Fatal crash second in year involving Oakridge police
OAKRIDGE, Ore. -- Don Hadley and Clifford Himmel spend a lot of time along Highway 58 where it cuts a path through Oakridge from the Cascades to the Willamette Valley.
Oakridge police park near Hadley's business, About Time, waiting for speeders to come along.
"They pull out of here and leave in front of my place going 60-65 miles per hour," said Hadley.
Himmel, who works at Service Parts Inc., sees the speeders and the police go by, too.
"It was going to happen sooner or later," he said. "Either the police were going to run into somebody or the speeders were going to run into somebody."
Police have not released the cause of Monday's crash that killed a 91-year-old Virginia Spalinger and critically injured an Oakridge police officer, 27-year-old Daniel Miller. Miller is now listed in serious condition. Their cars collided as the woman turned left on Hwy. 58 in front of the officer as he pursued a speeder with the squad car's siren and lights on.
Police have also not said how fast the officer was driving in pursuit of the speeder.
Business owners and Oakridge residents contacted KVAL News in the wake of Monday's accident to voice their concerns about how police chase traffic violators in Oakridge, prompting this report.
The crash is the second fatal collision involving an officer from the 10-person Oakridge Police Department in the last year.
In late September 2008, an Oakridge police officer chased a man riding a motorcycle. The man on the motorcycle crashed into a guardrail and was ejected. An Oakridge police car in pursuit couldn't avoid hitting the man on the ground. An autopsy was inconclusive as to which injuries killed the motorcyclist. | STORIES
At the time, KVAL News asked the Oakridge police chief what the department's policy was for high-speed chases. He said the policy leaves it up to officer discretion: the officer must determine if the risk of the pursuit outweighs the justification to pursue. | STORY
KVAL News again tried to contact Chief Louis Gomez on the topic. Messages explained that viewers and business owners wanted to know more about how and why police conduct pursuits, and that KVAL News wanted to get his side of the story, too.
The chief did not respond to repeated requests for an interview.
It's the same response Hadley said he gets every time he calls the police about the way they patrol.
