Hacker News Reader

Comment by dudul | Hacker News Reader

"The lead officer came and told me that they were not arresting me - there was no indication that I was negligent or distracted or impaired in any way - but he gave me a little lecture saying, "This child died, that's a terrible thing, you need to make sure that you never do this again.""

Was I the only one shocked by this? I mean, a little kid died and she's not arrested at least to conduct an investigation? How did they know she wasn't going to fast?

"never do this again"? What kind of BS closure is that?

I'm not saying she deserved to be convicted or something based on her side of the story, but taking the time for a basic investigation would have been nice.

View on HN

> Was I the only one shocked by this?

I think anyone who was actually alive in a time when it was possible for an accident to occur and people didn't automatically look for someone to blame aren't shocked. I'm a lot more shocked by what happens today.

You know, back when the police's job was to 'protect and serve'.

I think half the stuff my parents did to us kids in the '70s would lead to them being arrested today...

Not sure why this is being downvoted. Whether you agree with the values expressed or not, it is a fact that people who kill people with their car rarely face any sort of legal repercussion.

And yeah, I don’t think the fragility of the agent of death is a reason not to conduct even a cursory investigation into whether there might have been factors related to the crash.

Was there anything in the car that might indictate impairment or distraction? Was there something about the place in the roadway that limited visibility? Might she have been speeding, and might speeding have been a factor?

I mean, yes, some crashes are truly accidental, but some (especially nowadays with digital distractions) aren’t exactly without culpability on the part of the driver.

When I was in college a beloved professor of mine was struck by a man who got out of his pickup truck, looked around, and got back in his truck and drove off. My professor was left injured in the middle of the road only to be struck and killed by a second car. The first driver’s defense? The one that absolved him of all criminal and civil liability to my professor’s surviving child? He didn’t see her.

In this country we are pretty quick to assume innocence on the part of the driver. It’s been said that, if you want to kill someone and get away with it, do it with your car.

So, yeah, this woman probably wouldn’t have been convicted by a jury of her peers. But it’s pretty cavalier to suggest that we—out of deference to the operator of a deadly machine—that we shouldn’t even ask some questions.

It's being downvoted because there is no reason to arrest the person. "They looked for skid marks on the road and took some measurements", and presumably they concluded there was no foul play.

Yeah, still not getting it. Wouldn’t normally a person be detained for questioning if they had just killed a person in some other context?

Maybe arrest isn’t warranted—maybe a, “hey you look pretty shook up, would you mind coming down to the station with me to answer a few questions? Cool, I have to let you know before I get started that anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.”

But I also don’t think “nah, I’m good and don’t intend to come with you to answer your questions.” Is an acceptable answer either. So, if someone were NOT cooperating with the police in a fatal crash situation, I don’t think arrest is unreasonable in the least.

That's exactly what I meant. maybe I'm not familiar enough with what "arrest" entails, but at least keeping them at the station to make sure she's ok or something.

To clarify my comment, I wasn't talking about finding a way to point fingers at her or something. but really, just sending her on her way, driving the car she just used to kill a child with, is irresponsible.

This is what I took your comment to mean as well. To me, watching the responses to your comment illustrate why it is that it’s so hard for anything to change with respect to traffic safety.

I mean, we have here a story with a dead child and story of a woman who caused the death. On the strength of the emotional narrative presented in this story, people here have largely decided that it’s not even worth asking questions, maybe dotting an i or crossing a t or two.

I wouldn’t expect the officer to knock her head shoving her into the back of a squad car, or to keep her waiting in an interview room until she’s good and ready to crack. But then again, I generally expect humane, dignified treatment of people that police interact with.

I'm not sure what you want to happen here. An arrest is a (temporary) suspension of a person's civil liberties. There has to be a legitimate reason under the laws of the jurisdiction to do it. I don't know the law in England, but in the USA, if the investigating officer does not have evidence for a crime (the act, and "mens rea") or you aren't deemed a potential flight risk because you have some relation as a person of interest to someone who does in an ongoing investigation, you aren't arrested. You can be detained (which is technically what happened here - she was not free to run away from the officer while being asked the questions). She cooperated, and the questions were answered to the officer's satisfaction. Once his superiors read the report, if they find his work on scene to have been sloppy and her actions or answers suspect, they can go back and arrest her if there's cause.

I used the term detained intentionally, and then specified that arrest wouldn’t be unreasonable if required by circumstances of the investigation.

Consider that she was detained for a little bit by the rookie police officer while they concluded their investigation. That seems all that was necessary since this was an accident. Believe it or not, it's not actually necessary to arrest and jail someone every time there is an accident like this.

The police are not supposed to be able to arrest a person they don't think are guilty. The police could probably lie about it and fake probable cause, but they aren't supposed to.

Cars are sacred in the United States. Even if you're drunk you might only get 10 days in jail: https://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20170126/old-town/ryne-san-h...

What happened to all parties is horrible.

With that being said, I'm inclined not to believe people when they say they're following the speed limit without prior information about the driver. Speeding has become endemic to much of the western world. The driver in the BBC article claims to be following the speed limit, but can't remember it precisely ("45 or 50mph"). That's certainly not a point in her favor. And the various stats I've seen and also my real world experience suggest that relatively few people actually do follow the limit. I'm a cyclist who intentionally rides on roads with low speed limits. I can recall multiple instances where drivers decided to make dangerous "punishment passes" by me for apparently going too slow, despite the fact that I was actually going slightly faster than the speed limit (typically around 17 in a 15 mph zone). I can recall one particular instance where I spoke with a driver at the next light and they seemed incredulous that I was actually meeting the speed limit. I told another driver who almost ran me over that the limit was 25 mph and I was going around 28 downhill, so they can't claim I was going too slow. Their response was that I should be arrested, though they must have been going at least 40! That's entitlement. Too many drivers seem to have the attitude that someone deserves extra risk for inconveniencing others on the road. (The only reason I go a bit over the limit sometimes is because drivers tend to get angry if I don't, though I'm starting to question the utility of this. I go slower if there is no one else on the road.)

I often say that people are different when they're behind the wheel. They're less patient, and outright irrational. Speeding really does not save much time at all outside of perhaps empty highways. I see it all the time because my top speed is less than half of most drivers', yet I regularly catch up with them at stop signs and lights. Speeding is mostly extra risk for little gain.

People often don't think that 5 mph is significant, but it absolutely is.

https://one.nhtsa.gov/people/injury/research/pub/HS809012.ht...

Table 2 in that link shows fatalities approximately doubling for each 5 mph increment of speed added.

That doesn't even take into account the increased likelihood of hitting someone (increased speed means decreased ability to react and stop).

And yes, most (U.S.) roads are designed in such a way that practically begs motorists to speed. And thus speeding is the norm. Man if I had a dollar for every HN thread where someone bragged about getting out of a speeding ticket...

Most drivers do not appreciate how dangerous speeding is, definitely. As a libertarian friend of mine will say, "people automatically drive at safe speeds". (He has a very libertarian thinking style.) This view seems to be believed by the public at large if not stated explicitly, though it is false.

To be fair, one needs to consider both absolute and relative speeds. Risk increases monotonically with absolute speed, but if you are going around the average speed of other vehicles on the road, that is safer than going slower. Many drivers I've spoken with will point that out as if it says speeding is safer. But the reality is that slower speeds for everyone and relatively little spread are what's actually safer.

Learning patience and driving slower is a more productive use of one's time than fighting a speeding ticket. I am confident there's something about cars that actively erodes away patience in a way you don't see in bikes for example.

> Risk increases monotonically with absolute speed, but if you are going around the average speed of other vehicles on the road, that is safer than going slower.

This advice is good on highways to avoid colliding with other vehicles at high speeds. On local streets, it's better to be the neighborhood pace car and slow down :-)

Excellent point. I'll keep the phrase "neighborhood pace car" in mind for the future.

Also keeping distance from the car in front is very important.

Clearly who was mainly worried about her mental health knowing how hard it can be.

> you need to make sure that you never do this again

Just a stupid sentence that came out not knowing what to say.

It’s not stupid it’s a morally wrong thing to say and very mean. She was what, 19? He obviously knew it was an accident (why did he let her go? He obviously thought it was an accident, probably unavoidable), more the little boys fault (if you have to blame someone) than her’s..what a jerk-off.

How is it morally wrong?

The cop said it wasn't her fault, she didn't do anything wrong, but ALSO that "you need to make sure that you never do this again." How is she supposed to do that? The cop is pretending to absolve her of guilt while explicitly saying she is somehow in control of an uncontrollable situation.

What investigation? They measured the tire tracks. Unless there was an eyewitness, there is nothing else to do.

I guess. I'm just baffled picturing the scene. This young woman just killed a little boy and the cop is basically saying "ok, well, he's dead, just be careful next time. Ok, have a safe trip home, bye".

You're right, without witnesses what can you do? But I would imagine a procedure a little more involved when somebody kills a child.

The procedure later, away from the accident scene, probably was more involved, but at the scene, unless there was evidence of negligence or bed intent I wouldn't expect an arrest. She didn't flee. Apparently didn't appear impaired. What would they possibly arrest her for?

If you're driving fast enough on a local street that you can hit and kill someone, you're incredibly negligent (see: all NYC taxi drivers).

Whilst you're correct that the higher the speed the more likely a fatality, it's also possible to cause death at very low speeds.

Did you read the article? It was a rural road with a high speed limit.. very common in many parts of the world.

Engineers assumed people wouldn't run into the middle of the street without looking.

So 90% of drivers are incredibly negligent now.

If you slow down to non-lethal speeds for every parallel parked vehicle or obstacle in anticipation of some kid sprinting out from behind it, you might as well walk (not ride a bike, because that problem still exists).

I live out this way. These aren't local streets like in a city or suburb. It's very rural with houses spaced far apart. Speed limits are 45-55 MPH (70-90 KPH) depending on the road. See for yourself on Street View:

https://www.google.com/maps/@39.5080693,-84.689404,3a,75y,28...

But what procedure are you imagining, exactly? Grilling her until she confesses to something? There was no indication of any crime, just a tragic accident.

http://crashnotaccident.com

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concurrence

Accident doesn't imply it wasn't avoidable.

But unless she intentionally hit the child it was an accident on her part. I'm referring to a specific incident, not crashes in general. I thought that would be abundantly clear from the context. I certainly doubt she foresaw or planned on hitting a child.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/accident

> 1 a : an unforeseen and unplanned event or circumstance

A crash isn't intentional either. Meriam Webster has the following definition for crash:

"to fall, land, or hit with destructive force"

To me that is more accurate.

Cops are predominantly drivers and don't want to enforce anything against other drivers, because "it could be them".

Too true: my uncle's stepson was killed by a police car that T-boned his car as it (the cop car) jumped a red light in response to an emergency call (that later turned out to be bogus, as if the story wasn't grim enough). I imagine that the possibility of this happening to them preys very heavily on the minds of police drivers everywhere.

Right, this is sadly the unfortunate answer in many cases and the raw reality of our world. Too many people have been watching CSI and think the police could just go back and start 'zooming in' to see what happened.

Agreed. Even murder clearance rates are as bad as 60% in some areas of the US. If you're not a complete idiot, you can get away with most crimes.

Yeah this happened to me, my house got shot up and a bullet whizzed over my desk (where I would have been if I was at my computer) and into the wall over my sleeping head.

The police response was basically "well, sometimes people do this, but they usually don't hit anybody LOL". I didn't expect a full-on CSI investigation but really, my girlfriend or I could have died, I wanted something. There were never any charges, and I'm pretty sure there was no investigation beyond writing the report. It was really disappointing and disillusioning.

IMO, the only person to blame in this incident is the person that thought a 50mph speed limit was appropriate for a road that kids live on.

It's a limit not a target, if it's not safe to drive at that speed then don't.

True, although drivers shouldn't drive at the posted speed limit if it's not safe.

Uh...have you ever driven anywhere rural...anywhere? If you have to drive 100 miles in rural area, going 30 mph would never fly. But, people ( including children) often live along these roads. I grew up in a place like that.

People live directly off of highways. So highways should be 25 mph? 30mph?

99% of Sweden is rural, most of it with a significantly lower population density than the areas you're referring to, and they too had a lot of people that lived directly on their main roads.

Perhaps you've never been on rural roads that also have houses? There are many places where a 50+ mph speed limit is appropriate even though there are little clusters of houses dotted along the route. It's not practical to lower the speed limit for every house that has children.

Those houses are generally located far away from the road (farm houses) or are in some other way separated from the road way. If it’s a rural highway and houses are near the road, it typically results in a speed zone, even in desolate Nevada.

That's not true everywhere. My wife's parents live in rural Iowa on a highway that has a 45 mph speed limit. Their home is part of a small cluster of homes and their mailbox is across the road, similar to the circumstances in the OP story.

45 is a speed zone if the normal speed is 60 or 70. I just got done traveling on US 395 through most of California, and we would typically speed zone down to 45, then 40, then 35....around houses. I’m sure there are actually well defined rules about this in California.

Regardless, living on a highway is not prime real estate.

Sounds like CA and IA work differently. 45 is the speed limit for that highway because it's windy. On the straighter roads, the limit is usually 50-55. However, there are still no speed zones (as you call them) for small clusters of houses.

The whole west works different I think. I mean, who in their right mind would build their house right next to the highway (without a fairly long highway) if they didn't have to? As long as you have the land, you would build it 50-100 meters back!

The only time I see otherwise is if mountains or rivers are involved, or there is density (in which case it is sure to be zoned!).

There are many types of highways. You might even call these rural roads just roads, even if they share the default speed limit for the area (80 km/h here).

With very low traffic density, you might build the house closer to the road (maybe 10m off, separated with trees) for just that reason – to save land. (Not all rural houses are farms.)

It's common in the midwest and becoming an issue when towns expand and traffic picks up. Mailboxes on the opposite side of a county road should be illegal. I'm surprised actually that they are not.

> It's not practical to lower the speed limit for every house that has children.

Yes it is. Do you mean, it would make driving more inconvenient, since drivers would have to slow down when they passed?

It's not just inconvenience, although that is part of it. The transportation department would have a huge added burden by needing a way to determine which houses have children, a lot more signage to mark the designated slowdown areas, extra workers to make the adjustments as families move around, a way to update various mapping/GPS systems, etc. The number of passing zones would be drastically reduced. Jake braking would be a nuisance for those houses with children. And there are probably more side effects that I can't think of immediately.

I don't disagree with any intention of improving safety, but there are pragmatic reasons we shouldn't unconditionally implement reduced speed limits around children.

I think you're overcomplicating your proposed solution; if it's a hassle to track each family's residence, assume all residences may have families present. Compression braking is a nuisance, so post speed limit & compression breaking restriction signs well in advance of the houses so normal braking can be used.

In the UK, all this is done by putting up street lights. The Highway Code then dictates that the road has a speed limit of 30mph and is residential (no compression braking).

I don't understand your comment about overtaking. Are you thinking of long, straight roads with mostly-evenly distributed houses over a large distance?

I don't think we're talking about the same kinds of roads.

In an area zoned for residential, e.g. a small town or village, the speed limit will drop and there are noise restrictions. That's quite common, although also quite sparse within the land area.

I've been speaking to unincorporated areas that have no zoning. Many of them are as you described: long, straight roads with mostly-evenly distributed houses over a large distance. These are the types of rural roads that make up the vast majority of land area in the midwest area of the US.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com