Investigation: Police Chase Violated Procedure

An internal police investigation determined that officers acted improperly in a July 10 car chase that ended up with one child seriously injured and four teenagers hurt. The Professional Standards Section investigation, dated Sept. 4, determined that Specialist Diana Cloud violated department policy and procedure when she pursued a car full of the youths, who had allegedly stolen snacks from a Norwood United Dairy Farmers. Two of the five girls allegedly took the snacks from the store and got into a car driven by a 16-year-old. Cloud, who investigated the alleged theft, saw the car drive near the UDF and pursued it in her cruiser. During the chase — in which Cloud reached 75 miles per hour in a 35-mph zone — the girls’ car crashed into a steel utility pole, sending one to the hospital with a fractured skull and bleeding brain. The investigation found that Cloud’s pursuit was not in compliance with department procedure because of her failure to stop at an intersection, driving more than 20 mph over the speed limit and failure to turn on her digital voice recorder during the chase. The report determined that the girls’ injuries were a result of the driver’s inability to control her car. A May 2011 CityBeat look at a study of police car chases found that almost 40 percent of them result in accidents. A National Highway Traffic Safety Administration study examining deaths resulting from police pursuits found that more than 6,000 crashes and 7,500 deaths were caused by such chases. Almost 2,000 of those deaths — recorded nationally between 1982 and 2008 — were innocent bystanders. The Cincinnati Police Department has a policy in place since the early 1990s dictating when to chase or not to chase, when to break off pursuit and how to conduct chases as safely as possible.  According to the investigation into the July 10 pursuit, Specialist Cloud had decided to break off her pursuit due to the high speed just before the crash occurred, but could not report her decision due to high radio traffic.