Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Mike O’Malley’s recent call to loosen Cleveland police chase policies is based on a false premise that chases are the only way to capture hooligans who take over Cleveland intersections on street bikes, say the hosts of the Today in Ohio podcast.
Thursday’s discussion centered on the recent sentencing of Tyrique Loury , one of the ringleaders of the street takeovers that disrupted the city last year. Loury received nine months behind bars and three years probation. The sentencing concluded nearly two dozen prosecutions of the people involved in the takeovers – a resolution that came without a single high-speed chase.
“And what Mike O’Malley is arguing is that we should have high speed chases to catch people who are basically hooligans,” said cleveland.com editor Chris. “And we know what happens with high speed chases. We’ve seen it twice with the downtown reckless sheriff’s department.”
Two times this year, reckless chases by the Cuyahoga County Sheriff’s downtown patrol unit have killed innocent bystanders.
O’Malley had suggested that street takeover participants specifically targeted Cleveland because of the city’s restrictive police chase policy. But the podcast hosts were quick to point out that the same groups had conducted similar activities in Columbus, which has a different chase policy. More important, all the perpetrators were eventually caught through smart investigation rather than dangerous pursuits.
“I completely agree with you, Chris,” said Leila Atassi. “I wrote about this in a column recently. I think I abhor the high speed chases. I think it’s one of the absolute worst policies… There are so many technologies that police can deploy to track people. Get those drones in the air. That would be the easiest way to catch someone.”
The podcast discussion highlighted a fundamental question about law enforcement priorities: Is it better to risk innocent lives for immediate apprehension, or to use patience and technology to make arrests safely? For the Today in Ohio team, the answer was clear.
“Nobody died,” Quinn emphasized, contrasting the street takeover incidents with recent fatal outcomes from sheriff’s department high-speed chases. “I’d rather preserve innocent life and catch people this way.”
The podcast hosts also pushed back against overheated rhetoric characterizing the takeover participants as “terrorists,” with Lisa Garvin noting, “I would hesitate to say that these people were terrorized… They don’t have criminal intent.”
Even the judge in the case seemed to recognize this nuance, telling Loury that while his actions warranted consequences, this first offense wouldn’t result in maximum penalties. As Quinn noted, “They did bad, they got caught… I think this is a good conclusion to the case.”
The success of the investigation—which resulted in charges and convictions for all the main participants without endangering innocent lives—stands as a powerful rebuke to those advocating for dangerous pursuit policies.
Listen to the discussion here.
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