Red Lights, Babies and Cops

[CalHunter]

This is something that occasionally happens in policework (people rushing to hospitals with babies almost ready to be born) and is a good training issue for any police agency. Most accepted police wisdom calls for a cop to not allow a private vehicle to speed down the streets or run red lights even in an emergency situation as that vehicle does not have emergency red lights and a siren and is extremely apt to get into a serious accident and endanger the public as well as the vehicle occupants. Accepted wisdom calls for the officer to call an ambulance to the scene as the medics can perform emergency medical services on scene as required, have code 3 lights and siren capability and can still perform necessary emergency medical services while en route to the hospital. What are your thoughts on this situation?


http://www.sacbee.com/content/opinion/story/14161452p-14989351c.html

Sacramento Bee
Editorial: Did deputy offer help? Stories differ; outside scrutiny would help
Published 2:15 am PST Tuesday, February 7, 2006 Anybody who doubts there is a legitimate need for independent scrutiny of the Sacramento County Sheriff's Department should talk with LaToya Palmer and James Keys. A month ago, the department brass cast doubt on their complaints, suggesting the couple's encounter with a deputy early one morning in December never even occurred. Sheriff's officials have since changed their story. These facts are undisputed. Palmer was in the middle of premature labor when a sheriff's deputy stopped her and Keys for running a red light as they raced in their Honda to the emergency room at UC Davis Medical Center. One of the twins had already emerged from Palmer's womb. He was lying in a pool of blood and gasping for air.
Here's where the couple's account and the deputy's diverge. Keys and Palmer said they begged the deputy for help, to escort them to the emergency room less than two miles away. They say the deputy curtly told them that wasn't his job, and waved them on with a warning not to run any more red lights. The twin boys born that morning died.
When The Bee first raised questions about the incident, sheriff's officials said that after checking with dispatchers and the commander of the south Sacramento station, they found no record of the traffic stop. A month later, in a letter to Keys and Palmer, they acknowledged the stop had occurred. They said the officer, identified as Deputy Matthew Deaux, offered to call an ambulance, but "Mr. Key \ did not accept the offer."
Keys and Palmer dispute that. "I was screaming for help," Palmer said. "He didn't care and treated me like a piece of trash."

[boysda]

the fact that the LEO story changed sends all sorts of sirens (pardon the analogy) off in my head. my experience has been that when there is a dispute of fact, and someone changes their version of the events, 90% of the time it's they who have something to hide. Cal, you must have experienced the same thing in your line of work.

[ricoace]

Call me nieve, But I cant imagine an officer displaying that kind of a attitude in that type of situation. Even if he truly didnt give a damn. Duty, concience, guilt, ect would have motivated him to at least try to do something...just not buying it.

[CalHunter]

Usually when a person changes a story, you're now getting more of the truth but not necessarily all of the truth. The problem with this story is it's the department who's changing stories and not necessarily the cop. I agree with Rico in that I can't imagine any cop seeing a woman and baby in the back seat of a car covered in blood and not just taking charge and calling an ambulance to respond code 3. And if the car drove off again, I'd follow and have the ambulance respond to my updated locations given out over the radio. In situations like this, it's not uncommon for the citizens to be panicking (after all it was his wife and baby possibly dying in the back seat) and not necessarily thinking as straight as they usually would. People will say and do things under pressure that they wouldn't otherwise do.

[kevin1]

With just two miles to go I wouldn't have stopped in the first place , especially under that circumstance . Better to face the angry cop once my wife was at the hospital .

If the soon to be plaintiff's version was correct the deputy should be reprimanded and possibly fired . Even if the final version of the department's answer is correct then the deputy was still in error since the woman was in obvious life threatening distress and should have been reprimanded , escorting her to the hospital would have been better than waiting for the ambulance . I find their version difficult to believe anyway . The twins would probably have died whether she reached the hospital 4 minutes sooner or not under the circumstances . Either way that deputy was a complete deaux-deaux and will now be in deep doo-doo .

[Dave590]

I suppose that the idea of having to make one of those emergency runs has always been on the back of the mind of every expectant father.

However, a little bit of fore-sight usually tends to go a long way in planning for an event such as child-birth.

In a crowded, urban environment, it only makes sense to use emergency services when a bonified emergency rears it's ugly head...Transversly, in a mountainous rural environment like I live in, the common thinking is: "Throw 'em in the back of a truck and make your way to a hospital the best way you can"...As It might be several hours before a volunteer crew is put together and dispatched to a specific location.

With all of that said, I have one question and one comment regarding the original article...First, the question...How was it that the woman was already giving birth...or...this far along prior to heading to the hospital.

Secondly, a comment. Some people are just inherently not nice people, in fact, I would go so far as to say that some people are just plain Jerks. While I concur that folks in the law enforcement business should be held to a very high standard, there never seems to be a standard for the common public...Could it be that the driver was a jerk? And he failed to properly express the severity of the situation and instead just made a general butt of himself in an effort to continue on to the hospital?

When I read an article like this I always ask myself...What was the "jerk-factor" involved...How much responsability lies on the shoulders of the civilian as opposed to the law enforcement official.

[Tazman]

Dave I concur with you to a point, but in this case I disagree, the article states:

These facts are undisputed. Palmer was in the middle of premature labor when a sheriff's deputy stopped her and Keys for running a red light as they raced in their Honda to the emergency room at UC Davis Medical Center. One of the twins had already emerged from Palmer's womb. He was lying in a pool of blood and gasping for air.

How does one prepare for premature labor? In some cases of premature labor due to the baby being so small, the delivery happens in a very short span of time. I agree that in a normal pregnancy when the due date nears a couple should have some prepatory plans in place, but in this case they did not know that she would go into premature labor.

If the officer did not observe that one child had already been delivered and was lying in a pool of blood on the floor board he will not live very long as an LEO! How in the world could he be expected to detect a perp pulling a weapon during a traffic stop?

I have a rather strong suspicion that Mr. Keys was probably telling the truth and the officer was covering his butt. Let us think for a moment, you have just pulled these folks over for running a red light, if you offered to get them an ambulance and they said no and just took off for the hospital common sense dictates that you would at a minimum follow them to the hospital! The officer didn't!

More then likely the couple did ask him for help and he did exactly what they say he did, he told them to go to the hospital and not to run any more red lights and went on about his business. Now as far as the officer treating them like trash.... that is a matter of opinion only.

In regards to the jerk factor, it seems to me if Mr. Keys was being a jerk that the officer would not have just told him to go on to the hospital and not run any lights.

Look, I am not one of those folks that is anti LEO, I have the utmost respect for them until they do something to warrant my disrespect, this particular officer did warrant my disrespect.

My first wife went into labor with my oldest in the wee hours of the morning, there was virtually no traffic on the road so I was exceeding the posted speed limit, but not by a whole lot, I stopped at a red light, looked both ways and did not see any vehicles that I would endanger if I ran the light so I did. Well in rather short order I had an officer pull me over, I stopped, jumped out of my car, ran back to his and said "My wife is having a baby!", all he said was "GO!" He turned on his lights and followed me to the hospital, as he saw me helping my wife out of the car he hollered out "Good luck" and left.