Of the four
western Chatham County municipalities, Garden City (the largest) and Port Wentworth (one of the smallest, population-wise), are the only two whose police departments employ the maneuver known as PIT.When a driver decides to run from the police, he or she has already decided that my life and the lives of everyone else on the road are worth exactly zero. All that counts to the fleeing driver is himself. Personally, I don't care for that attitude. It's how innocent people get killed. Each police department decides for itself how to handle chases, and some have instituted policies that ban pursuits altogether. Since I get to express my opinion here on my own Website, I think banning pursuits shows an appalling lack of interest in the public's welfare.
I attended PIT training, rode in the cars that do the PIT and the ones the PIT is done to, and I am satisfied that, done properly in the right set of circumstances, the PIT is an excellent way to stop a fleeing driver. Since Garden City and Port Wentworth started using the PIT, a couple of drivers had accidents--an SUV rolled in Port Wentworth and a car did some spectacular gymnastics in Garden City. Nobody in those vehicles was hurt in either case, but so what if they had been? The drivers certainly weren't worried about hurting anyone else at the time. One was traveling at a high rate of speed the wrong way on a busy four-lane divided highway.
Here's the story on that one, from an article I wrote in the Spirit in August 2001:
Two men attempting to elude the Rincon Police didn’t get caught because they made a wrong turn. In fact, they didn’t turn at all, and wound up driving straight into the waiting arms—er, PIT bumper—of Port Wentworth police.
The pair refused to produce any identification, but are tentatively identified as Maurice Wells, 24, and Christopher Williams, 19, both of Savannah. They were arrested in the wee hours of Tuesday morning after traveling several miles on the wrong side of Highway 21.
Wells, who was apparently the driver of the red Isuzu Rodeo, turned out of Wal-Mart in Rincon directly into oncoming traffic, said Corporal Loren R. Scholes of the Port Wentworth Police Department. Besides being on the wrong side of the road, the vehicle’s license plate was missing.
Rincon Police Corporal Fredy Wagoner attempted to pull the driver over, but the SUV kept going. At one point, someone apparently tossed what appeared to be a handgun out of the car.
Traveling at high speed, the vehicle sped south in the northbound lanes of Highway 21, running several startled drivers off the road and nearly hitting more than one.
Meanwhile, Cpl. Scholes, who is experienced in the PIT (Precision Intercept Technique) maneuver, positioned his police car in the median near the Ponderosa on Highway 21.
"If ever there’s a chase where the PIT should be used," Cpl. Scholes said, "it’s that one. Because when they’re driving 90 miles an hour, going in the opposite direction of traffic, driver’s aren’t expecting that."
Cpl. Scholes said that most drivers seeing blue police lights in front of them will assume the police are stopped. If drivers do realize the police cars are approaching, he said, people tend to watch them, so the driver’s attention is diverted away from the violator.
"Worse yet," he said, "someone could have been turning onto the highway from a business. When you’re making a right turn on a one-way street, you look to the left and don’t look to the right at all. It very easily could have turned out deadly."
Port Wentworth police use the PIT maneuver to stop fleeing drivers quickly—and have done so on many occasions. Only officers trained in the maneuver and who have cars fitted with the special PIT bumpers are allowed to perform the maneuver, which involves hitting a fleeing driver’s vehicle with the bumper. The police officer must not only choose the safest place to PIT the other car, but must carefully choose exactly where to hit the other car to get it stopped. And the officer usually has to make these decisions within seconds.
Cpl. Scholes performed the PIT maneuver 71 seconds after he joined the chase.
"As soon as I heard they were going the wrong way on 21, I knew that there was no choice," Cpl. Scholes said. "I knew they were going to stop, they were going to wreck, or I was going to PIT them. But we weren’t going to chase them like that. It’s way too dangerous."
The SUV rolled, coming to rest on the shoulder of the southbound lane. "When you start talking about PITting a sport utility vehicle, a pickup truck or off road vehicles, especially at that kind of speed," Cpl. Scholes said, "the chances of the car flipping over go through the roof. It’s a choice I have to make as to whether I take the risk with him."
He said that because there are so many places for traffic to enter the highway from side streets, allowing the SUV to keep going was simply too dangerous for innocent motorists. A head-on collision at such high speeds, he said, would have devastating consequences.
"Traffic was light and we were fortunate with that, but it only takes one," Cpl. Scholes said.
The two suspects climbed out of the wrecked vehicle and fled on foot, but Officer Charles Guyer and Cpl. Scholes put a swift end to that chase, as well. The suspects were arrested and taken to Effingham County Jail. The driver was charged with fleeing to elude, reckless driving, no driver’s license on person, headlight requirement violation, no proof of insurance, and obstruction by fleeing.
The passenger was charged with obstruction by fleeing. Both were arraigned in Port Wentworth city court Tuesday and were returned to Effingham County to face charges there.
Police have not yet determined whether the Isuzu was stolen.
And the newspaper article that appeared in the Spirit in February, 2002, on the car that performed a few gymnastics of its own after a PIT:
A Garden City police officer was slightly injured when a man he stopped for a broken taillight and failure to wear a seatbelt tried to flee.
Staff Sergeant Wayne Daniels stopped the green 1977 Fleetwood Cadillac on Ogeechee Road just north of Fall Street late Saturday night. The driver, Allen Adkins of Savannah, told Staff Sgt. Daniels that he did not have his wallet, license or insurance information with him.
"But," Staff Sgt. Daniels said, "when he got out of the car, I noticed he had a wallet in his back pocket." And while he interviewed Mr. Adkins, Staff Sgt. Daniels saw that the car had two license plates, one attached atop the other.
"I noticed he was very nervous," Staff Sgt. Daniels said, "so I asked for other units to come. I was trying to talk so he wouldn’t hear me."
Officer Benji Selph heard Staff Sgt. Daniels on the radio, but couldn’t make out what he was saying. He decided not to take any chances and radioed back that he was on the way.
Officer Shawn Myers was also in the area, on a traffic stop of his own, and heard the radio traffic. He was closer than Officer Selph, so he finished quickly and left to back up Staff Sgt. Daniels.
Meanwhile, the antsy offender gave Staff Sgt. Daniels a Social Security number—leaving off a couple of digits. "I asked him again, and he added numbers to make it complete," Staff Sgt. Daniels said. "Then he said he had an expired ID in the car."
Mr. Adkins rooted around under the seat of the car as if looking for the promised identification, Staff Sgt. Daniels said, but then got into the seat. When he suddenly turned the key in the ignition, Staff Sgt. Daniels warned him not to run, and both men grabbed for the gearshift at the same time, struggling for control.
As the car lurched away, it struck Staff Sgt. Daniels, who nevertheless went back to his own car, calling on the radio that the driver was fleeing. He went after the Cadillac, which quickly accelerated to around 80 mph. With the intersection of Chatham Parkway and Ogeechee Road not far ahead, Staff Sgt. Daniels tried to go around the Cadillac and force it to stop. Instead of stopping, the driver steered his car as if to ram the police car.
"I saw the light at Chatham Parkway was red," Staff Sgt. Daniels said, and there were several cars in the intersection. "Since he dodged me and the light up there was red, I knew he wasn’t going to slow down. I couldn’t let him go into that intersection at 80 mph," he said.
The Cadillac was speeding along in the center lane of the highway. With Officer Myers coming up behind him and Officer Selph not far behind, and knowing other officers would also be on the way to assist, Staff Sgt. Daniels announced on the radio his intention to PIT the driver.
The Precision Immobilization Technique involves striking a fleeing car at a certain point which throws the car into a spin the driver cannot control, bringing the car to a stop. Depending upon the type of vehicle, its speed and the amount of force involved by the two vehicles coming together, the fleeing car may spin partway or completely around. On rare occasions, the vehicle may roll over, which is exactly what the Cadillac did.
"The vehicle probably rolled," Staff Sgt. Daniels said, "because it’s a heavier car and the axle broke."
For the car’s driver, the night quickly went downhill. A wheel broke off when the car hit the curb, and then the car stopped rolling, only to turn end over end. It came to rest against a signpost on the side of the road, but by then the Cadillac’s momentum was so slow that the sign remained upright.
Officer Myers immediately called for EMS, in case the driver was injured.
Mr. Adkins, however, was evidently in better shape than his car. He crawled out of the wrecked vehicle and started to run, but Staff Sgt. Daniels had brought his car around and was out of it already, heading for the Cadillac. Seeing him, the driver turned to run the other way, only to discover that Officer Myers was also out of his car, coming towards him.
"He went through a fence trying to get away from Myers," Staff Sgt. Daniels said. Officer Selph had also arrived, and the three officers caught up with the driver a few yards inside the fence surrounding an Ogeechee Road business.
"He had his hand under him," Officer Selph said, "and we didn’t know if he was holding a gun or not. He wouldn’t let us pull his hand out at first." It took several minutes to get Mr. Adkins in custody.
Mr. Adkins, who refused treatment by EMS at the scene and was subsequently rejected by the Chatham County Jail because he has high blood pressure, later told the officers that he ran because he was "scared the police were going to shoot him."
He was charged, Staff Sgt. Daniels said, "with a multitude of traffic offenses, obstruction by fleeing, and giving a false name and information." Since the jail refused to accept him, Mr. Adkins was taken home and is due to appear in court soon.
Notice the last line of the above story. The Chatham County Sheriff recently sued the county over budget cuts the County Commission made, claiming he couldn't operate the department without the full measure of funds allocated for the purpose. The man arrested in the previous story wasn't the only lawbreaker who got to go home recently. As a citizen, I have to wonder exactly what purpose a jail serves if it refuses to accept people the police have arrested. People are arrested because the law says they are not fit or not safe running loose among law-abiding residents. People who are arrested are normally kept in a jail, aren't they?
An excerpt from a feature on the jail:
…you'll be asked if you are ill or injured. "One of our questions," Cpl. Barbour said, "is are you hurt, are you bleeding from anywhere?" If you are, the nurse on duty will check you out. The jail has a licensed practical nurse as well as a registered nurse. If you are injured, you may be left in handcuffs until the nurse finishes examining you. If you are injured and require more medical care than the nurse is equipped to administer, the CCDC will refuse to take you and then the arresting officer will see that you get to the emergency room for treatment.
Why is hypertension--an increasingly common condition among African Americans, who coincidentally make up the majority of the jail's population--considered a legitimate reason to refuse taking an arrestee into a facility that has a registered nurse and an infirmary? Why are people unfit to be in society being sent home? How can the Sheriff's Department, mandated to run the jail and provide court services, justify spending taxpayer money to conduct traffic enforcement and other police services while failing to provide adequate service in its own realm?
But I digress.
The police cars in the above cases sustained almost no damage. This is usually the case when a PIT is performed properly, though a department committed to using the maneuver also has to be accept that damage is possible.
Also from the Spirit:
Two men turned left the parking lot of the Rincon Wal-Mart and sped south on Highway 21. Unfortunately, they were in the northbound lanes. Rincon police and Effingham County Sheriff’s Deputies chased the SUV at speeds in excess of 90 mph. The driver crossed into Port Wentworth, where Corporal Loren R. Scholes waited. That's as far as those suspects got, too.
In late January 2001, a driver trying to outrun Port Wentworth Police blew through school zones at a high rate of speed on Highway 21 in Garden City, crossed over to Highway 80, and wound up on Chatham Parkway--where Officer Jeffcoat made sure he’d stay.
Do you see a pattern?
Fleeing to elude isn't exactly the smartest thing to do in any town, but in Garden City and Port Wentworth, drivers who tried to outrun the police often found themselves spinning to a quick stop when police officers with specially outfitted cars performed the PIT maneuver.
PIT stands for Precision Immobilization Technique. A police car with the PIT bumper and a trained officer at the wheel catches up to a fleeing vehicle and bumps into the car. The jolt sends the car spinning off to one side--and out of the running.
As if fleeing drivers don't have it hard enough in these adjoining municipalities, Garden City and Port Wentworth Police Departments are going to make life even more miserable for offenders--and safer for residents.
The two departments recently began conducting training sessions so that every police officer in both cities will be certified to perform the PIT should he--or she--become involved in a vehicle pursuit that needs a quick ending. The distinctive-looking PIT bumpers have already been installed or are on order for all of the patrol cars, too.
Not all pursuits end in a PIT maneuver, says Staff Sgt. Wayne Daniels of the Garden City Police Department, one of the instructors for the school. Staff Sgt. Daniels stresses safety during the class, and outlines the criteria an officer needs to consider when deciding whether or not to PIT during a pursuit. The manual produced for the class reads in part, "If the danger of using PIT is greater than the threat of danger presented by the violator, do not PIT."
According to one of the school's instructors, Sgt. Matt Libby of the Port Wentworth Police Department, police pursuits last an average of 25 minutes. "Our pursuits (that end with the PIT maneuver) average only 3 minutes," Sgt. Libby said. The longest lasted just over 7 minutes, and the shortest was over in under a minute. "It’s just a fundamentally sound technique to use if done properly," he said.
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PIT instructors (Kneeling, L-R) Sgt. Matt Libby, Port Wentworth Police Department, and Sgt. Brian Hood, Garden City Police Department; (Standing, L-R) Staff Sgt. Wayne Daniels and APO Blair Jeffcoat, Garden City Police Department; Corporals Loren R. Scholes and James Ryan, Port Wentworth Police Department. |
When an officer chases an offender, the adrenaline level naturally shoots upward, bringing a host of physiological changes including increased heart rate, shallow breathing and tunnel vision. While this is Nature’s way of making sure a person focuses solely on whatever threat has presented itself, a police officer has to, in part, resist the fight-or-flight reaction. Not only does he have to watch the threat (the offender), but he has to keep track of everything and everyone in the vicinity.
"If you drive your car, if you plan ahead and you think ahead to what’s going on and you talk about that on the tape, you’re going to be calmer," says Cpl. Scholes, another of the instructors.
"When it comes time to do the PIT maneuver, you will be calm, it will be planned, and if something goes wrong, you should have it all on tape. It's harder to do than you think it is. It's not an easy thing," he said.
The best thing to do is to maintain your professional demeanor. "You have to try and work yourself out of it," said Sgt. Libby. "You’ve got to look down the road, look in your mirrors, talk to yourself, talk on the radio and also into your microphone. That’s going to help you concentrate and help you control your breathing, because you’re going to get shallow breathing and sweaty hands."
Fight-or-flight causes the short-term memory to shut down, Sgt. Libby said. Police officers’ training is stored in short-term memory, which makes controlling the adrenaline surge even more important. "You’ve got to keep officer safety first and foremost," he said. "You’re no good if you get hurt."
Controlling emotions can be difficult after a pursuit, Sgt. Libby said. "When you’re running 110 miles an hour and you PIT somebody, you have to maintain control of your emotions. Ninety-nine percent of emotional responses are controlled by our thoughts. That’s why we want to try to calm ourselves during this pursuit."
Nearly every aspect of a pursuit adds to both the stress and adrenaline levels. "The blue lights and siren, the high rate of speed," Sgt. Libby said, adding that not all pursuits occur at a high rate of speed. "Your verbal and physical gestures," he went on, "unanswered questions about the suspect--what is this guy running for, why am I chasing him, why is he driving like a maniac, why is he going through a school zone at 110 at two in the afternoon?"
Poor communication with other officers or dispatchers adds frustration to the mix, Sgt. Libby said.
There is no real defense against a PIT. Once the PIT is performed, the chase is over and the suspect gets a practical lesson in physics and inertia he or she is unlikely to ever forget.
Depending on which side the PIT bumper strikes, the suspect vehicle veers to the right or the left, and the driver has absolutely no control. The PIT car driver, meanwhile, breezes right on by, retaining command of his vehicle. If the suspect can regain control of his vehicle at all after the PIT maneuver, it won’t be for several seconds--which gives police plenty of time to catch him.
Instructors emphasize that the PIT maneuver is not to be used to take someone into custody. It is a means to put a swift, safe end to a high-speed pursuit. Period.
Garden City Officer Benji Selph thinks the training will help protect motorists in both Garden City and Port Wentworth, which have extremely busy major thoroughfares. Because it safely and quickly ends pursuits, the PIT maneuver can keep offenders from racing through busy intersections and causing tragic accidents. "It’s very effective," he said. "It saves a lot of lives."
This is exactly what a fleeing driver does not want to see in his rearview mirror.
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