So, here I go again

By Jon Farris, Chief Advocate and sad dad
11/2/2024

Paul celebrating Halloween circa 2004

18 Birthdays

November 2, 2024 is our son Paul’s 41st birthday.

But he’s not here, so for the 18th year we won’t celebrate with him. Every parent can understand how much this hurts.  Anyway, HAPPY BIRTHDAY, buddy.

Where are you now my friend?
I miss those days
I hope they take good care of you there
And you can still play the guitar
And sing your songs
I just miss those days
And miss you so
Wish I could be strong
When darkness comes

As I repeat often and after so many years, many law enforcement agencies continue with incredibly dangerous and deadly chases – the vast majority for simple traffic violations and property crimes – even when the fleeing driver was not endangering anyone at the time the pursuit was started. It defies logic.

The good news, if you can call it that, is that a group of law enforcement professionals and the Justice Department now strongly believe pursuits should be limited.

“… pursuits should take place only when two very specific standards are met”:

(1) A violent crime has been committed and
(2) the suspect poses an imminent threat to commit another violent crime.” (PERF Report here)

Will law enforcement agencies adopt these changes? Only time will tell.

Several days after Paul was killed, Boston Globe columnist Margery Eagan wrote the following editorial. I wish more had changed since Paul was killed. I wish Paul’s birthdays were spent together celebrating with our family. I wish…

Police chases not worth risk of tragedy

by Margery Eagan
Boston Globe Columnist
This editorial is no longer posted on the Boston Globe Web site

“Here’s yet another question: would you prefer someone driving through Boston erratically at 40 mph, or chased by police, at 70 or 80 mph?”

May 31, 2007—Explain this, please: Because about 100 children a year are abducted and killed by strangers, we have totally revamped American childhood. “Good” parents won’t even let children in the back yard alone.

Yet at least that many innocent Americans, including children (some estimate two or three times as many) are killed every year in police chases. And every time I’ve written a column asking if these chases are worth it, the response is the same.

Surely I am insane.

Really?

Two innocent bystanders killed; one permanently injured

The latest police chase tragedy came early Sunday morning when Javier Morales, 29, refused to stop for a state trooper in Everett. Morales made an illegal left turn off Route 16. He had no license and feared jail time for a previous no-license arrest.

Perhaps if he faced greater jail time for refusing to stop for police — a penalty many have proposed to reduce these chases — Morales, weighing his options, would have made a different choice. To stop.

As it was, Trooper Joseph Kalil chased Morales’ stolen SUV from Everett to Somerville’s Davis Square, where Morales plowed into a cab driven by Walid Chahine, 45, a husband and father. In the backseat were musician Paul Farris, 23, and his girlfriend Katelyn Hoyt. Hoyt and Chahine [Walid Chahine died at the hospital.] are at Mass. General, critically injured. Farris is dead.

The fourth victim: Trooper Kalil, who must live with what happened for the rest of his days.

So why is it that state police here, and in many other states, chase traffic violators at all? Boston police don’t. Neither do police in many other big cities, in part because of the risk of multimillion-dollar lawsuits. Boston’s pursuit standards are higher than those followed by state police: Boston is supposed to chase only violent or dangerous suspects or those driving erratically, possibly because of drugs or alcohol.

Here’s yet another question: would you prefer someone driving through Boston erratically at 40 mph, or chased by police, at 70 or 80 mph?

One more question: Why do we assume that chasing even dangerous criminals is always worth the risk of maiming or killing a pedestrian or family in a minivan?

Myth vs. Fact

The myth, by the way, is that police typically or even regularly chase the dangerous, “that there’s a dead body in the trunk,” says Geoffrey Alpert of the University of South Carolina, who’s studied police pursuits since 1983.

The fact is, between 75 and 80 percent of chases occur after moving violations, says Alpert. “They’re mostly young kids who’ve made stupid decisions. The more powerful tool for police? Turn off the lights and siren and it’s more likely the suspect will slow down.”

I guess the idea of letting the bad guy get away seems un-American. Perhaps, too, the car chase is too rooted in American legend, from “The French Connection” to O.J. to whatever live police pursuit Fox and MSNBC can find and broadcast.

And perhaps politicians don’t want to buck police. And then there’s adrenaline: If you’ve heard a chase on a police radio, you know want I’m talking about.

Yesterday Pearl Allen, a retired music and Afro-American studies teacher at John D. O’Bryant School, said what many say who lose family to police pursuits. That if police hadn’t chased, her grandson “would still be alive.”

Quentin Osbourne, once a standout for the Boston Raiders Pop Warner team, was 15 when he was ejected from a Hyundai Elantra he and six friends had piled into.

The 16-year-old unlicensed driver ran a stop sign. Police chased. He drove into a brick wall.

“They were just kids,” his grandmother said. “(The police) put on the flashing blue light. I think the driver got scared and sped away, and they just kept chasing until they crashed.”