Officers Fatally Shoot Pursuit Suspect-The suspect driver allegedly accelerated toward the officers at a dead end (Sam Spital)

Commentary by Sam Spital, Criminal Lawyer- San Diego:

“NBC Channel 39 in its electronic news on January 12, 2012 reported an officer had shot an assailant at about 1:15 a.m. when there was a pursuit of a vehicle driving at an excessive speed that in spite of the police siren and red lights flashing eventually only came to a halt at a dead end street when it made a u-turn. When the officers stopped the vehicle and ordered the occupants to exit the unreported stolen vehicle, they did not do so and instead the car was accelerated towards the officers. Even after the officers admonished the 21 year old female driver to stop, she did not. Fearing their safety, the officers who had been on the police force from 4 to 6 years fired their weapons and the driver was shot and killed in the process.

It would be unreasonable to attribute blame to the officers in such exigent circumstances because enough facts are not known as to whether the officers could have prevented the situation if they had blocked the street to prevent the car from escaping and/or obtained assistance from other patrol cars to do the same. Suffice to say, the reporter did not interview the officers and obtain more information, nor did she contact any of the passengers in the stolen vehicle to develop a more complete account of the events in question.”

–Sam Spital