Hey, there! Log in / Register
Kid seriously injured when hit by police wagon in Dorchester
By adamg on Tue, 05/25/2010 - 4:58pm
An 11-year-old boy who darted into traffic at Blue Hill and Talbot avenues was hit by a police wagon around 2:30 p.m. today and suffered serious leg, abdominal and head injuries.
Neighborhoods:
Topics:
Ad:
Support Universal Hub
Help keep Universal Hub going. If you like what we're up to and want to help out, please consider a (completely non-deductible) contribution.
Comments
Makes You Wonder
Makes you wonder if they were using their sirens. It isn't uncommon for them to do this when they wanna get all tactical at 2 o'clock in the afternoon. This is also near the Boys and Girls Club you would think the police have their eyes open. Probably rushing to help one of their brethren with a transport
If they were indeed using their sirens, the next question is:
Were the sirens on continously, or were they only ocassionaly "blipping" the sirens just before entering intersections - as I've observed countless police cars and ambulances do? In heavy traffic, it's pretty difficult to determine what direction a EV is approaching from if you don't hear the sirens until they enter the intersection.
It amazes me that there aren't more crashes because of the practice of "blipping" sirens (which appears to be an unwritten policy in deference to the "noise is absolute evil" crowd).
Blue Hill north of Talbot is a tough stretch
The block or two on Blue Hill just north of Talbot is a very tough stretch for drivers and pedestrians. There are jay-walking folk of every age, from kids scampering to great-great-grandmothers hobbling, usually from west to east, across Blue Hill.
There are south bound Blue Hill Ave vehicles making ponderous u-turns north. There is the (mostly) slow moving traffic turning north from Talbot. There is the constant double parking adjacent to the stores on the north-bound side, sometimes parked three deep.
And, perhaps most importantly, there is the much used south-bound MBTA bus stop at Angell Street. Mostly the drivers and jay-walking pedestrians have adapted to each other, but today, maybe not sufficiently.
Jonas Prang
When you talk about
When you talk about jaywalking, are you taking into account the fact that its 100% legal to cross at an unmarked intersection? Unmarked crosswalks have the same law behind them as marked ones. Im not familar with the area, but the map shows a whole bunch of legal places to cross that are not marked, for example, Blue Hill and Vesta.
Vesta is a less bad place to cross
Yup. Vesta is a less bad place to cross.
Still, the speed limit of Blue Hill is 35 mph, the road is divided, and has eight lanes. Ought it be possible for folk to traverse the city without having to hike a quarter mile out of their way to a marked cross-walk and back? You bet. But, until this halcyon day dawns—when words like jay-walk will be quaint, like buggy-whip—as I say, until this halcyon day breaks, we will have Boston cows and gazelles.
Sometimes the gazelle gets taken down, too.
I'm pressing my imagination too far, now. I have no idea where the boy was struck and am talking too much like it was at the cattle crossing at Angell.
Jonas Prang
Police Wagons...
Since there is no story attached, there is a good chance the wagon was not responding to a call and did not have any lights or sirens on.
But the "blipping" of the sirens is when you are responding to a call where you don't need to have them blaring 100% of the trip. More crashes actually happen when you have them on 100% of the time. As long as you stop at a red light, have the lights on and then the sirens on so everyone stops and it is safe to go, you don't need them blaring 100% of the time.
blipping
I just wish that some of them would blip a little BEFORE they enter the intersection...of course, most do, but I've seen police cars start the blipping as they're running a red light. Without stopping.
Again, MOST police vehicles I've observed do stop at the red and enter the intersection appropriately...just not all. On the other hand, I've seen far more civilian vehicles blow through red lights without the benefit of lights or sirens to alert their fellow motorists.
Ok. I'll remember that the next time I'm nearly in a head-on
crash because a police vehicle responding to a call without blaring their sirens 100% of the time decides to cross over into the opposing lane of traffic just as I was making a right hand turn on a green light into an intersection.
And, unless you can provide specific cites to the contrary, I find it very hard to believe that a responding emergency vehicle running its sirens all the time causes more crashes than one that only "blips" to clear intersections.
When emergency vehicles blare their sirens 100% of the ride...
more people panic and pull bonehead manuevers. It is more of a numbers game than it is an actual issue regarding the lights and sirens.
It is also human nature for someone driving a vehicle with lights and sirens to be safe when they enter an intersection because it is their own life that is in danger.
Anytime a cop needs to do something crazy like drive in the other lane then yea, they should have the lights and sirens on 100% of the time.
Did someone shove him out into the street?
Because that's what BPD claimed the last time they smacked a kid with one of their paddywagons. From the Globe story of the JP incident:
That falsified police report (numerous witnesses were found by the Globe, who all said the kid went flying) earned the driver a slap on the wrist- some desk time and a driver ed class, if I remember correctly, despite Ed Davis's zero tolerance policies.
How was the report falsified?
I mean, I know you are clueless about probably 75% of the earth's real life events, but have you ever read this or any crash report, a report where the driver was cited?
And where were the numerous witnesses found by the globe, other than the ones in the actual report? Oh wait, you mean the numerous witnesses you falsified in you own clueless mind.
In the end it was a crash that didn't involve serious injury and I don't think deserved anyone to be fired over. Zero tolerance policies don't really have to do with events like this one.
I mean really, if Adam had a zero tolerance policy for assinine statements, Brett would have been canned long ago.
Very generous
That's being extremely generous....I'd peg it over 90%, but that's just me.
Think about it though merlin....
25% amounts for a lot. Peeing standing up, not touching hot exhaust pipes, using hot water to shave, etc, are all things I would include in that 25%.
At issue: the word "brushed"?
It seems Brett might have a point if most of the witnesses would indeed have objected to that characterization of the incident as an understatement bordering on a falsehood. "Deceptive communication short of lying", the definition of B.S.
"shoved"
Is the word Brett made up actually. A little more BS since I don't see that word anywhere in the articles or reports. And I'm still waiting to see the "numerous witnesses" other than what the globe or police reported.
The baby got hit, and released from the hospital that night without a doctor even taking the precaution of holding the baby overnight? After the kid "flew" in the air and landed without injury?
The main point is that Brett only saw what he read in the globe and not what witnesses said at the scene or to the traffic division that had the follow up investigation.
So, Pete ...
Are you saying that cops never lie?
Do you ever get tired of the snark?
think about the debate into which you just launched yourself, and whether your contribution added anything. Do this each time you get the urge to snark.
Somebody lied
Either the officers lied, or the witnesses lied. The stories are not reconcilable.
No I'm not saying they can't lie, but it would be tough here.
It just does not make sense to lie about something that happened in a crowded area. Plus the crash was reconstructed and they know the minimum speed the wagon was going at the time of the crash. Objects like baby carraiges are factored into the crash and how it would be impacted at what speed.
Listen, from what I heard, the wagon was not going that fast but should have seen the pedestrain in the crosswalk. If this carraige was struck with any force the baby would have been killed.
And the globe did not print what all the witnesses said in the report, just one of them.
And I've done a lot of crash reports that involved major injuries. Everyone wants to come up to you and tell you what they saw and you would be suprised as to the difference in what everyone thinks they saw or did. On the other hand, the drivers are also not the most reliable witnesses either.
What would make it tough to lie?
Witnesses who contradict the story? Apparently not. The ability to set a minimum speed at time of accident? Nope. That's different from the actual speed. You can call the minimum whatever you want - say, at a minimum it was going 1 MPH. True statement. Relevant? No.
Hyperbole doesn't help an argument. Of course the carriage was struck with some force. If there wasn't any force, it wouldn't have moved. And yet the baby did not die. So the statement "If this carriage was struck with any force the baby would have been killed" is untrue, hyperbole which confuses rather than clarifies the matter. The question is not whether it was struck with force or not, but only how much force. One eyewitness says enough force that it "flew in the air." The perpetrator describes the force with "brushed" and "tipped over." The descriptions are very dissimilar, in a way that cannot be explained away with simple perspective. Either this eyewitness or the perpetrator is not stating the truth.
I would be interested to read the statements of other witnesses. But on the face of it, one of these individuals has more reason to lie. The fact that his buddies exonerated him doesn't change that.
Flying babies
This is beginning to sound like some sort of bad remake of Rashomon. Can we get an interview from the baby and get his/her take on the event?
flying babies...
Maybe someone can actually get the real report and the real reconstruction report. There is more information that would clear a lot of things up here. I've seen it once and it doesn't turn out like the globe story made it turn out.
And no one exonerated anyone. He was cited.
And 'minimum speed' does not mean you can say he could have been going one mile per hour. The minimum speed is determined after the reconstruction which says the vehicle had to have been going a specific minimum speed. If the minimum speed was determined to be 22mph, it would have been scientifically impossible for the vehicle to have been going slower than the minimum speed.