Opinion ID: 1662260
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: police procedure on pursuit of vehicles

Text: The evidence adduced during the offer of proof showed that the officer was aware of police procedures regarding vehicle pursuits; that he was supposed to consider road conditions, traffic, pedestrian traffic, officer safety, and safety of those not involved in the pursuit; and that he, the officer, did consider the nature of the defendant's crime, the speeds involved in the pursuit, the residential location of the pursuit, the volume of vehicle and pedestrian traffic, the time of day, the road conditions, and the weather conditions. Although defendant's counsel indicated he had obtained several policies, orders, and rulings that the police department has concerning motor vehicle pursuits, those were not made a part of the record. The evidence during the offer of proof did reveal that the officer believed several times during the pursuit that the defendant was ending the chase, that there were no children or pedestrians in the streets, that traffic was light, and that the motorcycle went substantially faster than the officer's cruiser. Defendant argues that he should have been allowed to present evidence of the police department's policies on the pursuit of motor vehicles in order to show that Officer Haskell's conduct contributed to the victim's death. The defendant contends that the evidence was necessary as bearing on the issue of proximate cause. Disregarding the fact that not knowing what the policies were, we are unable to determine whether they might be relevant or not, we will discuss the general principles of proximate cause as may be applicable in this case. Proximate cause has been defined by this court as a moving or effective cause or fault which, in the natural and continuous sequence, unbroken by an efficient intervening cause, produces the death and without which the death would not have occurred. State v. Sommers, 201 Neb. 809, 811-12, 272 N.W.2d 367, 369 (1978). `It is the efficient cause, the one that necessarily sets in operation the factors that accomplish the death....' State v. Lytle, 194 Neb. 353, 358, 231 N.W.2d 681, 685 (1975); State v. Harris, 194 Neb. 74, 230 N.W.2d 203 (1975). A helpful explanation was given in State v. Dixon, 222 Neb. 787, 796-97, 387 N.W.2d 682, 688 (1986), quoting in part from State v. Spates, 176 Conn. 227, 405 A.2d 656 (1978): Conduct is a cause of an event if the event in question would not have occurred but for that conduct; conversely, conduct is not a cause of an event if that event would have occurred without such conduct.... .... ... An act or omission to act is the proximate cause of death when it substantially and materially contributes, in a natural and continuous sequence, unbroken by an efficient, intervening cause, to the resulting death. It is the cause without which the death would not have occurred and the predominating cause, the substantial factor, from which death follows as a natural, direct and immediate consequence. [Citations omitted.] It is unnecessary for `proximate cause' purposes that the particular kind of harm that results from the defendant's act be intended by him. In many situations giving rise to criminal liability, the harm that results is unintended, yet is directly or indirectly caused by an act of the defendant. In such cases, where the death or injury caused by the defendant's conduct is a foreseeable and natural result of that conduct, the law considers the chain of legal causation unbroken and holds the defendant criminally responsible. The trial court held that the defendant's conduct was the proximate cause of the victim's death and that the officer's conduct was thus irrelevant. The defendant disagrees, claiming that evidence of the officer's contributory negligence may be material to whether the defendant's actions were a proximate cause of death. The case of State v. Rotella, 196 Neb. 741, 246 N.W.2d 74 (1976), is somewhat analogous to the present case. There, the defendant, who allegedly was driving on the wrong side of the road when he collided with the deceased's car, was convicted of motor vehicle homicide. On appeal, he complained of the trial court's refusal to allow him to present evidence that the deceased had a quantity of amphetamines in his system sufficient to impair his decisionmaking ability. The trial court determined this evidence to be irrelevant. This court defined the issue thus: Essentially what defendant is seeking to prove is contributory negligence on the part of the deceased. However, contributory negligence is not a defense to a charge of motor vehicle homicide. The issue is whether defendant's violation of law was a contributing factor to the death.  (Emphasis supplied.) Id. at 743, 246 N.W.2d at 76. The court then cited from other decisions holding that negligence or unlawful acts by another will not absolve the defendant. When one drives a motor vehicle in violation of law pertaining to the operation of such vehicles on the public highway, and, in so doing, as a result of the violation of law, causes death to another, he is guilty of manslaughter, and neither contributory negligence of deceased nor the driver of the car in which deceased was riding when killed, can be invoked to relieve the former of criminal responsibility. Id. at 744, 246 N.W.2d at 76, citing Vaca v. State, 150 Neb. 516, 34 N.W.2d 873 (1948). In criminal cases prosecuted under the motor vehicle homicide act, the negligence or unlawful acts of another driver which proximately contributed to the death, as distinguished from an independent intervening cause thereof, [are] not a defense if the evidence is sufficient to sustain a conclusion beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant's negligence or unlawful acts were also a proximate cause of the death of another. Rotella, supra, 196 Neb. at 744, 246 N.W.2d at 76, citing Hoffman v. State, 162 Neb. 806, 77 N.W.2d 592 (1956). The reasoning of the foregoing cases extends to the present circumstances. Regardless of whether the officer violated police policy or was negligent in his decision to pursue the defendant at high speeds, the defendant's actions were still a proximate cause of the death. The defendant's flight from the officer, his high rate of speed, and his failure to stop at the final stop sign all made up `the cause without which the death would not have occurred....' State v. Dixon, 222 Neb. 787, 797, 387 N.W.2d 682, 688 (1986). Under these facts, the officer's actions, even if incorrect, did not serve to negate the conclusion that it was the defendant's conduct which was `the efficient cause, the one that necessarily [set] in operation the factors that accomplish[ed] the death....' State v. Lytle, 194 Neb. 353, 358, 231 N.W.2d 681, 685 (1975). The fact that some other agency combined with the act of the defendant to cause the death is not a defense unless the other agency is an efficient intervening cause. State v. Meints, 212 Neb. 410, 414, 322 N.W.2d 809, 812 (1982). In State v. Machmuller, 196 Neb. 734, 246 N.W.2d 69 (1976), wherein the defendant who had threatened officers with a loaded gun taken from the officers' car argued that if the officers had followed their own procedure of locking the car door the incident would never have happened, the court stated that [t]his effort to shift the blame for what occurred to the police officers by introducing an argument based upon proximate cause does not impress us. Id. at 737-38, 246 N.W.2d at 71. There is no merit to defendant's first argument.