A Fort Wayne police officer with a history of traffic offenses has pleaded guilty to an infraction after his vehicle fatally injured a pedestrian who was in a crosswalk.

The officer was previously disciplined 4 times for other driving offenses, but killing someone - well - $35.50 oughta cover it.

  • starman2112@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    445·
    10 months ago

    After the crash, Hartup issued a statement saying that as he was completing a turn at an intersection, “I struck a pedestrian. I immediately stopped my vehicle, grabbed my radio, and started aid to the pedestrian, and called dispatch to send medics.”

    It gets a little harder to hate the driver when you find out that they did everything after the crash right. Guy still deserves jail time for fucking up driving again so badly that he ended someone’s life about it, but I’m not about to call for violence against him. Stopping and calling for help immediately is exactly what you should do if you hit a person.

    $35.50 is an absolute insult to the victim, though. I hope it’s hard to cope with taking a life knowing that you’ve only paid the equivalent of a tank of gas for it.

    • snooggums@kbin.social
      474·
      10 months ago

      I assume he is lying unless there is video evidence that he did any of those things immediately.

      • starman2112@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        6·
        10 months ago

        Seems like something the prosecution’s lawyer would have an easy time proving by subpoenaing the officer’s dash cam footage. If anything, when the victim’s family takes the officer to court, they’ll subpoena it then. If the camera supports the officer’s testimony, you’ll never see it, because it won’t be used as evidence against him, and no one will bother posting a boring video that just supports a cop’s claims