[Dallas] NFL player's police saga at Plano hospital captured on dash cam

There are several issues here, first I don't want to give people the ability just to drive willy nilly because there is an emergency. There are others still on the road.

secondly, it looks like he was pulled over for a minor violation, which leads me to third

the cop was clearly being a jerk avnd verbally abusive. that's uncalled for with anyone in a position of authority

 

I think this is a fire-able offense. As correctly noted by assistant chief Simpson, the cops actions resulted in the exact opposite of the entire purpose of the police force - to help society, not hurt it.

The lady died. She's dead. The finality of death is just so heavy - anyone who has ever had a loved one die, especially young and unexpectedly, knows what I mean. And not only did Moats not get to see her off, her own father didn't get to say goodbye.

The cops wasn't just a bad cop, he was a bad person, and likely always will be.

And, though I'll miss his continued stupidity, TJ is finally going on my ignore list. What a dickwad.

 

The Conquistadork....pissing off people in two forums now.

/me waits to find out which one he goes to for the hat-trick.

 

Being a difficult prick and deliberately pissing people off is pretty lame.

I'll let you figure out if I'm talking about the cop or a certain poster here.

 

It's not really at the entrance to the hospital, though. Despite what the articles say, the "infraction" had to have taken place at the intersection of the Bush Turnpike exit ramp and Preston Rd, which is a major intersection. The hospital entrance was at least half a mile away from the light, and you wouldn't automatically assume that people getting off at that exit would be going to that hospital.

The fact that the officer went after the car isn't an issue. The problem is that the officer appears to never even attempt to ascertain the nature of the problem. The family pulled right up to the emergency room entrance, and instead of asking what the emergency is, he immediately tries to get everybody to stay put (even when the wife says "my mother is dying". The officer doesn't know at that point if the mother in question is in the car dying at that very moment and he makes an attempt to keep them from entering the emergency room) and even when confronted with the evidence that this is a situation that could fit the definition of an emergency, he still decides to threaten and waste time.

Within seconds of getting out of his car, he had all the information he needed to write a ticket. There was no reason to hold Moats there at all, let alone for over ten minutes. Even when a Plano Police officer comes and confirms the story and attempts to get the Dallas officer to release Moats, the Dallas officer continues stalling.

And especially egregious to me is when the officer threatens at one point to arrest Moats with a false charge of fleeing (Moats pulls over 20 seconds after the officer catches up to him. The entire "chase" took less than 90 seconds). The whole thing is ridiculous, but when an officer threatens to file a false report and unjustly imprison you just because he doesn't like the situation, it shows what kind of officer this man is.

If he's willing to at least entertain the notion of filing a false report and making a false arrest based on a very minor situation, what lines will this officer cross if he's confronted with more serious situations? If he has so little respect for his job that he's willing to consider breaking the law to "put someone is his place", should he even be out patrolling in the first place?

 

I agree that the situation doesn't give you the right to drive dangerously.

I think he would have lived with the ticket, but the holding him up over it was awful.

 

Maybe shoot someone in front of their own house in Bellaire because he wrongly thinks the young man stole the car he's driving, which happens to be his own car...and in front of his mother? Good point. Who knows? If Moats had responded by walking away towards the entrance of the hospital, would the officer have attempted to stop him? And, how? Moats is very lucky he kept a cool head in this situation.

 

I think the clear take-away from this whole situation is that Moats needs to move his ass away from Dallas.

 

By the way, if anyone is bored enough to watch the entire, unedited video, it's available here:

http://www.wfaa.com/video/featured-index.html?nvid=345766

 

The sad thing is, he was only in Dallas for a matter of seconds, just long enough to run that light (and by the time he was finished making his left turn after running the light, he had already left Dallas).

 

Anyone remember the Simpson's Tree House of Horror episode when the advertisements went crazy? What was the one way to stop the madness?



"This message is hidden because Trader_Jorge is on your ignore list."

 

That is funny, Castor.

A not-too-dissimilar story (that I may have already told on this board) - my father is an anesthesiologist. One day in the 1980s, he was on call and got paged to come do an emergency surgery. He was rushing to the hospital, since it was an emergency and all (and people get grumpy when you operate on them without anesthesia), and he got pulled over. He immediately tried to explain to the officer that he was a doctor and was answering an emergency page.

The officer decided that someone's life being in the balance wasn't all that important, so he decided my Dad could wait until he ran the license plate, driver's license, etc. So once my Dad realizes it's going to be a while, he calls the hospital from his enormous 1980s-era mobile phone. He explains the situation to the nurse and says "I'll be there as soon as this dumbass cop writes me a ticket."

The officer, hearing the dumbass comment, decides this is an arrestable offense and asks my father to step out of the car, puts him in handcuffs and takes him down to the station. The officer wouldn't even let my Dad make a phone call to let the hospital know that he wasn't actually going to make it at all so, you know, start filling out the death certificate or whatever.

So the next time you or a relative are in an emergency situation and need immediate surgery, know that there might well be a police officer out there who would rather you die than let someone get away with calling him a dumbass.

What is ironic (to me anyway) is that the officer has to run a red light to give chase (a different red light than the one that Moats allegedly ran), creating a dangerous situation for the car that he, if the officer hadn't slowed down, would have hit a crossing car and caused a crash (plus, because the video automatically starts when the lights/sirens are turned on and because the first light we see is red, it likely means that the officer also ran a red light on the other side of the highway before turning on his lights/sirens, which is even more dangerous and, I think, a violation of DPD policy).

 

Almost as typical as it is horrible. . . .

Crazy . . .folx power tripping

T_J - You are exactly what we think you are. Continue to to try and hide it.. . to try and use euphemisms and false weak arguments. . but at the end of the day . .. . You are what we think you are.

Rocket River

 

No way he should be allowed to keep his job after that. Unreal

 

Once again, this is all about a perceived "lack of accountability" that a LOT of cops feel they have these days. And once again, this could EASILY be solved by having the police patrol a specific area of town, like they used to.

They would get a better idea of the people they were patrolling, and people could get to know the police on a much more personal basis.

Quite frankly, I'm not sure why there isn't more uproar about this. It would be in the greater good of us all.

 

15 year olds don't have his highly developed d-bag powers.

 

I agree with this. In terms of the uproar, it's on the front page of ESPN. Once more people get the opportunity to watch the video, I think there will be a dramatic change. The police officer will be fired, and I'm sure the Police Department will be sued.

 

the Moatses is the correct plural form of the Moats family name