. They need to

know how to not spin out, basically. Yeah, And that's I think the exception is a really elaborate course like this. I think a lot of local police still use the parking lot in the cones back, which is better than an orange cone. Your doctor days, you put an egg on it like a Brady Bump. God. That was one of the greatest television shows of all time, The Brady Bunch. Yeah. Absolutely. Um, so let's talk about pursuit equipment. Right, Basically what we

just said was police training. You get a couple of days. Maybe if you're lucky, you get a few days on like a really great course, maybe out in Colorado. For the most part, it's like, you know how to drive, just drive really fast. Here's your Crown vic Yeah, that the Ford Crown Victoria's is the most common police car, although they're using all sorts of different cars today. When you drive around you'll see like those Dodge Chargers and

like the more souped up I know. Uh, I think in l A the State Patrol had those Mustangs, like they really souped up sports cars. Um, apparently they're getting away from Crown Victoria's because that model of car had a big problem with it. Whereas if you were rear ended in a high speed collision, your car blew up. Yeah, that was that the Pacer that did that. In the seventies,

the Pinto Pinto, the Ford Pinto. Again, Ford had the opposite problem if you if you um collided with something on the front end, I thought it was the rear. I think it was the front. Well let me tell

you this either way. I learned about it from the movie Top Secret, where a Pinto like just barely hits a tree and then it's the front and blows up and then Ford ambulances for a while we're blown up to Yeah, so forward with the with the police inceptor crowned vic um created this, uh, this chemical fire suppression system where right when you're rear ended at a high enough impact, forceful enough impact, this this fire suppression thing goes off. So even if there's not a fire, there's

not going to be a fire anyway. Um, but apparently it's enough that some some people are like, yeah, we're gonna go with the intrepid. Uh. You see a lot of crown bicks in Atlanta to like just regular people driving them. It's like sort of a thing. Now, Yeah, it is like a little spotlight. Yeah, it's like, man, don't mess with me like that out on the highway. So, um, there are some differences of course tween a police car. If you think it's just a regular Crown Victoria. It

is not or whatever it is. Um. A lot of times it does have more horsepower in the engine because they need that kind of juice. Um. And they weigh more obviously than your standard car. Because there's more guns and things you're gonna have like metal reinforced seat backs and things, so like you can't get stabbed in the back from the back seat you did if you did, or shootings or anything if you didn't do a good job of checking for weapons. Um. What else. Extra transmission

coolers and oil coolers. Yeah, because I mean like a radiator tops. Like they don't turn their car off ever like that heat heat builds up, so they have like oil coolers and transmission fluid coolers, bigger alternators to supply more power up to a hundred and thirty amps if that means anything to you. And then lights well in vinyl seats stow in the rear. That's that's important. Yeah, You're never gonna find cloth interior in the back of

a police car because suspects are dirty. They're dirty, and oftentimes they will poop and vomit and bleed and just do whatever whatever. Bodily fluid they can get out in that police car, they probably will, so they want to make it uh easily. You just get out the four nine and the paper towels and just clean it right there. Um lights Apparently they used to have them on the fenders and they said, you know what, this is visible, but it's not as visible as if it were on

the roof. So they created what as the light bar, and which it was a little more recent than I thought. It was the seventies that these things made their debut. Yeah, and I thought back, I was like, oh, yeah, you never see like cars in the sixties or or even early seventies with that light bar. So I was born at about the time the light bar came along. Yeah, I think, uh, you know, you remember seeing the single sirens sometimes or the double blue Dirty Harry would put

one do like a UI. Well some some were built in but yeah, they also had the undercover cars. That was one of the great parts of any cop movie was when they got out the siren and put it on the roof. Um. And now you can get them at Spencer's Gifts. Summer blue and summer uh, summer blue and summer red. Though I've never known the distinction. I always thought ambulances were red and cops were blue, But

in different cities have seen cops have read. I think it depends on what side of the force you're on. Oh really yeah, like how your medic chlorine? So one thing they can do to uh, to prevent the chase from happening altogether. You've seen the old spike strip. They'll lay down these rubber mats with spikes all across the road, or they have them like uh, like an accordion. You just kind of throw and hang on to one end and the other. That's the quick version, and so that

will obviously disabled the tires. Um you can the good old fashioned roadblock that you see in movies actually happens. They line up cars and except in this version there's not a conveniently parked tow truck ramp for the criminal to jump over everybody or bust through. I guess, well, you have to be careful setting those up because it's normally going the criminals not going to try to push through the car, but they may try to go around.

So you have to make sure that if you set up this roadblock, it's it's not like going to funnel them into somebody's house. I don't think you do that in like a neighborhood. That would be a good idea.

You want to do it on a country road. And then modern techniques, which I think if they bring this stuff along, that's really where it's at, Like microwave technology to disable the electrical system of a car, or shooting a laser high speed avoidance using laser technology HALT system of course, But they left out a couple of letters there. H oh, yeah, it should be swa halt. It's not an acronym if you're leaving out words just to make

it a cute word. All right, Um, so they like a lay ocean last name if they spelled it out correctly. So in that case, they're shooting a laser to cut off your fuel supply. But here's the rub there is the vehicle that they're shooting it at has to have a special microchip in it. Yeah. I didn't look into that, did you. Is it like newer vehicles? All that's my guess is that they're going to start putting these in all cars or something like. They make some deal, that

would be fine with me. I mean, it's better than pursuing somebody. Absolutely you know, um, And then of course you have air support, either in the form of a police helicopter or like fifty news helicopters if it's the police chase out in California, um, or the world's Scariest police chase helicopter. Yeah. Whoever those guys are. I think they just get footage from news copters and cop copters. Do you watch the shows I know I've talked about.

I've seen them before. Yeah, Yeah, they're they're just so I don't know, I followed. That's one of my guilty pleasures. Do you watch this still? Yeah? I mean it's not appointment television. I never know when or where they come on. But if I'm flipping it around and I'll see a police chase. I lived in l A. It's sort of a thing, it is. Yeah, And apparently California has some of the most um police protective laws as far as

pursuits go. They happen a lot out there. Yeah, and like the everybody just stops doing what they're doing and watches the live coverage of it sort of. Do you remember the guy um who killed himself on live television after a police pursuit and yeah, showed it on Fox. I guess I saw that when it happened live. I was I remember very distinctly. It was like not like a movie. No, you know, like if you've ever seen someone shoot their head off with a shotgun in real life,

it's nothing like. It's not some big dramatic movie thing. It's just sad. Yeah, it really was. It was like he might have been like making or gami or something like. It was just that pedestrian or it was just like he just had the gun and he's pull it up and shot himself and he hunches over and just falls. Yeah, it was. It's weird. It was really weird to see. It was very sad. And of course all the kids

that saw that, that's like it's terrible. Yeah. Um. So, initially, if someone takes off, like you were talking about, the police officer that's on the scene has a decision to make to pursue or not to pursue. Lots of policies. One thing they want to do is run the tags. Is it a stolen vehicle where they just in an arm robbery or is it just somebody who has a couple of traffic tickets out or nothing at all on

their record. Apparently the pursuit that enjoys the widest support around the country is if it's a violent criminal, um, somebody who poses an imminent threat to somebody else, somebody who's just carried out a violent act and is escaping, like pretty much, which everybody says, chase that guy. Like if you said the person has a couple of traffic tickets or if they have nothing and they're the only reason to chase them is that they didn't pull over

for you, that is not reason to pursue. And yet of all pursuits, and I believe two thousand eleven were for traffic violations. Yeah, I mean, I feel for the cops has got to be their instinct, like go get that person. They're fleeing me for a good reason. Yeah, Like I get it, But there when people are interesting, people are dying, there needs to be like some policy in place for sure. And apparently, Chuck, ninety one point four percent of chases were for non violent crimes. I

believe that. So, um, if the cops says, okay, this guy's this car just came back stolen, the guy just waved a gun and it's a very clear case that he should pursue them. There are other things to consider. Yeah, uh, what's the what don't get him? What's what's traffic? Like, what's the word? Are the road conditions? Like it rainy? Is it dark? A neighborhood, pedestrians everywhere? You might want

to just kind of slowly tail the guy. Well, the one in Atlanta where they killed the trainer's wife, I think it was a sort of a busy afternoon in an urban area, Like they shouldn't have been pursuing anyone at this point. Do you know what they were pursuing

the person for? No, I don't remember. Um. And then so if they decide to like go ahead and pursue, then this this series of um procedures kind of come into place, like they need to be radio back into headquarters like immediately right and apparently they're every step of the way or they just kind of keep the whoever they're talking to their supervisor posted on what's going on. And the supervisor's role is to keep a cool head because they're not the one who the person isn't pulling

over for, so they're they're not mad. Sure, they don't want to correct heads, you know, UM, so their their whole role is to to say, you know what, like we we should You just told me that there's some pedestrians around. This guy is not a violent offender. You don't don't complete this pursuit, or we have like we have chopper coverage, so back off with the cars and we can still like follow this car from above. Yeah, you know, like we're still gonna get our guy. Don't

you worry about it? Um. One of my favorite things. If you watch the show Cops, you're well versed with the pit maneuver police I'm sorry, pursuit intervention technique also called the technical vehicle intervention, and that is the famous move. If a cop has you know, you'll hear them. They have to get clearance for the pit maneuver. Even they'll call it in and say, hey, I think I've got

a chance for a pit Can I take it? And they'll say, if you feel like, you know, the streets are clear enough and you know you have to do it on a turn, you don't just like run up beside someone and run them off the road. It's it's when they enter a turn, the cop hits the gas and hits them on the left rear umper and just basically spins them out, and uh, it's it works if done correctly, and they'll train. You know, you get trained when you get the defensive driving on the pit maneuver

and they just spin out. You can't come out of it, can't come out of it. Your car spins. And that's generally on cops at least when the guys will jump out of the car with the car still rolling and take off on foot. And then you hear these cops, you know, with the they're miked up, so all you hear is like running in the dark with all this gear on. You're like, man, what a crappy job. Well, you know, check your heavy breathing just reminded me of something.

Is it that time? It's time for a message break? All right? Heavy breathing indeed, So you we're talking about the wildest police chases, that kind of show that you like, I don't know who would watch stuff like that. Well, Grabster takes the task, um those kind of shows for presenting a very um unbalanced picture of police chases. They don't show the cops backing off of the pursuit becomes too dangerous. They don't show the cops crashing into an

instant by standards car right. Um. They never say, well, this cop probably shouldn't have pursued this person because this is a minor violation. Um. And they they always kind of tend to present the police in a favorable light. Yeah. And I think it's more I don't know if they're out to make Oh maybe they are. I just think it's better TV obviously, like you would want to show and they're like, oh no, let's just back off and

get back to get that for sure. Plus also they want to maintain a um the kind of relationship with cops police departments that where they'll give them their footage. Absolutely, you know, now the shows are good for the cops. I'm sure we hear I don't know if you can hear this people, it sounds like a police chase is going on outside right now. I think it is. This is this is really dramatic footage. Chuck. Um. Uh, do you remember the O J thing specifically? Yeah? Where were

you then? How's in college? Were in college? I remember too, of course, so I don't. The chase wasn't I didn't watch much of the chase, remember the verdict? Yeah? I remember the chase specifically because they it was during the Knicks Rockets NBA playoffs and my buddy Justin as a huge Knicks fan, and he was really upset and he was just like, do you have to have it on every channel? And I agreed with This's like, why don't you know you're going to pre empt the basketball game.

It's on a hundred channels. I can't in there one person out there that wants to watch the basketball game put their ratings would have gone through the roof. And that was a low speech chase. That wasn't even that was just weird. You know, the well love speech chases are very weird. I'm a c It's just like, you know who I am. I'm not gonna pull over. Yeah. So well, let's talk about the legalities of it, right. There's, like we said, there's pretty much no laws that restrict

police chases. They have the right to do that in all cases. Yeah um. And as a matter of fact, they don't even have to have their lights and sirens running to engage in pursuit. Yeah um. The there are department procedures regarding police chases though. But the thing is is, even if a cop violates department procedure and continues to pursuit,

they're still not breaking any laws. So for example, in Washington, d C. You can only pursue if the suspect has engaged in a violent act or um, someone could be seriously hurt if the suspect were allowed to escape. UM. In Des Moines, Iowa, no more than three cars can engage in pursuit. Yeah, that makes good sense. It's a good rule. And you have to take into account a m the time of day, road and weather conditions, the nature of the offense, and a supervisor has to pursue,

has to approve the pursuit. And then in Florida, Orange County, Florida, that's the Orlando area. Yeah. Are they the ones that have real restrictive policies. Yeah. And as a matter of fact, they found that after in the year after they enacted their restrictive pursuit policies, UM, felonies in Orlando declined. Yeah, what's up with that. I don't know, one of those weird things. Uh. There is also something called sovereign immunity UM, which is a government official is not liable for damages

that occur while they're doing their job. UM. Yeah, that's like old time common law. Yeah, old school. But these days there are a lot of municipalities that have overridden that law with with other laws. Um And like I think with the Georgia case, I think that cop was fired and brought up on charges, and I think they could even sue the police station. Yeah, with the but not himself in overriding the sovereign immunity laws. Most most

departments or communities protect the cops individually but financially. But the institution can still be sued, right, but they're not protected criminally, Like they can still be brought up on charges, they just can't be sued. I think, gotcha, because I'm pretty sure this Braves guy, I think he went upon trial. Well apparently if I'm wrong, then I'm gonna eat crow. But in California, you're basically out of luck if the

cops mess up your storefront with their cars during your pursuit. Yeah, they their laws very much protect the cops for from that liability. Insurance would help out though, you would hope, But I mean then your rates are gonna rise. What were you doing? Nothing? You just happened to have a store in the wrong place in l A. So that's a that's police chase. As you got anything else? I got nothing else. They seem way more dangerous than I

even thought, and I thought they were pretty dangerous before. Yeah, don't support those TV shows. People don't listen to me dolorify. Yeah, to do as he says, not as he does. That's right. Uh, if you want to learn more about police chases, you can type those words into the search bar. How stuff works and us and so I said, search par what is it? Chuck? Is the time for listener mail? It normally would be, but I do not have a listener mail prepared. Instead, we are going to uh have a

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