RICHLAND COUNTY, S.C. — There have been three suspect pursuits since Friday in Richland County where deputies have followed a vehicle and the chase has ended in a crash. At least two of those chases happened in residential areas, which has some residents concerned about safety. Others are asking when a chase would be called off.
Residents who live near St. Michaels Road tell News 19 there was a lot of commotion on Friday after the Richland County Sheriff’s Department (RCSD) says deputies were following a vehicle that lost control on a curve in the residential area, went through a neighbor’s yard and ultimately crashed.
“Here comes Richland County zooming by,” says resident Cierra Wright, who has lived nearby for five years. “Typically it’s quiet. There's kids normally playing up and down the road so it’s really not a lot of action over here. So when something does happen it’s like, wow okay.”
Wright tells me neighbors have been talking about it since the crash happened. On Saturday, Richland County incident reports also detail a pursuit on Beatty Road and on Apache Road, both of which ended in the fleeing car crashing.
“I was just helping my mom cook,” nine-year-old Dana Martinez explains.
Martinez tells me she was preparing a meal for her church when she noticed flashing police lights in the kitchen on Saturday.
“So I looked outside to see what’s happening,” Martinez says about the end to a police chase, which ended in one of her neighbor’s yards.
“Police really have to think about ‘why am I doing this and when should I stop?” South Carolina Criminal Justice Academy (SCCJA) Director Jack Swindler explains.
The SCCJA trains law enforcement officers from all over the state. Part of what they learn is what swindlers calls “precision driving.”
“It is a very stressful and tense situation when you get a vehicle up to a higher than normal speed and you're having to control that vehicle and wonder will someone pull out from a driveway or not stop at an intersection or will a dog or a deer or a child run out. And so all those things are going through your mind while you’re pursuing that vehicle and so it is quite stressful and it is dangerous,” Swindler shares.
Swindler says all officers are trained on how to look at car dynamics and road conditions to determine if they’re physically able to pursue a vehicle that might be fleeing.
“Everything has to be looked at: time of day, road conditions, weather conditions, whether you’re near a densely populated area, schools playgrounds,” Swindler lists.
Then, Swindler says officers are expected to apply their jurisdiction’s specific pursuit policy.
As of Jan. 1, 2023, the South Carolina General Assembly passed Act 218, which updated and mandates a set of minimum standards for law enforcement agencies. This means every agency has to have a written policy on nine different topics, including pursuits.
“Most policies that I have ever read, there's no consequence for an officer to discontinue that pursuit,” Swindler notes. “They have that ability to stop that and so I think that is important.”
RCSD has a policy that was published in 1995 and has been updated most recently in 2022. It says deputies are “expected to make reasonable efforts to apprehend violators” and includes 17 pages detailing specific circumstances. The document has 13 sections, which explain procedure, pursuit authority, officer responsibilities, driving tactics, intervention standards and pursuit termination.
Officers are expected to end the pursuit “when the need for apprehension does not outweigh the danger created by the pursuit."
The guidelines also say the pursuit should be terminated: when weather or traffic conditions increase the danger, when the distance between the deputy and suspect gets too large and when the danger to the public is greater than the value of apprehending the suspect.
When it comes to the handful of recent incidents in Richland County, Swindler says it might be because more suspects are fleeing.
“When people don’t feel like there are consequences, they feel like they can do more. I certainly would like to see the legislature increase the penalties from fleeing from the police,” Swindler shares. “If you would make it a serious felony with some substantial jail time for running from the police, we may would have fewer of those police pursuits and then we would have a safer outcome for the citizens and the police and all involved.”
Above all, Swindler urges drivers and citizens to “keep their head on a swivel.”
“Everyone who’s out in public needs to be aware of their surroundings while they’re out driving,” Swindler says.