Victim's Friend Questions Elk Grove High-Speed Chase
ELK GROVE (CBS13) -- After a high-speed pursuit Sunday night came to a violent end, killing the suspect and seriously injuring an innocent driver, that man's friend is asking whether the pursuit should have been called off before the crash happened.
He was headed to work, but 48-year-old Alejandro Topete never made it there. Instead a driver hit him head-on during a high-speed chase down Grant Line Road.
The crash killed the suspect, 35-year-old Jose Sanchez, instantly. Topete suffered numerous broken bones.
Topete's friend Craig Ledbetter is thankful he is alive, but he's questioning why the CHP allowed a chase at 90 miles per hour on a narrow two-lane road.
"It's dangerous, especially on two-lane roads that are busy, it's always dangerous," he said.
But the CHP defended the chase, calling traffic in the area light.
"I can tell you we followed policy in pursing the vehicle," CHP Officer Michael Bradley told CBS13's Derek Shore. "At that split-second in time, I can't say we would have done anything different. You can't speculate on what should have happened. The collision happened. Unfortunately, that suspect decided to run."
The crash came just one day after another pursuit ended badly. A Sacramento police cruiser was speeding after a suspect who ended up slamming into a home in Oak Park. A spokeswoman for the department would not discuss their pursuit policy with Shore.
The CHP is conducting a full investigation into Sunday's crash.
"Every pursuit is critiqued and looked at by the supervisors and goes all the way to the captain, to management to review and see what we can do better," Bradley said.
Ledbetter hopes that means being more cautious.
"I would hope that this never happens to anybody else," he said.
