U.S. Route 1, which hugs the eastern seaboard from Maine to Florida, is just about the last freeway drivers want to use for commuting to and from work every day. It turns into a parking lot at rush hour, and is dotted with so many intersections that off-peak travel is equally dismal. Any potential for open flow -- away from the metropolises -- is quickly choked as the road converges down to two lanes. It would appear that the builders designed the road with malice aforethought. If one were to be poetic - predestined for congestion.
Near the Washington, DC beltway, Route 1 is especially bad, as aggressive lunatics vie with road construction for first place in the daily "foul the freeway" contest. Of course, lunatics usually operate from within the vehicle.
Yesterday, a man by the name of Kevin Kline took first place all by himself with the Fairfax County police coming in close second.
Around 3 PM, at the start of rush hour, Kline ran onto a bus and demanded everyone else get off. He waved a gun around, and so everyone paid attention. For the next few hours, the Fairfax County police negotiated with the man, finally convincing him to peacefully give himself up around 7 - the same time traffic usually begins to subside.
The process in these situations involves a negotiator who delivers some sort of pre-defined spiel through a megaphone. If the spiel doesn't work, a SWAT team prepares to remove the perpetrator by force. Force is a last resort because the emphasis is on whatever hostages are involved. In the U.S., human life is very important.
But Mr. Kline had no hostages. They all ran off the bus -- at his insistence -- right after he boarded.
Kline obviously wasn't thinking ahead. Hostages are the only valuable resource one has when it comes to making the police do something they don't want to do. Criminals are often known for their stupidity so Kline's lack of foresight can be written off in the usual manner.
The problem here doesn't involve Kline at all. The problem regards the negotiation period.
We can assume the disembarking riders immediately informed the police that Kline had a weapon. Policemen don't want to be killed any more than anyone else does, so a bit of nervous dawdling is to be expected. Also, there is the matter of counting heads, calling negotiators, and assembling SWAT personnel. All told, 30 or 40 minutes of immediate downtime is customary in the initial reaction. But past that, there was no more need for waiting.
Kline had no hostages, one semi-automatic pistol, and he looked hurried so it was unlikely that he was loaded down with extra ammunition. Also, he was covered with blood so it could be assumed that whatever ammunition was originally in the gun was depleted. SWAT stands for Special Weapons And Tactics; we assume that the police had lots of weapons, each fancier than Kline's single piece, and lots of ammunition. Even if Kline had a bag of bullets stashed somewhere, it takes more than a few seconds to reload.
After phone calls had been placed, and some yelling back and forth, the police should have simply stormed the bus and dragged Kline out, releasing traffic a few minutes later. Instead they talked with him for four full hours until he walked peacefully off. The area newspapers noted that the matter ended without harm. But that is terribly incorrect.
There was tremendous harm. According to a Transit Alternatives Analysis Study sponsored by the Virginia DRPT, the south-bound traffic coming from Alexandria to Kline's bus stop is currently around 43,000 cars per day. This may seem like a lot, but the greater I-95 beltway traffic ranges from 180,000 to 240,000 cars per day.
When it comes to the value of time, Fairfax County is no ordinary county. The median income in Fairfax was $100,318 in 2006, the highest anywhere in the country. That is more than double the national average of $48,451. Per business hour, that's $48 per person.
To be fair, commuters have to spend some time commuting, but remember that the commuters still had to drive home after the affair was over. Rush hour did not disappear at 7 PM. That day, it simply began anew.
At $48 per hour, the expense in lost time was somewhere north of $8 million. Paying policemen to stand around for four hours wasn't figured in.
Nor will we dwell on the fact that while negotiators were placating Mr. Kline, other issues were ignored.
Here once again, the government has stolen time and money. What did the citizenry get for it? The arrest of a dangerous criminal instead of his (and only his) possible death. Oh, and by the way - Kline had murdered a woman a few minutes before he ran onto the bus at 3 PM. So he will be rotting in prison -- again, at taxpayers' expense -- for the next 20 years.
We hear a lot about the problem of police brutality. We forget the price we pay when the police aren't brutal enough.
And there is the matter of precedent. Not one of crook stupidity - there is more than enough of that. Negotiating four hours for - what? Was the team needing practice? Maybe, but it doesn't look very good doing it so publicly.
I live in LA, and this sort of thing is common. I have no problem with the coppers trying to "talk down" someone for hours if nothing else is being affected. In a back alley and the guy is holding the gun to his head? Fine, take your time. But the value of traffic should be considered. Here they were affecting up to 43000 lives? Unbelievable, our government.
I wonder how many policemen were involved. Some of them would have stayed extra shifts; can anyone say "overtime"? DC reported last year that there were cops making more than $160,000 during the year due to unmonitored overtime submissions. SWAT members probably get paid more.
Yes, that's happened MANY times. Massive overtime for DC police is the norm now. Here's an article just three days ago: www.examiner.com/a-991726~D_C__police_officers_rake_in_big_overtime_dollars.html
Notice the leaders there averaged more than 40 hours of overtime *per week* all year long. They overtime'd twice their base salary.
I don't have a problem with policemen making that much money or working extra where needed. But one might smell a rat here. Is it possible for a beat cop to work 80+ hours for a solid year? And would it be cheaper to taxpayers to simply hire more bodies? Of course, none of this will be considered.
Cops should gamble their lives . Their LIVES.
Hello, their LIVES ! On your assumptions that maybe this guy didn't have the ammo to KILL one or more of them ?
Or they should shoot someone, kill a human being, so you didn't have to deal with one bad day ?
You drive this hideous excuse for a road daily- and one human life should be disposed of so you aren't later than usual today ?!?
Reading this, I now know what's wrong with the beltway.
The folks on it.
And , the cost of the loss estimated in business hours lost , leaving out commute time ?
Um, commuting home, EVERYONE was going to go home and continue working ?
Time was lost. Money was spent on cops. But basing the cost on average income divided by hourly wage x number of hours sitting on a highway AFTER WORK?
This wasn't even time lost from the work day.
Quite a 'distance' to 'drive' to try to justify cops laying down their lives so you can get home on time....
"This wasn't even time lost from the work day"
So as long as it's people "off time" it's ok to waste it? Considering, that this was time people were going to spend with their families to some degree it was even MORE valuable than work time. And What if the guy never came off? Should the cops have waited forever? Clearly, there is SOME practical limit to how long police should have waited.
And yes, cops should gamble THEIR lives. That is what they are paid for. Their armor, tactics and training minimizes personal damage. Certainly no one wants them to be hasty, but come on. four hours during rush hour??!?! The clown had no hostages and one gun.
Time wasted from their lives is a reasonable thing to say - a misleading estimate of money lost from the workday while on the commute home is not only unreasonable, it's deceptive.
Cops get paid to risk their lives FOR YOURS.
No one's life was at risk, no one's life needed to be at risk.
Had the situation gone on longer, at some point an alternative would have been used.
But to claim it's a cop's job to DIE so YOU can get home one time ?
Insane.
So you're basically saying that time spent at home, with family, etc. is to be valued less than time at work? Time is time, and one of the most valuable resources we have. Hours of time multiplied by thousands of people can't just be trivialized away.
Kit, get a grip. The only solution was NOT "either cop's die OR the traffic backs up". The situation was not black and white. Cops serve warrants and arrest people at gunpoint thousands of time per day. Very few ever die in the process.
Have you ever seen the material a SWAT team member wears? It takes high caliber weaponry and a lot of effort to hurt those guys. Add to that the fact that the perps are usually scared and nervous.
Ever heard of tear gas? Ever heard of a flash grenade? They could driven the guy out hours earlier with no damage to anyone but him.
Next time you think cops are so easily killed, take a look at this:
images.google.com/images
Chris, I'm saying that the point of this article was bolstered with false figures.
Of course time with family is valuable.
If a human life is less valuable than a few hours of your time, I feel very badly for you.
Twibi, the writer claims "he looked hurried so it was unlikely that he was loaded down with extra ammunition. Also, he was covered with blood so it could be assumed that whatever ammunition was originally in the gun was depleted." and adds that "the police should have simply stormed the bus "
Cops do die in these storm trooper tactics, and so, usually, does the perp.
I prefer our nation's rule by law, not stormtrooper tactics.
This guy deserves jail- possibly the death penalty - but being late home is NOT a good enough reason to negate the rule of law.
143 cops died this year in the line of duty.
This year alone.
http://www.odmp.org/year.php
Can you present the true cost figure? You've called the author's figures and the reasoning behind them false several times. But you never make any argument why they are false or any analysis of what the true figure would be.
There are over 30,000 policemen in NYC alone. The nation has a quarter million. It is tragic that any cops died, but a rate of 1 out of 1,500 per year is FAR better than I ever would have imagined, considering how hard their job is. Kit has decidedly made my point.
There were over 30,000 fatal car accidents last year. This figure has remained fairly constant for the past few years. Should we stop driving to avoid all this death?
Kit's perspective is sort of like Hillary's calls to "save the children" with SCHIP. Hassle and steal from millions of people to "save the lives of a few". Conservatives do not want poor children to die. They simple see the bigger picture and the bad precedent. Similary, Von's point here is about the big picture. The only possible person who was going to die was the idiot with the gun.
No one is *wanting* anyone to die. Playing on the fact that cops *sometimes* DO die (although the rate appears very low) is misdirection.
PS. I am not the author of this article, but thank you for the compliment.
Chris , scroll up. I covered this already. The author is claiming that the majority of monies lost are based in his estimate of the hourly wages of those stuck in traffic - going HOME at the end of the day !
They going home- they are done , they are not on the clock.
Family time is valuable, but I'm not aware of anyone who gets paid to spend time with their families.
That's what makes the author's claim of 8 million dollars in lost wages ludicrous.
Twibi, right now the policy you abhor is - avoid lethal force if at all possible, and to always try to wait it out.
But you don't like that- it makes folks late getting home.
You want them to storm in and attack - that's going to have a direct effect on the death rate for cops- and for perps..
While you're dumping rule of law for stormtrooper tactics, were you also planning on eliminating the courts ?
There's a real world cost that your 'storm in and free up my commute ' doesn't address.
The courts don't much like it when cops storm an perp whom they believe is out of ammo - the judgments handed down cost cities real money, not fake 'lost income' from a slowdown of the commute home...
All your rhetoric boils down to one idea : you'd rather cops use lethal force in situations that don't call for lethal force if your commute is delayed...
Sad.
You seem to have misread the article. The author did not talk about "lost wages." Instead, he is making a back of the napkin calculation of the value of the time lost. In standard economic terms, the monetary value of time is the amount that could be earned during that time. Unless you have been reading different economic textbooks than I, that is the standard definition of the value of time.
This has all gotten very interesting. It sounds like we're debating a branching topic though. What is time worth? Because people are not doing a "day job" during the time they are hassled, means nothing. To everything, there is a balance. If 10 or 50 or even 100 people were hassled or had to wait, fine. All well and good. But upwards of 50,000 people waiting in cars for four hours is very much over the line. But Kit is right that it does depends on some balance. That is true. For instance, if Mr. Kline has hostages that would again change the balance. The likelihood of innocent deaths would become much more certain. The balance there would be far more slanted.
Kit said "While you're dumping rule of law for stormtrooper tactics"
What rule of law? What stormtrooper tactics? If the guy was in the bus for 10 or 20 hours would they not go in at SOME point?
200 years ago, in England they had something called "reading the riot act." We still use this phrase today. Basically, the way this worked was, whenever there was a mob or riot of some sort, they would try to stop it with normal means if possible. But if this didn't work, some appropriate official would come out and "read the riot act" - that is, shout that if they did not disperse at once, the soldiers would come in with bayonets and live fire. After waiting some statutory time - a few minutes, I suppose - if the rioters did not stop and clear out, "they had been warned" and the military would move in, shooting as they saw fit.
We obviously don't need the military involved in situations like this, but there is a useful analogy. What prevents the police, once they are all in place and innocents are cleared out of the way, from announcing on the megaphone, 'Surrender now, or be shot." Then wait 5 minutes. If the armed madman comes out with his hands up, then arrest him and try him as he should be. If he won't, though, then you throw in a flash-bang grenade, teargas, knockout gas, whatever - the object being, to minimize any danger to the police, and we don't really care if the criminal is harmed since he has had a fair warning and fair chance to surrender - but TAKE HIM DOWN.
How does it benefit anyone to have an armed criminal holed up somewhere? Every moment that's the case, there is grave danger of something worse happening, even aside from the costs of people's time. Give the police enough time to prepare themselves - then a loud, fair warning to the criminal - then move in. Of course this is assuming no innocents are at risk, that is a completely different situation.
Back to you. How long, exactly, should we wait before doing something? Why that long, and no longer or shorter?
Let's suppose the cops acted hastily and the hijacker kills some bystanders; then 3 families sue for 5 million apiece.
What kind of selfish nation are we that people would weigh the cost of human life against the petty inconvenience of traffic? So you're stuck in traffic for 45 minutes. Wah! How can you possibly argue fiscal costs verses the irreplaceable cost of human life?
Can't buy another Officer Smith to replace the one that gets shot. Can't buy another husband for the wife who becomes a widow. Can't buy another son for the mother who loses her son (and I don't mean simply the police officers either).
I hope you all remember this the next time your car breaks down on the side of the road and no one stops to help. After all, time is money right? Enjoy changing a tire with cars whipping past you at 75mph because stopping to help costs them too much.
What about a woman caught in traffic who is going into labor at the same time? With 43000 cars stuck in traffic, not moving, the likelihood of this is actually pretty great. Same with someone with an illness, rushing to the hospital. You're right that there *is* other value to consider other than money. But that also goes for the 43000 trapped people in automobiles. What if the pregnant woman sues the police for needlessly delaying her?
>>What kind of selfish nation are we that people would weigh the cost of human life against the petty inconvenience of traffic?
Well, let's see. First, we surely should weigh INNOCENT human life more heavily than that of a criminal, should we not? After all, the whole definition of criminals is that they foul things up for innocent folks, to a greater or lesser extent.
Secondly, I don't think anyone here is wishing ill upon the cops. But it is a fact that, as with soldiers and firemen, they have knowingly chosen a profession that entails some danger. We should do all we can to minimize that danger, but we can never entirely eliminate it, and it's not unreasonable to expect them to be willing to face it.
Last, this discussion has cast a sharp highlight on the way Americans determine value. We like to say that "Nothing is as valuable as a human life" - but clearly that's not true, or else we wouldn't drive cars. We also like to say that everyone's life is worth the same - but again, that's clearly untrue, or else we would deal with bad choices (e.g. smoking, excessive drinking, eating McD's) differently.
In this case, we have a criminal stealing from the lives of other innocent people. Lives? Well, 43,000 people were delayed for 4 hours. That's 172,000 hours - which is 7166 days - which is almost 20 years. Would you be so sanguine at someone being killed 20 years before their time?
"What if the pregnant woman sues the police for needlessly delaying her?" - True, there are other lives to consider, but in the example of the pregnant woman or suffering from illness, they have the option of calling 9-1-1, obtaining both police escort from the scene and/or medical attention on the spot. I mean, ambulances and police are able to get to car accidents amid rush hour traffic, so what would the difference be here? Also, the weight of the article is focused on the inconvenience and costs of time, not an emergency.
"First, we surely should weigh INNOCENT human life more heavily than that of a criminal, should we not? " - Exactly. The safety of the innocent police officers and any innocent civilians within gunfire range (stray bullets can travel a pretty fair distance). Why put everyone at risk just because the alternative is sitting in traffic a little longer?
"Would you be so sanguine at someone being killed 20 years before their time?" - That's a little extreme and over dramatic, don't you think? This one act is not costing an individual person 20 years. And, of course, there's still the lives of police officers who ACTUALLY could be cut short 20 years by storming in against an armed suspect.
Yes, I agree, it is foolish to think we as a society think of every human life as equal. But there is a difference between subtle risk and choices versus a blatant disregard for life, especially when the only "cost" pointed out is a little time. Traffic and accidents are a fact of life, nearly unavoidable. But to toss into the air the lives of others just so someone can get home a little faster is simply self-centered rubbish.
Let's forget who it was that was on the bus. For arguments sake, let's say that it wasn't a murderer but a mentally unstable man off of his medication. Is it fair to say that the officers should have taken more or less time with the unstable man? If the officers start devaluing life, then who is to say when it's ok (or not) to devalue yours? A police officer doesn't care what you have done. It is not a personal vendetta for an officer when he takes someone to jail, it is his job; and in the larger picture, it is his job to value all life equally. We scream and shout when an officer is too quick to use physical force but it is somehow alright when we are inconvenienced? Say it isn't so.
We expect officers all across the nation to not distinguish between someone they like or dislike. We expect them to do the job that they are paid for, and NO, they aren't paid to put themselves into harms way when a lesser option is available. This is true in all instances, and is commonly referred to as the continuum of force. If the force exhibited was greater then the officers would have also stepped up theirs.
I wouldn't have been happy, in fact, I would have been pissed, but it's always good when a situation ends up with one less dead guy, murderer or not.