Beaumont — Police Car Chase Results to Arrest of 2 Individuals
Posted on Wednesday, January 30th, 2019 at 11:46 pm
On Friday, January 25, 2019, a police chase in Beaumont resulted to the arrest of 2 individuals.
According to reports, at approximately, 10:50 p.m., two Beaumont Police officers were patrolling in the 2300 block of Herbert when they noticed a red Chevy Tahoe commit several traffic violations. The officers then tried to conduct a traffic stop, but the driver of the Tahoe, 26-year-old Virginia Calhoun, fled away from them. Calhoun eventually lost control of the vehicle near North 6th Street and Rusk Street.
Calhoun was soon taken to custody, but her passenger, 24-year-old Jerrick Odell, ran away from the vehicle. He was eventually found hiding under a vehicle at the residence on North 6th Street.
Both Calhoun and Odell were arrested for evading arrest and were brought to Jefferson County Jail.
It is great to hear that nobody was injured in this accident. Unfortunately, there are countless other victims who are not as lucky. Police car chases are not uncommon in the United States; in 2012, an estimate of 68,000 vehicle pursuits was reported. In addition to that, it is also common for police chases to end in death or injury. In fact, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, from 1996 to 2015, an average of 355 people — about 1 person per day — were killed every year in pursuit-related accidents. A third of that number are innocent bystanders, which suggests that police chases kill more people every year than tornadoes, lightning, and hurricanes combined, and a USA Today investigation has reported that chases kill black people – both as innocent bystanders and as the target of the pursuit — 3 times more than anybody else.
Back in 2015, the Washington Post reported that police chases are almost always excessive; about 91% of police pursuits are in response to non-violent crimes, like shoplifting and the like. To explain this, retired police Captain Tom Gleason said that most police chases start just because the officer is incensed by the target, and as a result, he would get into this mindset of “I have to catch him.” This excessiveness of the police chase nature is what moved many police departments to have policies for it, which is great news. Hopefully, the statistics for pursuit-related accidents will now go down.
If you are a victim of this kind of accident, or you know someone who is, or you lost a loved one because of this, then don’t lose hope. There will always be help available to you, in the form of car accident lawyers and personal injury lawyers.
