Balancing safety, speed at issue with deadly trooper crash
Few departments offer speed
guidelines
Larry Gilbert, the director of the Southwestern Illinois College Police Academy, walks a fine line when it comes to instructing young police officers about how fast is too fast when responding to an emergency.
Gilbert, whose 10-week courses are filled with rookie officers from across the region, knows that most departments have general policies about officers driving safely, but few specify a top speed limit.
Instead, almost all rely on a deceptively simple calculation for driving to an emergency: Go fast, but not fast enough to become unsafe."There's no set limit of speed that's too fast. But when you start getting up to 100-plus mph, your vehicle is almost out of your control," he said.
That caveat is at the heart of new allegations revealed last week that an Illinois State Police trooper was driving 126 mph on Interstate 64 last November when he lost control and slammed head-on into a car carrying Collinsville sisters Jessica E. Uhl, 18, and Kelli C. Uhl, 13, killing them both.
The bombshell -- State Police officials had never disclosed how fast the officer, Matt Mitchell, had been driving -- came from a hearing Wednesday in front of a St. Clair County coroner's jury, which ruled that that the girls died as a result of reckless homicide.
While the ruling does not necessarily indicate that there is any criminal wrongdoing, St. Clair County State's Attorney Robert Haida added fuel to the revelations later Wednesday by announcing that his office may file criminal charges against Mitchell.
Haida in an interview Wednesday said prosecutors are reviewing the case.
"We've deferred final judgment on that to review the case file. It will be a couple of weeks or longer before we make a final decision," he said.
Several calls to the Uhl family last week were not returned, but the family's lawyer, Thomas Q. Keefe, said Friday that they are still grieving from losing their daughters.
"Those kids were very special children," he said from his Belleville office.
Keefe said the family has also not decided whether they will seek civil damages mainly because so much about the case remains in question.
Keefe said State Police have been resistant to revealing specifics about the crash and only disclosed some details after pressure from him and the media.
Mitchell's speed, for example, became known only after he was allowed to question State Police officials during the coroner's jury hearing, Keefe said.
"I have to assume more stuff is going to come out," he said. "We still have to figure out what the truth is."
A Thanksgiving tragedy
The accident that killed the Uhl sisters on Nov. 23 happened on a semi-rural stretch of I-64 just east of O'Fallon as Mitchell, of Carlyle, was racing east to a reported car accident outside Mascoutah around noon.
Near Shiloh, he lost control of his 2006 Chevrolet Impala cruiser, careened into the gully-like grassy median between the lanes and crashed into a westbound Mazda sedan driven by Jessica Uhl, a freshman in the College of Arts and Sciences at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville.
Her sister, a student at Collinsville Middle School, was riding in the passenger's seat as the two returned from a holiday photo session.
They died at the scene. Mitchell, 29, was badly hurt.
In the aftermath of the crash, State Police have said Mitchell was cut off by a white vehicle and lost control, although only one witness has stepped forward to corroborate the story.
State Police also later revealed that Mitchell, who turned off his dashboard video camera, was driving on the shoulder even though he had received a radio call at least six minutes before the collision telling him that he wasn't needed at the Mascoutah scene.
But the biggest surprise was the speed: Mitchell's patrol car was moving at 126 mph, almost twice the posted speed limit, and 102 mph just before the impact, according testimony heard by the coroner's jury last week.
Mitchell, who was involved in two previous crashes on duty, one that resulted in a $1.7 million judgment, was not available for comment.
He is still recovering from his injuries and is being paid, said State Police spokesman Lt. Scott Compton, who added that the agency followed all policies when investigating the crash.
"He's still an employee of the Illinois State Police," Compton said.
Compton noted that Mitchell received high-speed driving training in 2001 in the State Police training academy near Springfield, where cadets take 26 weeks of courses before becoming troopers.
Asked if cadets learn about maximum speeds behind the wheel, Compton said the State Police has never set exact guidelines.
He said the rule of thumb is that troopers have to stay safe and not endanger other motorists.
"Our policy does not indicate a specific speed," he said.
Compton would also not rule out that 126 mph was too fast.
"It would depend on the situation," he said.
Speed decided by officers
That void of across-the-board top speed caps is common among law enforcement agencies, said Geriann Brandt, a former officer with the St. Louis County Police Department who teaches criminology at Maryville University.
Different emergencies and road conditions require different responses that are difficult to account for in such plans, Brandt said.
"It's one of those things where so many factors come into play," she said. "It depends on those."
But Brandt said that many departments take steps to discourage over-speeding among officers.
"A lot of them have policies," she said. "You're going to travel with caution. If it's not an emergency, you do the speed limit."
In Granite City, Police Chief Richard E. Miller said his department also has no top speed for his officers, but strongly urges them to side with safety over speed.
"A lot of the time, you don't have to get there that fast," he said. "You have to control your vehicle."
With stop signs, traffic signals and sometimes heavy traffic, driving aggressively often isn't worth it, Miller said.
"It's just minute seconds you're saving," he said.
Edwardsville Police Chief James S. Bedell said his officers are also warned to avoid top speeds, but the department has no top speed mandate. He said such protocols are unrealistic.
"We're not going to say you can only go 50 mph in a 25," he said. "It could be 3 o'clock in the morning and there's no one on the road."
Regina M. Hays, the chief of the Southern Illinois University Edwardsville campus police and former president of the Southern Illinois Police Chiefs Association, said such policies largely depend on what area a department covers.
Regulations for SIUE campus police, for example, forbid pursuits almost entirely.
"There would have to be some extenuating, life-threatening circumstances before we would pursue," she said Thursday.
The Illinois Vehicle Code also leaves the decision up to officers, saying only that those driving emergency vehicles can "exceed the maximum speed limits so long as he does not endanger life or property." It does not offer a specific maximum.
The Illinois Law Enforcement Training and Standards Board, the state agency that sets training criteria for police officers, also does not indicate a top speed for police, said spokeswoman Sheila Albright.
"We don't issue any speed limit," she said, pointing to a 12-page document "Police Pursuit Guidelines" issued in 2004 that again says the speed question lies largely in the situation.
That policy and vehicle code also lay the groundwork for the SWIC courses, a block of classes and training in Belleville that's required by the Standards Board for all rookie cops.
Almost all local agencies and the Madison County Sheriff's Department use SWIC as a police academy, putting new officers through the rigors of basic police work, legal issues and firearm training.
About eight hours is also made up of driving instruction, when officers are put behind the wheel of a mock police car for training on a road course full of sharp turns and other hazards.
Gilbert said students learn about defensive driving, evasive techniques and quick decision making.
The tests all occur at low speeds, which mirror conditions officers are likely to face in the real world, Gilbert said.
"We don't talk about high speeds. They're very seldom going to reach high speeds," he said.
He said that officers should pay close attention to safety regardless of speed "and never operate their vehicles higher than what conditions allow, be it weather or traffic."
He said the SWIC course helps cement what that speed is.
"We feel that getting them to make good decision-making is key," Gilbert said.
A cloudy legal picture
The vagueness of the law can also present issues in filing for civil claims against police in tragedies like the one that killed Jessica and Kelli Uhl.
At issue are two statutes.
The first, in the state Vehicle Code, allows drivers of emergency vehicles with lights and sirens to disregard certain traffic laws when responding to an emergency or chasing a criminal.
But another law, part of the Tort Immunity Act, says that a public employee "is not liable for his act or omission in the execution or enforcement of any law."
Gregory E. Kulis, a Chicago attorney known for handling police misconduct cases, said the Immunity Act means lawyers have to show that police officers are ignoring safety protocols and knowingly taking chances.
"It's a higher burden," he said. "As to tort immunity, if they were reacting in reasonable fashion for their job, they're immune for prosecution."
In the O'Fallon crash, Kulis said, the key is that the officer was still driving 126 mph even after being waved off the Mascoutah accident.
"That's pretty negligent," he said. "They have a class action."
Brandt, the former St. Louis County officer, however, noted that more information could come out about to what Mitchell thought he was responding.
"That could put a whole new spin on it," she said.
Regardless, she said, Mitchell's aggressive speed is almost inexcusable.
"(Driving) 126 mph is embarrassing," she said.
Gilbert, meanwhile, admits that he'd like officers to receive more road training, although the state Training and Standards Board has been resistant.
"I feel there's never enough practical time, be it defense driving or decision making processes in a 10-week academy for recruits," he said "We could always use more time."
Staff writers Aaron Sudholt and J.W. Campbell contributed to this report.
E-mail: ccoates@yourjournal.com
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