A nearly hour-long Houston police chase Monday night, ended with a suspect in custody, and no one hurt, but at least half a dozen vehicles with flat tires, including several HPD cruisers.
Journalism student Shamika Ferguson saw the chase and the deflated drivers.
“Maybe four or five, even the police had flat tires,” she said.
U.S. 59 was strewn with stranded officers and everyday motorist stung by the so-called “stingers” or spike strips. Police agencies use them to deflate the tires of fleeing suspect, but it can be tricky, said former Houston Police Chief and current Houston City Councilman C.O. Bradford said.
“It is always very dangerous to deploy spike strips on the freeway. There are so many variables out of control of the officers,” he said. “On a freeway it is going to almost always be impossible to retrieve right after it’s deployed.”
During Monday’s chase, police deployed five spike strips on the freeway. Two missed, two hit their target, deflating the suspect’s front tires and one was yanked from the officer’s hands, said Houston Police Assistant Chief Brian Lumpkin. Lumpkin heads up the department’s Pursuit Review Committee.
“What’s a little gray, is that there was one of the stingers got loose, probably flung off the rim of the suspect’s vehicle and ended up in the path of the unfortunate motorists we saw on TV and our own police officers,” he said.
So was the damage worth the result? Bradford said to consider what might have happened, if the suspect wasn’t stopped.
“If the officers had not did that deployment we may talking about a suspect who kills someone or an officer injured down the road,” Bradford said.
At least five motorists had called the city’s legal department by Monday to file a claim for damage to their vehicles.
However, Houston City Attorney Michele Arturo said the city doesn’t typically reimburse citizens for these kinds of property losses.
The city does pay for the tows and tire changes associated with flats from police chases.
