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Thursday, October 10, 2013

Un-Belted, Handcuffed Arrestee Killed When Police Car Rear-Ended by Drunk Driver



In a story of with multiple levels of criminal incompetence all leading to the death of a woman in police custody occurred in downtown Houston at 3:30 in the morning.  A 21 year-old woman was arrested on public intoxication, handcuffed and put in the back of a squad car, but was not seatbelted in.  It wasn’t reported, but likely she had her hands cuffed behind her back for an easy out when she got to jail.


A terrible thing happened on the way, though.  The driver of a Chevy Cobalt ran a red light and rammed the squad car.  You can see the damage in the picture to the left. It looks as though the side windows are up, but the rear window was blown out in the crash.  The Cobalt was obviously going way, way too fast for Chartress, a slow neighborhood street near downtown Houston.  The woman in the squad car was thrown from the cruiser and later pronounced dead at Ben Taub Hospital. The driver of the Cobalt was charged with intoxication manslaughter.

There was no report of what, if any, charges would come down on the officer, who put an intoxicated, handcuffed woman in the backseat of a squad car and didn’t belt her in.  There have long been reports of offers putting arrested  individuals in the back seat, with their hands cuffed behind their backs and not belting them, letting them flail around in the back seat on the drive to the jail as a sort of unamusing (except to the officer) extra punishment.  Obviously this needs to end.  It’s not funny when someone gets flung around a squad car.  It’s really not funny when someone dies from a rear-end collision because they weren’t belted in by a police officer.

Full Story and photograph: http://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Suspect-killed-in-HPD-squad-car-crash-near-4862290.php?cmpid=hpts

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