Editor’s Note: The Monona City Council moved to end the pursuit policy reflected in this article. To read an update, click here.
By Anna Hansen
The Wisconsin State Journal
MONONA, Wis. — Monona has tightened its policy on police pursuits in the wake of a crash Monday night that killed three occupants of a fleeing vehicle, the third time the city has re-evaluated the policy since 2020.
In a statement to the Monona City Council Wednesday night, Police Chief Brian Chaney said the department “has decided to temporarily focus our priorities on suspects who we believe to be involved in dangerous and violent felony offenses. This revision is put in place while members of the Monona community and its elected officials have the opportunity to weigh in on what is best for Monona.”
At about 9 p.m. Monday, officers tried to pull over a vehicle near the corner of Nichols Road and Monona Drive in Monona. The vehicle fled, and police pursued. At some point, the Dane County Sheriff’s Office deployed a tire-deflation device to stop the vehicle, and it crashed at the corner of Femrite Drive and Buckeye Road in the town of Cottage Grove, according to the state Department of Justice’s Division of Criminal Investigation, which is investigating the incident. Three occupants in the vehicle died.
The Dane County Medical Examiner told the Wisconsin State Journal on Thursday that the names of the people killed likely would be released in the next couple of days.
In his statement Wednesday, which was posted to the Monona Community Media YouTube page, Chaney provided some new details about the crash, noting that the pursuit was conducted by Monona police, not an outside agency, and that the three people killed were two 30-year-olds and a 19-year-old. Chaney said additional information about the three is being withheld at the request of DCI.
“We have every confidence in the Wisconsin (Department of Justice) and it is our fervent hope that they will share additional information on their investigation as quickly as feasible,” Chaney said.
The Dane County Sheriff’s Office assisted the Monona police in the pursuit, but the “ongoing investigation prevents us from providing specific details concerning that incident,” Sheriff’s Capt. Kerry Porter said in a statement Thursday afternoon.
While details of the crash are still unknown, Porter said the use of road spikes has proven “safe and effective” in ending pursuits, noting that the system is designed to avoid causing a blowout by using hollow tubes that act as valves, “releasing air from the tires at a slow and controlled rate.”
Policy changed in 2022
In November 2022, the Monona City Council approved a change to the policy governing when police can engage in vehicle pursuits, removing the requirement that the people being pursued must be suspected of having committed a violent felony or that they were about to commit one.
The new policy included a dozen factors for officers to consider when deciding whether to pursue a fleeing vehicle, including “whether the suspect represents a serious threat to public safety,” “the safety of the public in the area of the pursuit” and whether the person fleeing has been identified and could be safely arrested later.
That expanded a previous policy, adopted in 2020, in which the City Council changed the requirement that police have “reasonable suspicion” that a violent felony had been committed to instead permit pursuits if police had “probable cause” that such a crime had occurred.
“Having a year’s experience with the ‘old’ policy, in my opinion it was simply far too restrictive,” Ald. Doug Wood said. “It was so restrictive that in too many instances people could simply refuse to stop for the police even when their emergency lights and sirens were operating. That laissez faire attitude was in itself a threat to public safety.”
On Thursday, citing the advice of city attorneys, Monona Mayor Mary O’Connor referred questions from the State Journal to Chaney. Chaney said he will answer questions about the situation on Friday.
Chaney on Tuesday declined to say whether the people fleeing Monday were suspected of a violent felony, citing the ongoing investigation.
Vehicle was ‘suspicious’
Authorities haven’t said what prompted the attempted traffic stop in Monona on Monday night that escalated into the chase and crash. DCI said police had deemed the vehicle “suspicious.”
In 2022, Chaney said he understood that restrictions are “what policy is for” but said the pursuit policy put in place in 2020 was more restrictive than the council likely intended.
“I don’t know if you knew or the general public knew that we were quite restricted in what we could and could not pursue,” Chaney told the council.
The officers involved in Monday’s chase have been placed on administrative duty, per agency policy, while DCI investigates the incident with assistance from the Wisconsin State Patrol. Monona police and Dane County Sheriff’s Office squad cars are equipped with dashboard cameras, DCI said.
DCI said it will turn over its reports to the Dane County District Attorney’s Office when the investigation is concluded.
The Washington, D.C-based Police Executive Research Forum, which conducts research and makes recommendations on police policy, last year released a report showing an increase in the number of fatal crashes involving a police pursuit, from 311 in 2015 to 455 in 2020.
It recommends that departments “should adopt restrictive vehicle pursuit philosophies that permit pursuits only for a limited and serious set of circumstances” and that pursuits should only be allowed “for violent crimes and where failure to immediately apprehend the suspect presents an imminent threat to the public based on the suspect’s criminal actions.”
To engage in a vehicle pursuit, Madison police are required to have probable cause “to believe that the vehicle driver and/or occupant(s) has recently committed, is committing, or is about to commit a violent felony,” under that department’s policies.
State Journal reporter Chris Rickert contributed to this report.
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