5 ms·

Would there not be some police investigation and possibly prison time if you recklessly caused such a serious accident? I’m not sure how this misunderstanding

Would there not be some police investigation and possibly prison time if you recklessly caused such a serious accident? I’m not sure how this misunderstanding could occur for so many years.

hef19898 3y ago
Because history is true, stories on the other hand can be totally made up.
n6h6 3y ago
Police aren't known for their investigation skills.
astura 3y ago
No, even if you kill someone while driving, if you're not drunk and don't leave the scene then you don't get more than a traffic ticket. https://www.vice.com/en/article/9bzdpv/you-can-kill-anyone-you-want-with-your-car-as-long-as-you-dont-really-mean-it https://www.vice.com/en/article/9bzdpv/you-can-kill-anyone-y...
- PcChip 3y ago
  Manslaughter is a traffic ticket these days?
  - astura 3y ago
    Manslaughter charges only happen if the driver is drunk or flees. Otherwise it's a traffic ticket AT MOST. My friend's teenaged son, while biking, was run over by a driver who did it completely intentionally. Zero charges or tickets. From my link above >Leah Shahum from the San Francisco Bike Coalition told the New York Times last year that her organization does “not know of a single case of a cyclist fatality in which the driver was prosecuted, except for DUI or hit-and-run.” Kristin Smith, also of the SF Coalition, says that “Last year, four people were hit and killed in San Francisco and no charges were ever brought,” including for a collision captured on video that showed the driver was at fault. >But if the public is at a loss, so are prosecutors. Portland, Oregon, attorney Ray Thomas explains that DAs don’t like to go after “some soccer dad who made a mistake… The police, prosecutors, and courts don’t feel it’s a mistake that should net someone jail time… There are criminally negligent homicide laws. But [a crash] has got to be really, really bad.”
    - hef19898 3y ago
      Well, accidents do happen, don't they? Thing is so, if one party was reckless it amounts, usually, to some charges of hurting / injuring someone. But you show nicely the differemce between history / facts (number of accidents from official statistics matched against charges and results of analysis of each accident) and feelings / story / narrative (someone says something to a journalists who then reports on it).
    - rob74 3y ago
      Ok, this article shocked me more than the post this thread is about. What has manslaughter have to do with whether you are drunk or not? Does that make the person you killed any less dead? Is this a consequence of DAs being elected officials in most of the US? So, as long as there are more drivers who could see themselves in this situation than cyclists who could get mad about this in the electorate, drivers killing cyclists will be off the hook?
      - mowse_winded 3y ago
        The definition of vehicular manslaughter is unlawful or negligent operation of a vehicle resulting in a death. If the driver was not driving unlawfully, such as DUI, then it is not manslaughter. Fleeing the scene of an accident is unlawful so that also makes it meet the definition. Other reasons could include speeding or running a red light. https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/vehicular_manslaughter https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/vehicular_manslaughter
        rob74 3y ago
        That still leaves us with the second part - "...or negligent". I find it a bit hard to believe that in all those cases the cyclists were at fault? Unless you consider that they were already acting recklessly because they tried to use a bicycle on a public street (I know a lot of people subscribe to this opinion, but I don't).
        hef19898 3y ago
- chmod775 3y ago
  > What makes Cann’s story notable among the 700 or so bicyclists who are hit and killed in America each year is that San Hamel faces charges in Cann’s death. In the end he got 10 days in jail, 4 years probation, and had to pay the cyclist's funeral expenses - for plowing him over from behind while driving home drunk from a bar. So apparently even if you hit someone while DUI nothing really happens.
  - astura 3y ago
    Thank you for the update on this case. It's appalling.
_ea1k 3y ago
Look at it this way, officers see car accidents every day. The majority are cases where someone ran directly into the car in front of them due to inattention. Humans make a lot of mistakes and unless there were extenuating factors (DUI, for example), they are very unlikely to become criminal. In many cases, they wouldn't even be ticketed. Given that there was a yield sign involved, it also may be a known problematic intersection. Sadly, we have a lot of those in the US too. Yield signs in places with low traffic and poor visibility are way more common than they should be.
- benjaminwootton 3y ago
  That's very surprising to me. Here in the UK, a serious accident where someone broke their spine would be investigated without a shadow of a doubt. They would want to rule out any criminal culpability.
  - pharrington 3y ago
    Yeah, the US in general is extremely cavalier with our car culture. Usually the only police involvement when an accident occurs is when they're called to the scene to take a report of the incident. Afterwards, the parties usually just deal with the aftermath themselves and through insurance companies. Even if you have to show up to court, people almost always walk away after pleading "not guilty," because again, the officer who reported the incident can rarely be bothered to show up on the court date.
    - benjaminwootton 3y ago
      It's probably outsourced to the civil system knowing the US. It's a huge contrast between the US and European approach though.
      - mrguyorama 3y ago
        It's really just another example of cops in the US choosing to not do their job. We have plenty of laws on the books that could punish inattentive or reckless driving especially when it results in a severe outcome, but that would require a cop to open an investigation and all that noise so they just write up a report for your insurance and try to get you to believe there's nothing else they can do. The complete inefficacy and refusal to do any work of most american police departments is absurd. It's like they still believe their primary mission to be slave retrieval and violently suppressing strikes, as if it's still 1890.

Would there not be some police investigation and possibly prison time if you recklessly caused such a serious accident? I’m not sure how this misunderstanding could occur for so many years.

hef19898 3y ago

Because history is true, stories on the other hand can be totally made up.

n6h6 3y ago

Police aren't known for their investigation skills.

astura 3y ago

No, even if you kill someone while driving, if you're not drunk and don't leave the scene then you don't get more than a traffic ticket. https://www.vice.com/en/article/9bzdpv/you-can-kill-anyone-you-want-with-your-car-as-long-as-you-dont-really-mean-it https://www.vice.com/en/article/9bzdpv/you-can-kill-anyone-y...

PcChip 3y ago
Manslaughter is a traffic ticket these days?
- astura 3y ago
  Manslaughter charges only happen if the driver is drunk or flees. Otherwise it's a traffic ticket AT MOST. My friend's teenaged son, while biking, was run over by a driver who did it completely intentionally. Zero charges or tickets. From my link above >Leah Shahum from the San Francisco Bike Coalition told the New York Times last year that her organization does “not know of a single case of a cyclist fatality in which the driver was prosecuted, except for DUI or hit-and-run.” Kristin Smith, also of the SF Coalition, says that “Last year, four people were hit and killed in San Francisco and no charges were ever brought,” including for a collision captured on video that showed the driver was at fault. >But if the public is at a loss, so are prosecutors. Portland, Oregon, attorney Ray Thomas explains that DAs don’t like to go after “some soccer dad who made a mistake… The police, prosecutors, and courts don’t feel it’s a mistake that should net someone jail time… There are criminally negligent homicide laws. But [a crash] has got to be really, really bad.”
  - hef19898 3y ago
    Well, accidents do happen, don't they? Thing is so, if one party was reckless it amounts, usually, to some charges of hurting / injuring someone. But you show nicely the differemce between history / facts (number of accidents from official statistics matched against charges and results of analysis of each accident) and feelings / story / narrative (someone says something to a journalists who then reports on it).
  - rob74 3y ago
    Ok, this article shocked me more than the post this thread is about. What has manslaughter have to do with whether you are drunk or not? Does that make the person you killed any less dead? Is this a consequence of DAs being elected officials in most of the US? So, as long as there are more drivers who could see themselves in this situation than cyclists who could get mad about this in the electorate, drivers killing cyclists will be off the hook?
    - mowse_winded 3y ago
      The definition of vehicular manslaughter is unlawful or negligent operation of a vehicle resulting in a death. If the driver was not driving unlawfully, such as DUI, then it is not manslaughter. Fleeing the scene of an accident is unlawful so that also makes it meet the definition. Other reasons could include speeding or running a red light. https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/vehicular_manslaughter https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/vehicular_manslaughter
      - rob74 3y ago
        That still leaves us with the second part - "...or negligent". I find it a bit hard to believe that in all those cases the cyclists were at fault? Unless you consider that they were already acting recklessly because they tried to use a bicycle on a public street (I know a lot of people subscribe to this opinion, but I don't).
        hef19898 3y ago
chmod775 3y ago
> What makes Cann’s story notable among the 700 or so bicyclists who are hit and killed in America each year is that San Hamel faces charges in Cann’s death. In the end he got 10 days in jail, 4 years probation, and had to pay the cyclist's funeral expenses - for plowing him over from behind while driving home drunk from a bar. So apparently even if you hit someone while DUI nothing really happens.
- astura 3y ago
  Thank you for the update on this case. It's appalling.

_ea1k 3y ago

Look at it this way, officers see car accidents every day. The majority are cases where someone ran directly into the car in front of them due to inattention. Humans make a lot of mistakes and unless there were extenuating factors (DUI, for example), they are very unlikely to become criminal. In many cases, they wouldn't even be ticketed. Given that there was a yield sign involved, it also may be a known problematic intersection. Sadly, we have a lot of those in the US too. Yield signs in places with low traffic and poor visibility are way more common than they should be.

benjaminwootton 3y ago
That's very surprising to me. Here in the UK, a serious accident where someone broke their spine would be investigated without a shadow of a doubt. They would want to rule out any criminal culpability.
- pharrington 3y ago
  Yeah, the US in general is extremely cavalier with our car culture. Usually the only police involvement when an accident occurs is when they're called to the scene to take a report of the incident. Afterwards, the parties usually just deal with the aftermath themselves and through insurance companies. Even if you have to show up to court, people almost always walk away after pleading "not guilty," because again, the officer who reported the incident can rarely be bothered to show up on the court date.
  - benjaminwootton 3y ago
    It's probably outsourced to the civil system knowing the US. It's a huge contrast between the US and European approach though.
    - mrguyorama 3y ago
      It's really just another example of cops in the US choosing to not do their job. We have plenty of laws on the books that could punish inattentive or reckless driving especially when it results in a severe outcome, but that would require a cop to open an investigation and all that noise so they just write up a report for your insurance and try to get you to believe there's nothing else they can do. The complete inefficacy and refusal to do any work of most american police departments is absurd. It's like they still believe their primary mission to be slave retrieval and violently suppressing strikes, as if it's still 1890.