First of all I think that the law suit is simply ridiculous. Coming from a criminal justice background going into volunteer fire/ems i can understand both sides of the story.
Lets start with the cop. He was already investigating a call about a black dodge charger that was impersonating a police officer. When he pulled the u-turn and began to accelerate he should of turned on his lights and sirens then, not when he gets close to the vehicle he passed. Secondly crossing the line while cresting a hill is a no no last I knew. great way to get yourself killed. following the ff thru town I would of turned off the siren when i noticed that the vehicle I was pursuing stopped speeding, started using turn signals, and stopping at stop signs. When they got to the fire station I agree with the police officers tactics a little bit. I wouldnt have told the suspect to get back into his vehicle, where he could potentially have access to a weapon, I would of had him lay on the ground. But he was wearing a shirt with what looked like a badge on the chest. I didnt see anything on the back of it saying he was a volunteer fire fighter. Which would lend credence to the officers assumption that he was the car from the call earlier. The cop did holster his weapon once he realized it was a fire fighter, but when he approached the car he did the right thing. Suspect was fleeing apprehension, failed to yield, Officers safety is the number one priorty. As for those of you saying but he pulled into a fire station, I have seen people running from the cops who did everything the ff did, pull into a hospital then take off running on foot.
Now for the ff. Running code/hot for a non emergency code is against his department policies. He is in a POV with what looked like a dash light. I am not sure what oregons law is for volunteers and having lights but in texas the pov needs to have 360 degree visibility for emergency lights. The lights have to be visible up to 300-500 hundred feet. Plus the firefighter needs to have displayed on his vehicle fireman, firefighter, or a departmental decal(thats from my chief). I did not see any of those on the ff vehicles. Lastly the ff was in a pov. I know my chief has stated, along with the DPS captain for my area, that even though our pov's are considered emergency vehicles in Texas if we do not yeild right of way for marked police officers then we are going to be in trouble, because at the end of the day we are still in our POVs.
So with that said the blame falls on both the cop and the ff. Both parties acted in a way that is against the best interest of the public. Do I think things could of/should of been handled differently yes, do I think the fire fighter has a valid law suit, no. This is an internal matter for both agencies. Unless the cop was monitoring fire dept. radio channels then he would not of know about the fire call. He should be disciplined for initiating a pursuit without activating his warning equipment. The ff, and the entire department, needs to be disciplined if they are violating departmental policy by using lights and sirens for non emergency calls.
For those of you wondering I have been a volunteer firefighter for about 6 months and today is the first time I used my warning lights. I had a local SO get behind me running code and I did yield the right of way.
