By Fran Spielman
The Chicago Sun-Times
CHICAGO — A Chicago Police pursuit in 2004 that ended in a crash in Evanston, killing a 16-year-old girl, will cost taxpayers $2.8 million under a settlement advanced Friday by a City Council committee.
A Honda Civic being chased by an unmarked police car went through a red light, struck a minivan, then rolled over before it hit a street light and came to rest against a light pole at the Evanston intersection of Dodge and Main.
The crash killed 16-year-old passenger Tarrea Black. Another passenger, 24-year-old Ezell Holden, suffered a severe head injury. Driver Levar Drane fled the scene, but subsequently pleaded guilty to reckless homicide and driving under the influence.
Plaintiffs’ attorneys contend that the high-speed chase -- from a gas station at Howard and Ridge -- was unauthorized and violated a 2003 pursuit policy.
The officers tell a different story. They claim they were simply “following” the Civic “to get close enough to do an investigation” after watching Drane approach several motorists at the gas station, show them something and walk away. The officers suspected Drane was offering to buy gas for customers with a stolen credit card in exchange for cash.
The information gathering turned into a chase, the officers contend, only after they activated their sirens and emergency lights.
“As they were turning their lights on, that’s when they called it in. . . . The collision occurred seconds later,” said First Deputy Corporation Counsel Karen Seimetz.
If the chase was authorized and the officers were never punished, why did the city settle the case?
“Juries don’t like police pursuits that occur in the crowded metropolitan area that is Chicago unless they’re done for violent felonies. Here, what you had at the most was a theft,” Seimetz said.
Juries oppose chases “particularly when the injury and death occurs, as it did here, to innocent third-parties. The person dying being a 16-year-old girl. There was also evidence that passengers in the car were pleading with the driver to stop,” she said.
Copyright 2008 The chicago Sun-Times