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Data journalism busts speeding cops, wins Pulitzer
- ritonlajoie 14y agowell, am I the only one to find that a little bit strange? pardon me for the cross reference but it feels like this should be on /r/nottheonion
- pavedwalden 14y agoWow, an officer was FIRED for speeding. That should be the headline right there. I was beginning to think it was impossible for a cop to get themselves fired.
- eterm 14y agoOne was. Out of 800 found. That should also be a headline.
- jrockway 14y agoI'm not sure you need to fire someone for driving 125mph at 4 o'clock in the morning. The punishment should fit the crime.
- davis_m 14y ago320 accidents. 21 maimed or killed. I really think this is more than a little bit of middle of the night speeding.
- fancyketchup 14y agoIs it also kosher to drive while intoxicated at 4 o'clock in the morning? I'm not asking to be snarky, I just don't understand the line of reasoning. It seems like you are saying that engaging is behaviors that are risky to other members of the public are ok as long as nobody is hurt on the specific instance in which you engage in them.
- pyre 14y agoI think that idea is that driving at 125mph is less risky at 4am because there are fewer obstacles around. Attempting to drive 125mph at, say, 4pm would be a lot more risky/dangerous. That said, I don't think that actions outside of work necessarily should mean someone is fired. Using your badge to attempt to get out of trouble, or stating that you feel that speeding is your 'right' (on-duty or off-duty) just because you are a cop, on the other hand...
- jrockway 14y agoI didn't say that he should not be punished, I said that he shouldn't be fired. If we fired everyone for every mistake in judgement, nobody would be doing any work.
- bcoates 14y agoIn most jobs where you drive for a living maintaining a clean or at least insurable DMV record both on and off the job is required.
- BHSPitMonkey 14y agoHave you been getting in the habit of using kilometers, perhaps? 125mph is absurdly fast.
- jonknee 14y agoHe was something of a super speeder, check out his lap times: http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/speeding-cops/fl-gx-fausto-timeline.eps-20120210,0,7170986.graphic http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/speeding-cops/fl-gx-f... 120 MPH was almost double the speed limit (65 MPH) and as the data shows it was a routine. The data shows only average times, so who knows what his top speed was (he was "only" averaging 95 the day he got busted for going 120). He was very frequently averaging speeds that constitute reckless driving. He's lucky he just got fired, his license should be suspended for a long period of time just like it would be for anyone else that wasn't a cop.
- darkarmani 14y agoIsn't that an arrestable offense? How can you work from inside jail?
- dnm 14y agohttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/14/fausto-lopez-speeding-mia_n_1884426.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/14/fausto-lopez-speedi...
- ndonnellan 14y agoThe officer fired was the one "who sparked the project", that is, the one that was pulled over (after refusing to stop) by a state trooper, if I remember correctly. It sounds like no police officers were fired as a result of this investigation.
- fnordfnordfnord 14y agoMaybe he was fired for drawing negative media attention.
- NewAccnt 14y agoLocal journalists got the cops fired. How the hell such a thing exists, I'm not sure.. Probably teens or funded by a local community college.
- brokentone 14y agoOr Pulitzer winners. One of the three for sure!
- NewAccnt 14y agoSo all I need to do to be a great journalist is to win a Pulitzer?
- brokentone 14y agoGo for it! I wish you the best in that endeavor.
- pc86 14y agoYes, and all you need to do to be a great mathematician is to win the Fields Medal. All you need to do to be a great jurist is to become the Chief Justice of the SCOTUS.
- NewAccnt 14y agoThat's the joke!
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- a3n 14y agoThey got away with it because they're cops.They sped outrageously (literally) because they knew they'd face no consequences. That's an abuse of public trust and duty, whether they're on or off duty.
- ajmurmann 14y agoExactly! My point is that real scandal for me is that apparently most cops won't give other cops a speeding ticket, which enabled the speeding and killing of 20 people in the first place.
- pstuart 14y agoIt gives some hope that it's possible to police the police.
- rhizome 14y agoExcept when that gets the policer threats from officers being policed (and their colleagues in the brotherhood): http://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local/Florida-Highway-Patrol-Trooper-Who-Arrested-Speeding-Miami-Officer-Files-Lawsuit-184753781.html http://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local/Florida-Highway-Patrol-Tr...
- nazgulnarsil 14y agoour only real hope at this point is that the panopticon will go both ways.
- jere 14y ago>The reporters found nearly 800 officers who reached speeds of 90-130 mph, many of them while off duty. The accidents caused by officers driving at high speeds had caused at least 320 crashes since 2004, killing or maiming 21 people. That's such a horrifying statistic if true. Even at their peak, homicide offending rates in the US were at around 20 per 100,000; assault rates about 10 times as high: http://bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/htus8008.pdf http://bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/htus8008.pdf Maybe I'm looking at this the wrong way, but in my mind I'm comparing 20 homicides per 100,000 citizens to to 21 people killed/maimed by a group that is orders of magnitude smaller: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miami_Police_Department http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miami_Police_Department I think this is just another reminder that Bruce Schneier is right when he says we should be more worried about car accidents than terrorism.
- knowtheory 14y ago> That's such a horrifying statistic if true. What more evidence do you want of it's truth? The story's right there. you can see how they reported it. The data is searchable.
- jere 14y agoThe speeding data, yes. I don't know where I'd get access to the 21 killed or maimed though beyond the story. But sure, I probably don't have a good reason to believe the numbers are inaccurate.
- civilian 14y agoOver the period of 2004-2011. So divide by 7. You should also try to find the vehicular death per 100k statistic.
- mrmaddog 14y agoExactly. Per Wikipedia it is about 12 deaths per 100k on average from the period of 2004-2012. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_motor_vehicle_deaths_in_U.S._by_year http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_motor_vehicle_deaths_...
- RyJones 14y agoJohn Allen Paulos has been pushing using toll data for speeding citations for decades, most recently here: http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/WhosCounting/t/story?id=97915&page=1&ref=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/WhosCounting/t/story?id=979...
- AnthonyMouse 14y agoThere are a number of problems with doing things like this. The first is that significant speed differentials are extremely dangerous. Uncalibrated speedometers are very common and very inaccurate. Anything that causes guaranteed enforcement is going to reduce safety because people will start religiously following their speedometer instead of the normal flow of traffic, so now you have people driving all different speeds than one another based on how badly and in which direction their speedometer is miscalibrated. On top of that you have a situation where anyone who has made a stop for coffee or gas is exempt from the timer because of the stop, so you put a number of people driving 15MPH over the limit (because they stopped and aren't subject to the timer) on the same road as people driving 15MPH under the limit (because they haven't stopped and their speedometer is inaccurate) and you're going to see more collisions. Then there is the pragmatic problem. Speeding tickets are big money because the law is enforced sporadically under unpredictable conditions. To generate revenue, enforcement has to be rare enough that it doesn't induce compliance. And the proposed scheme is entirely deterministic. Everyone who doesn't make a stop will discontinue their speeding between toll booths -- which is ostensibly the intended result, except that it means the scheme will generate no money and will deprive the government of existing ticket revenue that would have been generated on that stretch of road. Meanwhile it reduces the need for police presence, which means you'll have to fight the law enforcement unions to boot. It's not at all surprising that there has been little interest in implementing it.
- drakaal 14y agoGreat use case for big data, and a great story about how "shadow data", the data that is avaialbe only through manipulation of data can be extracted.
- austenallred 14y agoThis lends to a trend that's way to prevalent as of late: There are no checks and/or balances on the Police; the only discipline comes internally, often as a result of public outcry. Perhaps it's the bias of what you actually hear about, but it seems like the worst that can happen to a Police officer is paid leave.
- ryanac 14y ago"as of late"? Feels like the lack of checks and balances on the police has been going on for a while. It's only when something major happens that people take notice, like someone putting together this report, now all of a sudden it's a new trend that's way to prevalent as of late. :P
- austenallred 14y agoOK, I guess "as of late" means "since the Internet."
- SoftwareMaven 14y agoIf anything, I bet it has gotten better since the Internet. Pre-Internet, it would take a local news agency to ferret out problems. Now, problems can be reported by anyone and viewed by many.
- sbov 14y agoWhich allows people to read about it more often, making them think the problem is worse now.
- danielharan 14y agoIt's even worse for national security agencies. Questioning whether they are doing a good or necessary job means you're a threat to national security.
- ryderm 14y ago> The reporters found nearly 800 officers who reached speeds of 90-130 mph, many of them while off duty. Well, driving above the speed limit while on duty is required. Why would that be included in the statistic? And driving 90 is hardly out of the ordinary where I'm from. That being said, driving 120 or 130 while off duty is clearly a bad idea.
- jacalata 14y ago"Well, driving above the speed limit while on duty is required." Not always. It is technically not even allowed unless they are actively responding to a call, I believe. (There's a lot of police work that involves being in a marked car without being on your way to stop a robbery in progress).
- uxp 14y ago> Well, driving above the speed limit while on duty is required. Admittedly, it's not really physically possible to catch up to someone traveling at 90 mph when you're limited to 65, however they have lights and sirens that, according to law, they are required to use while responding to an emergency or incident, which broadly covers speeding. According to the original article, more than half of all incidents occurred outside of the officers jurisdictions. Miami-Dade limits officers to 20 mph above the speed limit at all times, even while enroute to an emergency (270 cops were found going over 90, 70 being the highest speed limit in Miami-Dade). FHP limits officers to 15 above the posted limit, but does allow excesses if the situation requires it, but only if the environment allows it and it is safe to do so, but earns the prize for the fastest speed of 129.8 mph. http://databases.sun-sentinel.com/news/broward/ftlaudCopSpeeds/ftlaudCopSpeeds_list.php http://databases.sun-sentinel.com/news/broward/ftlaudCopSpee...
- fyi80 14y agoYou might be interested to learn that radio waves can travel well in excess in of 90mph. as can helicopters. In fact, many jurisdictions ban high-speed chases, specifically because they are more dangerous than they help.
- doorhammer 14y agoWhat makes me happy about this is that it's an example living in the information age. Every day people are gaining more and more tools that can be used to, in a way, force transparency. I think the situation from that standpoint will only get better as stories like this unfold. I really like this one because it's a demonstration that given the right tools, some folks can cut through and make their own transparency. I'm not saying it's a panacea, but I do think that we live in pretty interesting times for this kind of thing. Here's hoping it continues in that direction.
- krschultz 14y agoWe like to talk about the "10x developer", but journalism has to be the field with the highest disparity in value. Some journalists are worth their weight in gold, and some are worth less than nothing.
- wahsd 14y ago"The database was so innovative that two law enforcement agencies sent investigators to the newsroom to learn how to replicate it." Expect your ticket in the mail, while legislation is passed that prevents cops from being held accountable.
- dnm 14y agoI'm curious as to the technical details. I can't imagine why investigators couldn't get access to the raw Sun Pass database, which records tag id, toll booth, and a timestamp, if it works anything like my EZ-Pass system. From that, it's trivial to match up enter/exit records and divide the distance by the time to come up with an average speed. The article says they got the data from 12 police departments. I wonder what kind of records they obtained.
- ajtaylor 14y agoI wondered the same thing. Perhaps the distance between toll booths is what they measured in the 2500 miles driven? It seems like you should be able to get the data from OSM as well, with a lot less time required!
- treerock 14y agoJust guessing here, but I'd imaging they they would have to request the police car transponder details from the police departments, so they could filter police from other drivers.
- ajmurmann 14y agoNothing makes me more upset than corrupt cops. Obviously the off-duty cops got away with speeding because cops don't give tickets to other cops. That's the real scandal. Corrupt cops undermine the entire legal system, which is much worse than anything any terrorist could ever hope to achieve. They should be treated accordingly!
- auctiontheory 14y agoOP here. I'm sensing some generalized anti-police sentiment. Many cities allow residents to "ride along" in a police car for a shift. (In the front!) It's not a bad thing to do.
- beatpanda 14y agoAnti-police sentiment exists here because police abuse their power systematically, and notably so in places with strong tech communities like New York City and the Bay Area (specifically Oakland), residents of which are over-represented on HN.
- pavedwalden 14y agoPersonally, I don't really feel an anti-police sentiment on an individual level. I get that it's a hard job, and I've met some respectable officers. But collectively, the seemingly total lack of accountability drives me nuts.
- sampsonjs 14y agoAnd even the dumbest, most corrupt cop isn't going to do anything scandalous while you're sitting right there. And the flatfoot giving you a ride has probably been told it's his job to babysit you for the night, while they tell you bs about what an unflinching view of the mean streets you're getting.
- kriglin 14y agoIt's true - the majority of crime and unprovoked acts of violence in many regions are committed by law enforcement and the legal system as a whole. The solution is to replace the current feudal legal system with a framework that seeks to reduce violence.
- ck2 14y agoAnd absolutely nothing will change. Like Congress voting back insider-trading. Zero penalty for speeding off-duty cops and they will still kill people and get away with it.
- obviouslygreen 14y agoAnd people will use this as a reason to scream "OMG CORRUPT COPS ALL OF THEM ARE AWFUL!" Welcome to the history of law enforcement. People are people. We all do stupid things, and pretending that cops are anything but people is idiotic. Yes, they should be held to a higher standard. No, that does not mean you should not expect them to fuck up; it means that they should be punished when they do, just like the rest of us. I know people who scream corruption and all sorts of other stupidity every time some government agent does something that seems even remotely wrong. I also know people who will defend, against all logic, all actions of anyone carrying a badge. I fall somewhere in between; I know and have known a whole lot of government employees, and have even been processed by a few of them. Yep, it was my fault, and I can't bring myself to hold it against them. The point is that most people who take the job of upholding the law do so. That the laws aren't perfect is not their fault. That there are people who take that job but still break the law means they're not perfect, and it means they're still subject to the same laws as the rest of us. That's not news; that's just reality. The idea that cops should be perfect sure as hell didn't come from cops. At least, none that I know. Higher standard? Sure. Perfection? Try a mirror. No one can manage that, and if you want perfect people chasing you down the street, you're likely to get sued when they find out you're using Superman without express written permission.
- sfall 14y agook I really am not getting this it says: "the technical challenges were daunting because the raw information does not allow speed calculations,'' Maines said. "We came up with some neat tricks to overcome that, and it's great that the judges recognized our hard work."" I am crazy to think that the raw data would be something like: account#, toll location, time And this would be the bare minimum. How would determining the length between tolls and using the times to determine the average speed required be "neat tricks"? Am I really off? I am not saying it wasn't hard work, but please tell me the real technical challenges, that I really would love to hear.
- cafard 14y agoA retired Marine I know said roughly "we recruit them with commercials showing guys rappelling from helicopters or advancing through fire, we train them to take extreme risks, and we're astonished when they go 130 on a motorcycle and get killed". I have very little interest in driving over about 75, but then I also have very little interest in confronting dangerous people.
- pc86 14y agoA decent chunk of my last few weeks on Parris Island was them telling us how much money they'd spent on us and not to [expletive] it up by killing ourselves doing something stupid.
- pitt1980 14y agoI'm just going to throw this out there, people don't pass marked cars so a marked car driving the speed limit causes traffic to back up behind them for no other reason than to alleviate traffic congestion, it probably makes sense for them to drive 15-20 miles over the speed limit (that obviously doesn't excuse driving 130 mph)
- freehunter 14y agoI would argue that for the sake of the law, having a backup of cars behind an officer all doing the speed limit is a good thing. It's called the speed limit, not the speed range. As in, the maximum you're allowed to do on that road in perfect conditions. If we want to enforce the laws, having everyone follow a pace car going exactly the speed limit is a good thing. Having an officer going 65 in a 55 just to relieve congestion means the law is irrelevant.
- pc86 14y agoI suspect a lot of people would may the majority of speed limits are irrelevant, but I digress.
- jisaacstone 14y agoAgreed. Having laws that _everyone_ breaks is worse than useless, as it encourages a disregard for the law and resentment towards enforcement officers, as well as leaving lots of room for unequal enforcement.
- jamesaguilar 14y agoAlso, having pace cars alleviates traffic jams (assuming the pace car is leaving appropriate space in front of him to absorb traffic shocks). This obviously doesn't work in the current situation because no one feels bad passing a cop in a traffic jam, but there's something to this idea.
- a_m0d 14y agoWhat's the problem with the marked cars driving the speed limit? If all the cars drive at the speed limit, that's good, right? I always thought the speed limit was there as a speed limit. I've found that in Australia, speed limits are obeyed much more than in North America, where they seem to be suggestions or lower bounds on speed. Many times in Canada I've been travelling in traffic that's doing 30 - 40 kph over the speed limit. That's enough to get your car confiscated in Western Australia!