No Charges Against Driver Whose Car Killed a Washington Middle School Student
From The Seattle Times.
No criminal charges will be filed at this time against the owner of an SUV that rolled unattended onto a sidewalk outside Washington Middle School in the Central District last month, killing a 12-year-old girl, Seattle Police said.
However, police said Thursday the owner was issued a citation listing four parking violations in connection with her decision to leave the vehicle, a 2018 GMC Arcadia, unattended outside the school.
Parking tickets are for infractions, which are punishable only by a fine.
The issued citation includes violations that included parking in front of a fire hydrant, improper parallel parking and for failing to stop and secure the vehicle when parking, police said.
One other piece of info in the story that I hadn't seen before is that the car also hit two other students as well. I assume they were not badly injured.
While the city apparently couldn't charge the driver criminally, the family would be able to sue civilly.
I'll have to ask but I would assume the district is doing an investigation into why these middle school kids were standing out on the sidewalk during lunch. That should not have happened and unless these kids sneaked out, some SPS adult must have seen them out there.
Comments
One wildcard question is whether students (not necessarily the ones run over) had anything to do with setting the vehicle in motion. It seems unlikely -- with most newer cars, you can't leave the car without putting it in park or having it put itself in park automatically; and you can't get it out of park without the key.
Another question would be whether students realized that the SUV had no driver inside as it rolled. Perhaps it veered onto the sidewalk and struck them by surprise, or perhaps students and/or adults noticed something strange was happening, and stood to watch with interest and amusement (some sort of crash being inevitable). If adult(s) were aware of the situation, and didn't at least try to move students back from the street, that would look worse for the school district.
But I disagree. The middle schools have outside places to roam and kids should not be on the sidewalk. Yes, it was a freak accident but boy, that driver was very selfish (parked next to a fire hydrant) and careless.
I would hope the district is doing an internal investigation and I would guess the family will sue the district.
Meanwhile, you could implement strict controls that coerce students to stay in school even when they don't want to be there or don't think it has any purpose. But that approach might have all sorts of negative side-effects, demoralize students who are willing to attend, and and cost a lot of money, and maybe it's going out on the wrong limb.
What will it take to have a school board that starts thinking in terms of a "race to the top," where kids can be their best selves as students, artists, athletes, citizens and more during the school day? What is it going to take for the adults in charge of our schools to take schooling seriously? How can we compel our school leaders to give a damn about safety of our children and the mental health of our administrators?
SPS is in an existential moment where it needs to decide if it is going to be the safety net schooling of last resort or a world class school system (emphasis on system) that prepares our kids for a world that desperately needs their brains, hearts, talents, and concern for a better world.
Like with our democracy, we have past the time when SPS is going to self correct. We need to start demanding better leadership. We need to do that today, tomorrow, and when we vote.
Enough
Not all terrible events can be blamed on the schools.
Reason
In order for the vehicle to have been in Neutral, which would have allowed to roll down the hill? The driver would have had to leave via the passenger seat, and purposely disabled the anti-rollaway prevention; which GM spent a lot of money on the design in order to prevent this sort of occurrence.
Google "FMVSS 114" for a description of the system.
I know for a fact that the Principal pulled every child who witnessed the event into their office; they additionally went through the children's phones who captured pictures ( which were shared to a private group).
I hope the parents have found legal support, because there is absolutely no way that vehicle rolled down that hill by itself.
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