US police car chases result in 8 deaths around one week

A series of police pursuits have led to at least eight deaths around the country in less than a week amid ongoing calls from some law enforcement experts to curb risky high-speed car chases.

In Texas, a man fleeing from police died Sunday. In Alabama, four people died when a car being pursued by a state trooper went off a road and hit a tree on Friday. And in California, three people were killed in vehicle crashes during police pursuits in separate incidents last week. The deadly incidents are among the hundreds of fatalities that occur during police chases each year.

In 2023, a report from the Police Executive Research Forum, a national think tank on policing standards, called for police to put the brakes on car chases unless a violent crime has been committed and the suspect poses an imminent threat. The report noted a spike in fatalities and an increase in pursuits by some departments, including in Houston and New York City. In the case in Alabama, a driver was trying to elude the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency’s highway patrol in southeast Alabama’s Pike County.