We love the cops in NZ. No. Matter. What.
I’ve always believed it’s part of some deeply ingrained settler mentality in this country meaning we turn a blind eye when the mounted constabulary turns up and beats the living christ out of unruly Māori on the edges of town because we fear those unruly Māori.
We allow the cops to have vast unchecked surveillance powers (which I have found myself personally the victim of).
We allow the cops to taser and shoot at will.
We allow our cops to chase kids until those kids kill themselves….
‘Ball of fire’: Three dead in fiery crash after police abandoned pursuit in Christchurch
Three people have died in a fiery crash after a police pursuit in Christchurch overnight.Canterbury district commander Superintendent John Price said the vehicle crashed after running over police spikes and crashing into a tree, bursting into flames.
And it’s NEVER the Police responsibility, it’s never their chaotic chase policy, it’s never their lack of driving skills, it’s never alternative responses.
It’s always the kids fault, despite every scientific study proving and showing us that young people’s brains react rather then think out the consequences.
We spook kids into a flee response and then blame them for the carnage, we don’t question the cops chasing kids into Police spikes and then killing them.
Every time the issue comes up, NZers like sheep all rear up on their hind legs to scream, ‘WHAT SHOULD THE POLICE DO, JUST LET THEM ESCAPE????????’
Well, actually.
Yes…
Yet the record shows the police haven’t got this balance right. Between October 2016 and September last year, seven deaths and 552 crashes were recorded as a result of police chases. This mayhem is not new. There’s a long history of between one in four and one in five of police pursuits ending in a wrecked car, along with ambulance loads of drivers, passengers and bystanders left maimed or dead. Six people have died in police pursuits in the last five months alone.
Often the chase is triggered by something trivial like a minor traffic infringement.
Defending the status quo, Police union boss Detective Inspector Chris Cahill, claims existing rules are “very strict,” requiring the officer instigating the chase to immediately notify the police communications centre, which then takes control. This, he says, takes the decision making “away from the police officer in the car who may get tunnel vision, who may have the adrenalin rush going on.”
In saying this, he admits that the road cop is subject to the same “thrill of the chase” weaknesses as the driver he’s pursuing. The deadly flaw in the policy is, this reference to higher authority happens after the sirens and flashing lights have been switched on and the pursuit has begun. By then it’s too late. The adrenalin on both sides has kicked in, and the race has begun.
Even if the cop obeys an order to pull back, the hyped-up fleeing driver doesn’t know.
The Police and Police Minister Stuart Nash are now hiding behind yet another review of existing chase policy by the Independent Police Conduct Authority (IPCA) due to be finished later this year.
We don’t need any more reviews. In 2009, then chair of the IPCA, Justice Lowell Goddard delivered a scathing critique, questioning “the value of pursuits that begin over driving offences such as speeding, careless driving or suspected drunk driving without observable, immediate threat to public safety”. She said “there is little benefit to the public in police taking action that is likely to make a potentially dangerous situation worse.”
She noted that in the previous five years, pursuits had resulted in 24 deaths and 91 serious injuries, and that only 47 of the victims were the fleeing driver. Subsequently, the IPCA has continued to criticise the pursuit policy.
Back in August 2016, after 17 year old tourism student Moana Matthews died after flipping her car into a Rotorua stream, chased because of her erratic driving, I argued for adoption of the approach adopted in several Australian state, which restricts chases to when lives are threatened or the offender is high risk. Then Police union chief Greg O’Connor rounded on me, suggesting it would be a green light for every hoon and criminal in Christendom to take over the streets. He’s now a Government MP, luckily with no power.
…rather than ask ‘what’s the best outcome for public safety’ we give cops the licence to pursue tactics that kill time and time and time again, so why could this time be different?
Because look at the victims…
..I’ve often said the only moment this insanity of allowing cops to chase kids to death will ever change is if the victims are white middle class kids, because when it’s brown poor teenagers dying, middle NZ doesn’t give two shits, but the millisecond it’s kids they recognise and can identify with, well then brothers and sisters SOMETHING MUST BE DONE!
You can feel the palpable shock wave run through white middle NZ as they view the picture of the two boys who died and immediately connect with them.
The Police will be terrified that change is coming as public backlash builds, because in NZ, when their brown, it’s their fault they went down, but when their white, HEY THAT AIN’T RIGHT!
Let’s hope my sickeningly insightful views about what motivates middle Nu Zilind proves to be correct, for the sake of future dead teenagers.
I recall my ‘first indocrination to Canadian life’ in th late 1960’s as a young kiwi immigrant was a large public Canadian ‘backlash’ that was all over on the media over there, to a similar rash of young deaths from police car chases, as it was worrying most people then.
So the Canadian Government then stopped police cases and guess what happend then?
The deaths went down and stolden vehicle numbers also declined as wel!!!!
So it showed that police chasing was a studid move, and it was very dangerous to other drivers it showed then in Pierre Trudeau as prime minister’s time.
So we must stop these mindless police chases now since cars are faster and chases are becomming more dangerous and costly and fatal.
Never let the truth get in the way of a good excuse to rubbish the Police eh Bomber?
Cops screwed up. At least I don’t have to be a snow flake about it.
Not true that the Canadian government stopped Police chases. At least not in Ontario.
https://www.ontario.ca/laws/regulation/100266
“2. (1) A police officer may pursue, or continue to pursue, a fleeing motor vehicle that fails to stop,
(a) if the police officer has reason to believe that a criminal offence has been committed or is about to be committed; or
(b) for the purposes of motor vehicle identification or the identification of an individual in the vehicle. O. Reg. 266/10, s. 2 (1).”
Would you please quote some figures / reference supporting the claim that only brown children have been chased to death by the cops?
D J S
Even worse than our dumb cops yesterday I heard public comments on the radio. These kids are fucken dead they made a grave mistake and they paid with their lives. But to hear people say they deserved to die like that. Now what sort of people do we have in our country, nasty, vile, judgmental arseholes it really makes me angry that we have people like this living in our country.
a car is not as important as these kids lives get real NZders
By that logic, the Police should stop catching burglars, rapists, assailants etc. Where did you get this stupid nonsense cleangreen. Calling you out here…what you say is total fabrication!
What should a hot pursuit policy even look like? Move your family and business to our town! Where we have excellent police protection, just as long as no one ever tries to run.
As far as being a hypocrite being frowned upon, I’ve always seen it as more “denying you/they are a hypocrite when you are being one” competently different then accepting that as humans we tend to be hypocrites some times.
Crimes are crimes that come with punishment. They shouldn’t come with extra punishment. We shouldn’t be sending people to jail for minor traffic offences and then killing them in the process of capturing them. That’s just silly.
Good day,
Sympathies to the grieving families of those who died – BUT WHEN will not only teenagers begin to have a little respect for the LAW!!! Why blame the POLICE??? should they fail in their duty they are criticized but when they try to protect us law abiding citizens then they are blamed! As a mother of five children, four boys brought up without a father NOT one of them has ever had a run in with Police and all respect the Rule of Law! A pity more people in this country cannot abide by the given rules!!!
I kinda get the notion that a cop chasing a solo driver and said driver kills him/herself is a bit of a, shall we say, Darwinian outcome. However, the passengers in the vehicle can’t possibly be held equally responsible and somehow deserve to share the same fate – let alone all the other drivers/passengers and pedestrians that share the road whose lives are being put in danger. These chases imo need to stop immediately, the stakes are simply far too high. However I suspect it will take someone like a minister/celebrity (or one of their children) or a cop to inadvertently die as result of a police car chase before this madness stops.
When I was 13 I was home at night, not out stealing cars or riding with other young kids in stolen cars. My parents cared enough about me (and took their legal responsibilities seriously) to ensure that I was where I was supposed to be.
It appears this isn’t the first time the kids in question were out doing this.
It’s quite simple – if these kids were at home as well (where they should have been) then the chases wouldn’t happen and no one would get killed.
It is all too easy to blame the Police, but the fault does not lie there.
Let’s back the bus up and place the blame fully where it truly lies, and that is with the parents.
Let’s also not forget that they are LEGALLY responsible for their kids until they turn 18, so why haven’t they been arrested and put before the court to answer for their kids’ recklessness and their own disregard for the law?
When I was 13 I was home at night,
… blah blah blah…
It’s quite simple – if these kids were at home as well (where they should have been) then the chases wouldn’t happen and no one would get killed. …. blah blah blah
Just because you grew up on the set of the Happy Days tv show doesn’t mean that is the same reality for many others.
Your simplistic derisory towards my comments echoes the values of someone who is more aligned with the criminal behavior of these kids than someone who wants a better NZ and indicates that you fail to appreciate the problem here.
Happy Days TV set? Really?
‘Reality’ is what you make it. Choose to go out stealing cars and you’ll probably end up dead. That’s reality.
I have no problem about how the Police went about doing their job with this situation.
My problem is the front page obituary to those three idiots in the press today.
I’m pretty sure one photo, had one of those germs giving the camera the finger.
I would prefer they crash their car and die in obscurity.
On the bright-side, Nobody will care about them by the end of the week.
Shame on you, Spoon. Those three kids weren’t germs – are you kin of Adolf ?
What happened to them is a tragedy for all involved, including the police, and don’t drag the rest of us down by saying that nobody will care about them by the end of the week. Speak for yourself.
What you should be asking is what has happened, and is happening in this country,that we have swathes of young men living their lives as if with a death wish – except that these were children, and in NZ we’re good at snuffing out kids – we’re world leaders – and every violently killed child is an indictment on all of us – like it or not.
As sad as it can be for young people to lose their lives, I’m with you on this one.
The kid giving the camera the finger is typical of the attitude that so many of them have today. It’s fuck this, fuck that, fuck you and fuck the world.
They’re angry and they’re disrespectful. Why?
Bad upbringings? Crap families where there’s no father present? Quite likely.
So they’re out stealing cars at 13 – I think one of them was quoted as saying it was his ‘hobby’. Really?
What ever happened to model railways, art, crystal radio sets or building plastic planes?
a 16 year old driving a stolen vehicle with two 13 year old passengers and a history of stolen vehicles, Who would be a cop….and yet we almost all call them when it all turns to shit,
Sorry Martin but I cannot agree with your perspective here. Certainly the Police need to carefully consider their policy around when to pursue and when not to, and it is always a tragedy when kids die BUT is it OK for anyone to take others property (not to live- e.g. food) for joy riding and shits? Should Police just let people steal others cars and say “Oh no – might end up in a tragedy – we’ll just let it go – we can find the burnt out shell later”? I think not. Yes you are right about the “brains” of young people, but theft of other peoples expensive assets (car theft) is NOT OK. Most young people will run for the excitement that ensues without really comprehending the risks they are taking – but to do nothing is to condone this behavior which is simply not acceptable to most in this country I believe.
It would seem that Chase’s result in deaths. I’m more worried about the kids running red lights at 130kmh, who else dies?
Nobody is asking what is a 16 and two 13 year olds doing out late stealing a car? Parent(s) where? Seems it’s always the cops fault but they are merely mopping up.
The policy of terminating pursuits encourages speeding as the offenders know they’ll be able to get away if they start driving dangerously.
I’m just glad this kid didn’t kill any innocent bystanders, his own death is regrettable but deserved in the circumstances, where he put the lives of other road users (and his passengers) at so much risk.
Such an unsympathetic appalling view by most of the commentators here.
One has to wonder whether as teens any of you ever did anything wrong or if you’ve ever raised children.
They were kids, kids do stupid things we know that, we know their brains aren’t fully developed, we know that boys especially push the boundaries.
My thoughts are with the parents of the 3 young kids who were killed, we don’t need this, we need it to stop NOW!
Great response by an ex cop into today’s press – he talks about the adrenaline rush that comes on how cops enjoy that, but he says this must stop too.
What is your response all you ‘SAINTS’ out there, I’ve 6 kids I know things they shouldn’t have done IN THE 70s 80s and 90s. I know that one of them got out the window when I was asleep and assumed they were asleep very late at night. I thought I knew were my kids were.
You should all write the book about raising children and how to do it you all know so much.
Welcome to the Wild West.
This country hasn’t changed since 1981.
It is NOT so much a cop worship culture, it is a sickening CAR WORSHIP CULTURE, that most Kiwis are engaged in. They have been sucked in decades ago into the American Way of Life, consumerism, wastage, driving everywhere, convenience culture, mental laziness.
So young kids grow up to become car adoring youngsters, then they fall in love with the vehicles, speed, race, become boy and girl racers, and think nothing much of the rest, of the consequences.
It is not possible to excuse some behaviour, and so ALL, young and old Kiwis, they better grow up and learn to live with less car use and less pollution, that only destroys our climate and our existence on this planet.
How were the police to know the age of these idiots. It is the polices job to protect law-abiding citizens by stopping law breakers and should be congratulated not condemned. I do not hear any difference in the reaction to these deaths of white lawbreakers than when it is brown ones most people are glad the police can get them off the street
Well said Martyn.
Is the chase the only tool in the policemans tool kit ?
It is all about risk assessment and risk management. With some of these kids ie wanabe gangsters it is the thrill of the chase. Spoke to an acquaintance of mine who was an ex gangsters who is now a teacher with University qualifications. Told me he was in the gangs as youth growing up said he had a hell of a lot of fun. His father was ex Maori Battalion WW2 and he comes from good stock on both his Maori side and European sides of the family.
The problem we have had we have neglected educating our youth and do not provide them with educational pathways and routes to employment hence their migration towards the gangs where they can be someone.
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