Pubdate: Sun, 21 Nov 2010
Source: New York Times (NY)
Page: A33A
Copyright: 2010 The New York Times Company
Contact: http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/lettertoeditor.html
Website: http://www.nytimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/298
Author: Brandi Grissom and John Tedesco

A BORDER FACT OF LIFE: HIGH-SPEED CHASES

On a quiet November morning, Trooper Johnny Hernandez patrolled the 
dusty back roads along the Rio Grande in Hidalgo County. In the back 
seat, his M4 rifle sat within arm's reach. In the trunk, he stored a 
bulletproof vest.

Trooper Hernandez, a 15-year veteran of the Department of Public 
Safety, has been in so many high-speed pursuits that he cannot 
remember the first one, and he doesn't know which has been the scariest.

There is so much going on, he said, "your thoughts are going 100 
miles per hour."

Often, so is his car.

According to department pursuit reports analyzed by The Texas Tribune 
and The San Antonio Express-News, officers like Trooper Hernandez on 
the United States-Mexico border were involved in far more high-speed 
chases from January 2005 to July 2010 than were officers in other 
regions of Texas. Statewide, troopers were involved in nearly 5,000 
pursuits in that period. About 13 percent of those, 656, were in 
Hidalgo County. Of the 10 counties with the most chases, 5 were along 
the border.

Data confirms what troopers on the border say is their daily reality: 
smugglers are becoming more active and brazen, taking more desperate 
measures to evade capture. But troopers also often use aggressive 
pursuit tactics -- including firing guns and setting up roadblocks -- 
that many other law enforcement agencies prohibit.

One expert, Prof. Geoffrey P. Alpert at the University of South 
Carolina, said the policies at the Texas Department of Public Safety 
allowed troopers to take too many risks, jeopardizing the lives of 
officers and citizens. "They're crazy," said Dr. Alpert, who has 
studied pursuits at police departments across the country.

Statewide, chases by the department resulted in 1,300 accidents, 780 
injuries to officers, pursued drivers and bystanders, 28 deaths and 
an estimated $8.4 million in property damage in the last five years. 
In Hidalgo County, the chases caused 71 injuries, two deaths and more 
than $440,000 in property damage.

Trooper Hernandez and others who patrol the Interstates, highways and 
meandering caliche roads that connect the United States and Mexico, 
said the primary reason they see the most chases is simple: location.

"We're the first line of defense out here," Trooper Hernandez said. 
"We're going to have pursuits."

There is also more of a Department of Public Safety presence, with an 
additional 160 troopers assigned to the border since 2006. About a 
decade ago, just 20 highway patrolmen worked in Hidalgo County, said 
Lt. Armando Garza, who supervises troopers there, but today there are 60.

Lieutenant Garza recently moved back to the border after working for 
12 years in Corpus Christi, where, he said, troopers had one or two 
chases every three or four months. In Hidalgo County, it is 
practically a daily occurrence. The peak, he said, was earlier this 
year when there were six in two days, including one that ended when 
the driver escaped from his car but was pinned under a train that 
severed his arm.

The only thing to do, Lieutenant Garza said, is to remind troopers 
not to take unwarranted risks.

The risks do not always result in the fleeing driver in handcuffs. In 
about 40 percent of the chases in Hidalgo County, the drivers escaped 
on foot -- or swam across the Rio Grande to Mexico. Statewide, more 
than 30 percent of the department's chases ended with the driver 
escaping on foot. Fewer than a quarter of all drivers, both statewide 
and in Hidalgo County, stopped and surrendered.

To avoid arrest, and to get the drugs or the humans they are hauling 
into Texas, drivers are getting creative, troopers said. In the last 
year, the smugglers started using bags of homemade spikes --nails 
welded together in a triangular shape -- to blow out the tires on 
patrol vehicles. They also take advantage of dirt roads in rural 
areas to kick up dust, reduce visibility and elude officers.

The pursued drivers seem to have little regard even for their own 
lives. Last April, Trooper Edwardo Ruiz was blazing down back roads 
in Hidalgo County, with siren blaring and lights flashing, in pursuit 
of a reckless driver in a black pickup. Suddenly the truck's red 
taillights disappeared. Trooper Ruiz, filmed on his car's dashboard 
camera, stopped where the road came to a dead end.

"It looks like they grew wings and flew or something," Trooper Ruiz 
said to another officer on his cellphone, as he peered into dark, empty fields.

Thirty minutes later, officers found the truck smashed into a canal 
on the other side of the dead end. The 18-year-old driver was dead. 
His blood-alcohol content was 0.22, nearly three times the legal 
limit in Texas.

Department policies allow troopers to engage in riskier chase tactics 
than large Texas police and sheriff's departments. Troopers can set 
up rolling and stationary roadblocks to end a chase, a strategy they 
used 68 times from 2005 to 2010. They can also shoot out a vehicle's 
tires if other methods, like deploying spike strips, fail to stop the 
pursuit. They fired their guns during chases nearly 90 times over the 
last five years, including 14 times in urban areas.

By contrast, the San Antonio, Austin and Fort Worth Police 
Departments and the Harris County Sheriff's Office prohibit officers 
from using their firearms during a pursuit except in self-defense, 
and they are not allowed to set up roadblocks to stop a chase.

Trooper Hernandez said that if a driver began to flee, he would 
almost certainly give chase, but that he would disengage if it put 
the lives of other officers or of the public at risk. Yet only 142 of 
the department's nearly 5,000 chases analyzed by The Tribune and The 
Express-News -- less than 3 percent -- were terminated voluntarily by 
the trooper or a supervisor.

Dr. Alpert said most state highway patrol departments had "very 
aggressive, loose policies." In 2007, the Texas department 
acknowledged that it needed to do a better job of giving officers 
hands-on training after crashes involving troopers rose 30 percent.

"We fall short in providing the necessary practical driver training 
to our officers," stated a February 2007 newsletter by the 
department's public information office.

At the time, troopers practiced their driving skills at a parking lot 
around a football field in Austin. Since then, the department has 
built a modern training course, where more than 880 officers have 
trained since June 2009.

Department officials and troopers on the border said their training 
had improved in recent years and that safety was their top priority.

"We've got families, too," Trooper Hernandez said, "and we want to go 
home to them."

Troopers, particularly those on the border, quickly acquire 
real-world experience in driving safety and remaining calm, Trooper 
Hernandez said.

Standing on the banks of the Rio Grande, between a neighborhood of 
mobile homes and a colorful waterfront bar, he recalled when the 
river was full of boaters, and locals cooked food on the banks and 
enjoyed the breeze. Now the revelers are gone, and he and other 
troopers regularly stand guard while workers pull vehicles loaded 
with drugs from the muddy river.

"They all run," he said. "It's easy money for them, and they don't 
want to get caught."

This article was produced by The Texas Tribune in partnership with 
the San Antonio Express-News. 
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake