You hit someone driving the speed limit you have still screwed up, you hit some one speeding? In my opinion you deserve no mercy. There is no excuse for this type of driving, perfect conditions or not, nor is there any excuse for your defending this selfish SUV drivers actions.

Nothing about that picture makes it appear that "the victim walked out from between two cars into the middle of the street." It doesn't reveal anything about where the collision occurred. And what other blog are you citing?

At the time, I was citing Brooklynian, who also had a thread about the accident. One of the people that blog said:
[quote="ericrochow"]a pedestrian crossing between cars on Carroll above 8th ave was hit by a car turning from 8th ave onto carroll .

i'm told the driver of the car was visibly shaken. the car's windshield was shattered. the police were there taking photos, etc for most of the day[/quote]

The bottom line is that this is a horrible tragedy, but I am not yet convinced that the driver's life should be ruined over it. If it is eventually proven that the driver passed a red light or really was driving twenty mph over the speed limit then yes, at that point I would advocate his punishment.

I don't mean to be graphic, but the famous picture of a woman lying on a car after jumping off the Empire State Building shows just how much damage a person could inflict on a vehicle if there is enough velocity involved.
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2006/04/23/nyregion/thecity/scar450.jpg

I was also in this intersection on the west side of 8th Ave - pedestrian was struck on the east / park side of the 8th Ave in the Carroll St crosswalk. This driver was FLYING up Carroll. Anyone who says sun glare is an issue...clearly we have all had this happen as drivers, however speed should be reduced if that's the case. I would estimate he was going close to 50mph. He flew by me across 8th Ave...I did not hear brakes just the impact and there were no skid marks indicating any attempt to stop. If you saw it, you know how he was hit extraordinarily hard based on how high he flew in the air and forward away from the car. We all share the roads, pedestrians and drivers alike. Neither has more of a right to negligence. We all must take care to know our surroundings, but speed limits were clearly not abided by in this case. It was a horrific scene that could only be caused by excessive speed.

As for automobile crash facts and waiting on them, under the old information hierarchy you would be waiting until you're dead and buried. This post and thread are part of the new distributed order, in particular a public demand not to write off the lives lost to autos. It does good work, even if it's messy and offensive to some sensibilities. I recall with the cyclist killed by a school bus in Brooklyn that we learned far more in the discussion than was ever reported, eventually determining that the man was run over when the bus turned right and into him, while newspapers had described the cyclist only as "trying to beat the light." (If true, they both were and one was driving a freaking school bus.) Speculation is part of the process of unmanaged discovery; it comes a lot closer to the truth than white lies passed along by bored police-beat reporters.

Cops' jobs is to maintain the public order, not arrest people regardless of reasonable suspicion.

IANAL, but isn't that crater in the windshield grounds for reasonable suspicion?

This is probably one of the weakest and journalistically reckless things I've seen posted on Steetsblog in the 2 years I've been reading. I'm sorry but you make absolutely no point with the accusations made in this blog post. It's all total speculation!

Yes, there is a very good chance that the driver may have been driving in a way that was reckless towards pedestrians (ie. Speeding) but you have not a clue besides a photo and mere speculation. And yes, I agree that law enforcement's attitude in pedestrian CRASHES is disgustingly flippant but that's about it and there was no proof of that here! In fact just the opposite since you even state that the investigation appeared rather intense and thorough.

Finally and most importantly the title is grotesquely misleading. I expected something at least remotely concrete to warrant such a bold title. Instead the police officer's quote is not even remotely related. And guess what! Even though it was totally in appropriate for him to say and unrelated to the crash at hand, HE WAS ABSOLUTELY RIGHT!!

As a lifelong daily cyclists, 90% of cyclists I see on the road truely are "asking for it." I've nearly hit, while riding my bike no less, countless numbers of cyclists who blew through red lights, were riding on the wrong side or riding without lights. I've also been nearly clobbered a quite a few times by passing neuvo-roadies riding their two-week-old carbon "road bikes of the month."

If you need someone who can write a story without making reckless accusations and actually has a legitimate education on these issues, I'm free.

It appears from the picture and from another blog that the victim walked out from between two cars into the middle of the street.

Nothing about that picture makes it appear that "the victim walked out from between two cars into the middle of the street." It doesn't reveal anything about where the collision occurred. And what other blog are you citing? The only other coverage I've seen is on Brownstoner, and I don't believe anything posted there claimed the victim had emerged from between two cars. In fact, two posters who claim to have witnessed it said the man was hit in the crosswalk.

> Let the COURTS presume innocence until proven guilty. Not cops.

Please god, no. Cops' jobs is to maintain the public order, not arrest people regardless of reasonable suspicion.

I got a litany of cop problems stuck in my craw, and none of them will be solved by cops being less reasonable about arrests.

if the driver was only going 15-20 mph

I don't know exactly what happened. But I came upon the scene of that collision about 30 minutes after it happened. The head-shaped dent in the windshield strongly suggested that the vehicle was traveling substantially faster than 20 mph. How fast does a head have to hit a windshield to create a basketball-shaped divot and nearly penetrate the windshield? That's how fast this vehicle was traveling. My guess is 35 mph, at least.

I don't know if you charge this driver with a misdemeanor or vehicular manslaughter. But at the very least the person who was driving the car should have their license revoked until a proper investigation has been done by an agency whose officers don't sound like the one quoted above. The person who was driving this vehicle should not be back out on the street in a car today. Unfortunately he or she is. Just like the guy who killed the kids in Chinatown a couple of weeks ago. Just like virtually every other killer driver who didn't happen to be drunk.

Secondly, before anyone can be charged there has to be evidence that the driver did something wrong. I hate for there to a precedent in any type case of someone being charged with a crime before there is any evidence.

With other possible crimes, cops and DAs can be plenty aggressive in pursuing charges, which may very well get dismissed, or not lead to a conviction.

It's just that all too often when a car is involved, cops and DAs (and in fact, our whole society) are too quick to see motorists' behavior as unassailable, when in analagous non-car situations, they'd be way more likely to press charges. And again, let the court make the final decision on guilt or innocence. But cops and DAs should be taking the first step much more often than they do.

Certainly, if cops responded to what you were involved in when you were 12 and that driver was not charged, there