Dallas Police Pulling Stop Sticks Off The Streets
DALLAS (CBSDFW.COM) - On the same day that a high speed chase weaved through the streets of Fort Worth, the Dallas Police Department announced that it will no longer use stop sticks, commonly seen during high speed chases.
Last year, an Ohio sheriff's deputy died after a suspect swerved to avoid a set of stop sticks and struck him on the roadside.
There are more than a dozen other tributes online to law enforcement officers killed while using tire deflation devices. All were hit by either a suspect's car or squad cars in pursuit.
Citing these deaths, the Dallas Police Department said that it conducted a review of the use of stop sticks and the study's results. "It was decided the deployment of stop sticks posed too great a risk of death or injury to the deploying office and public to continue their use," read a statement released by the department.
A website for Stop Tech, the manufacturer of the Stop Stick, the leading tire deflation device, claims the product is designed for officer safety, and lists 18,000 examples of it being successfully deployed.
There are no known reports of local law enforcement officers being injured or killed while using stop sticks.
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