This is part one of a four-part entry about the damage caused by the 2021 Washington police pursuit law. This entry covers the lives lost to traffic accidents as a result of this legislation. The associated spike in drunk drivers will be covered in part two, the unprecedented crime wave and it’s horrendous impact on Renton residents and businesses will be handled in part three, and the setback to Washington State environmental progress will be covered in part four. 10/28/2023 Update: I’ve covered this topic extensively during the past ten months, since publication of this first article. To see these later entries, click here
Last week Washington Transportation Safety Commission reported that 2022 saw the most traffic deaths on Washington roads since 1990, a total of 745 last year.
After decades of positive safety trends on Washington highways, our lawmakers in Olympia have seemingly put Renton’s and other Washington streets on the path to becoming Fury Road.
Traffic fatalities are up by 37 % since 2019, an inconceivable loss of an additional 207 souls beyond the 2019 baseline. Even worse, the trend in new deaths is accelerating with no end in sight. With no effective enforcement for the most dangerous drivers in our state, we will all be increasingly at risk of dying on our streets and highways. (Note that for every highway death, there are about three serious maimings like head injuries or limb-losses, and dozens less serious but painful injuries; 207 deaths equates to thousands of tragic accidents.)
Starting in July of 2021, any driver willing to break the law can choose not to pull over for police when requested. They exercise this new privilege by simply stepping on the gas and exceeding the speed limit. Under the new RCW 10.116.060, the police may not chase them unless they are in the process of committing a violent felony, a sex crime, or they are intoxicated.
They are allowed to go on their way, even if they are in a stolen car and leaving the scene of a burglary. It doesn’t matter if their vehicle lacks basic required safety equipment, or even a license plate. It can be a pickup truck full of stolen catalytic converters, and the police must not pursue. As more and more criminals get word that they can steal a car, take anything they want, and speed away from police without getting pursued, we can expect even more carnage. With opportunity like this, we should expect burglars and car thieves to relocate from other states.
Of course anyone who works with highway safety could predict the carnage such a law would bring. Astronomical increases in the rates of stolen cars, unlicensed and uninsured drivers everywhere you look, smash and grab burglaries in every business district, road rage shootings, and worst of all deadly, preventable car crashes that currently take another innocent life every two days. I recently posted on a Facebook page about this rash of new highway deaths and loss of ability to enforce traffic laws on the worst offenders, and within minutes I heard from a Renton Mom grieving the recent passing of her daughter who was struck down by one of these hapless drivers.
Why did the legislature pass such a calamitous law, killing an additional 207 Washington residents a year –and counting? Because they had data that said that between two to six people fleeing police each year crashed and died (sometimes killing a bystander also), and the legislature wanted to try to save these lives. Trying to save a few mostly-fleeing suspects has cost us 207 innocent lives per year, and this lopsided, horrible result is accelerating. In engineering terms, this type of catastrophic miscalculation is referred to as “sub-optimizing for one element of safety.” This can be a deadly mistake rookie engineers make when they don’t have a more senior engineer ensuring that they carefully map out and address all possible unintended consequences of changes made in the name of safety.
Enforcement of rules is one of the three basic elements of a well-engineered highway transportation system, along with safe highway design standards, and safe automobile standards. These three elements are like a three-legged stool that supports our safety on our roads. With the enforcement leg removed, Washington motorists are now balancing precariously on a two legged stool. Peace officers have been forced to stand down in many cases when they know they could stop future tragedies.
What can be done?
Fortunately, our state legislature is looking at this law again this year, and some who originally voted for it are expressing willingness to reconsider. Our governor signed the law originally, and even he has acknowledged that it may need to be rolled back. There are bills in the senate and the house to reverse this, and allow police to pursue traffic menaces again. Please contact your legislator and encourage them to support House Bill 1053 and a companion bill out of the senate.
Note 1: Traffic deaths increased across the United States in 2020 as a result of reduced enforcement during the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. These US average rates are now starting to drop back toward their pre-pandemic levels as life returns to normal and other states diligently enforce traffic laws again, while Washington’s accident rates continue to climb unacceptably.
Note 2: The data for this blog comes directly from Washington State Transportation Safety Commission and the Federal National Highway Transportation Safety Agency.
Thanks for such a thoughtful, informative summary of the situation.
It’s great to see you blogging again.
Now these idiots are purposing a law to stop all traffic stops.
I cannot believe the stupidity of our elected officials and I cannot believe the stupidity of the voters who elected them.
Oh no Alvin! Thank you for pointing this out to me. I just read about it after you mentioned it. Obviously this will even make traffic accidents worse in out state for the reasons mentioned in this blog entry. For others, here’s a link to the story. https://www.king5.com/article/news/politics/state-politics/washington-state-house-bill-1513-traffic-stops-fatalities-racial-equity/281-89036c2b-51a6-4ded-aa60-b0ce24732aca
Thank you Randy for the informative information and for the time you put into it. A ways back, I remember hearing of a man calling 911 to tell them that a police officer was chasing him and they needed to tell him to stop. He recited the RCW numbers to the 911 operator that showed it was illegal for them to be chasing him. Unbelievable!
I will be contacting my state legislator and encourage them to support house bill 1053.
Looking forward to your next post.
Thanks Linda. Yes, I remember that case as well. According to this story “Isaac stated he regularly runs from the police because he knows the police can no longer pursue him due to the house bills.” Then he tried kidnapping his girlfriend and got angry police chased him (which they can do in the relatively rare case that a suspect is actively involved in a violent crime like kidnapping.) This demonstrates the criminal escalation that results from not enforcing the less serious offenses. The lenient pursuit law did Isaac no favors, as he thought he could pull off a kidnapping without consequence, and now he’ll go to prison. The compassionate thing would have been to teach him how to be accountable for his actions before he violently kidnapped someone. Here is the story: https://www.police1.com/suspect-pursuit/articles/911-audio-suspect-tells-dispatcher-to-call-off-seattle-pd-pursuit-citing-new-law-3xTnDZEnCK1hOkt3/
Thank you Randy, time to contact our state Reps in apposition.
Thank you Randy, for starting your blog up again. You provide the best information and get such good comments. I’m looking forward to seeing more posts!
All the crime going on since they changed the pursuit law. How can anyone be stupid enough to not want the police to be able to pursue. A small store I frequent was rammed by their’s police could not pursue because of the rollback this is just ridiculous. Bring back the pursuit. This state is lawless and it truly scares me.
Thank you for your writing. I look forward to more to come.
I am not as optimistic that Governor Inslee is concerned about the adverse effects of the legislation that he signed. Does the following statement sound like he’s chomping at the bit to make drastic changes to it?
“It’s a myth that the police accountability laws have caused some crime wave – the fact is crime has gone up across the United States. So the fact that the legislature passed some police accountability, rightfully so, I think it hasn’t caused crime to go up in New Jersey or Minnesota. This is not the reason we’re experiencing some additional crime in our in our state. It is a national phenomena,” —Gov. Jay Inslee 2023
Thanks Mark. I’m also concerned about the judgement of state leaders on this topic. It’s a type of bandwagon fallacy for anyone with the duty to fix something to say in effect, “well it’s bad there so it’s going to be bad here.” Many public servants are falling back on this right now, and they need to stop it.
Furthermore, it’s simply not true. Car accident rates are dropping across the US, as they have for decades, while skyrocketing in Washington state.
Furthermore, when data on total numbers of reported crimes is collected and compared to other states, it can give the false impression that we’re not to different from say, Minnesota. But a large number of thefts reported in Minnesota are shoplifting, and in Washington we’ve almost stopped treating that like a crime (rarely are people stopped or reported), so Minnesota looks worse for shoplifting. Similarly, Minnesota is still making drug arrests, which account for a lot of their crimes against society, and we are not making these arrests. So drug crimes have fallen to near zero, causing crimes against society to drop in half (This is not a success story when we look at the 300 people per year dying from overdoses in King County alone). So when someone casually tosses out “we’re the same as “x” state”, and does not even look at these trends, they are being either naive at best or deceptive at worst.
I have had mixed feelings about this for a long time. Recently I got sucked into a YouTube vortex about these chases and while watching the clips I said to myself that it can’t be worth the lives of theses officers and possible bystanders. However, you made some good points for the end results of letting these offenders go and I will do some more research and educate myself. Thank you for bringing up the topic.
Thanks Renate. I’ve probably watched many of those same videos and had similar mixed-feelings about it. I do feel sympathy for the pursued drivers…I know it is probably terrifying, they are frequently in crisis, and often having a reckoning with being dealt a bad hand and/or making unfortunate life choices. My hope is always that they can be apprehended safely, and get the help they need to get back on track.
One thing I probably could have done better in my article is clarify that police most definitely need policy on how to make a decision regarding when it is okay to pursue and when it is not. There are definitely times when the risk to the public is too high to justify an automobile pursuit, and good departments, like Renton’s which is accredited, have such policies in place. It’s important that a motorist being pulled over not know that they will or won’t be pursued; leaving it to the officer and their leadership (via the radio), following proven department policy, is a good way to handle this. But again the driver must perceive they have to pull over– the safest police pursuit is one that never happens.