Brickbat: Failure To Report

Seven police officers in West Palm Beach, Florida, face charges related to an unauthorized high-speed chase that ended in a fatal crash in Boynton Beach, killing Marcia Pochette and her pregnant daughter, Jenice Woods. The officers pursued suspect Neoni Copeland at speeds up to 119 mph, despite it being against department policy because they only wanted to conduct a routine interview. Copeland crashed into the victims' car, but the officers did not aid or even check on the victims, and they left without notifying authorities in Boynton Beach. The officers also failed to activate their body cameras, notify supervisors, or file paperwork. Three of the officers face two counts of leaving the scene of a crash involving death—a first-degree felony—while all seven face one count of official misconduct, a third-degree felony.

Comments

[bye]

Chasing a car at 119mph I might forget to pick up the milk at hte grocery store !!! No surprise at all , at least to me.

[Fist of Etiquette]

I'm assuming they'll get off and Copeland will be convicted of the deaths.

[Mockamodo]

I'm curious why the heck is a woman with a pregnant child in her car is driving 119 mph evading police? I've found numerous articles on this but NONE even broach the subject, it's all about the cops.

[Bob1062]

They weren't chasing them. They were caught in the crossfire, as it were. They were chasing a different suspect, she was the one evading police.

[Roberta]

Yeah, and what was the routine questioning to be about? Gotta be a big story.

[mad.casual]

This feels like a one-in-a-million or return-to-true-form brickbat.

For so long, probably before body cams, there were a lot of "No one was clear as to why police were on the scene. Bullets struck bodies. Nothing else happened." and Reason, apparently, assumed every last cop was abusing their authority at all times.

Then, for years, we got false portrayals, one-sided stories, contradictory and favorable narratives about "Police shoot unarmed man in back at ex-girlfriends house (where they were called because of a restraining order and the knife she alleges he threatened her with was recovered at the scene." right alongside "Kyle Rittenhouse shouldn't have been there."

Assuming receipts, we've finally gotten back to a "WTF were these police officers doing?" reporting.

[AT]

No link to source material.

Chaz is basically stealing money from KMW at this point.

[mad.casual]

Remember Priscilla Villareal and how President Biden found out about a 10 yr. old girl getting an abortion in IN because he overheard something from a little birdie?

It's interesting how anyone with a badge is not to be trusted, unless that badge says, "Press". In which case, even though they've been lying for generations at this point, to the degree that there are several overt and documented social phenomenon around it, they are just doing the Free Speech work as ordained by "our" Creator. A few rotten apple cops spoils the entire cart, but an entire field of journalism literally awarding itself accolades for distortion and abuse of the truth to the point that a college-educated SCOTUS jurist can't answer the question "What is a woman?" is just how life on this side of the thin blue line is supposed to work.

[AT]

Make sure you take the time to appreciate the headline of this article.

[Jerry B.]

But did they shoot a dog?

[Get To Da Chippah]

https://www.wptv.com/news/region-c-palm-beach-county/west-palm-beach/west-palm-beach-officers-accused-of-driving-119-mph-in-chase-of-suspect-that-resulted-in-crash-that-killed-2

According to data pulled from one of the vehicle's location systems, investigators said the chase started at 7:59 p.m. at 25th Street and Australian Avenue, went south to Okeechobee Boulevard onto I-95, then southbound to the Lantana Road exit. It concluded at the intersection of Lantana Road and Congress Avenue, where the collision between Copeland and the vehicle occupied by Pochette and Woods occurred at around 8:09 p.m.

Boynton Beach police officers responded to the wreck minutes later while the two women were still trapped in their vehicle.

Investigators said Copeland ran from the scene and was caught by police about 10 minutes later. According to court documents, Copeland said he was fleeing because he was being chased by West Palm Beach police.

Video footage from businesses near the surrounding roadways showed the officers fleeing the scene immediately after the fatal wreck, according to the investigation. The arrest affidavit said none of the officers exited their vehicles to check on the crash victims and render aid, and none of them notified emergency personnel.

The arrest report said that all three of the police vehicles returned to West Palm Beach after the crash.

According to court documents, the West Palm Beach lieutenant on duty that night was not aware of the incident until almost three hours later because none of the officers told their supervisor about the incident. The lieutenant was made aware of the accident after getting a call from a West Palm Beach police sergeant, who got a call from a Boynton Beach police captain.

Investigators said one of the police cars involved in the chase was equipped with a vehicle location system and pinpointed the excessive speeds during the chase, including 119 mph on I-95 South, 98 mph westbound on Lantana Road at the edge of Lake Osborne and 103 mph on I-95 North (after the crash).

Additionally, none of the officers had activated their body cameras during the pursuit.

Emphasis copied from the article.