Waiting for the Truth

Within 24 hours, there were two horrific auto accidents in the Valley. In one, two females were killed, and a male and a female inside the vehicle were rescued and taken to the hospital in critical condition. The good news is that an infant in the car, securely strapped into a car seat, was not hurt. In the second accident, one car went head-first into a palm tree and burst into flame, killing the occupant; the other car involved in the incident continued on for another 50-60 feet, went head- first into another palm tree, ejected the occupants, and burst into flame. In this incident, one driver was killed, a 28-year old police officer with a 4-week old son.

The bloggers hit the internet the minute the sketchiest details were presented by the media, not to express their sympathy, but to begin the racial epithets and homophobic slurs that characterize their comments about anything that happens in this area. In the first incident, because the accident happened in the east valley area, it was immediately assumed that it was gang-related; thus, no mercy for anyone involved in the accident. Two people dead, another two people perhaps on their way to the morgue, with a brief stay in the hospital first, and a child the sole survivor -- and the bloggers went for the jugular, accusing the people involved in the accident of endangering "innocent citizens" who may have shared the road with them prior to the fatal crash. No details were known, but the people involved must have been Mexican illegals, uninsured, driving an unsafe vehicle, and had it coming to them for some reason known only to the bloggers.

In the second accident, before it was known that it was a police officer fatally injured, the bloggers immediately went on the attack about west valley gangsters, illegal Mexicans, gay rights, and, again, the potential danger to innocent citizens on the road at the time of the accident. Saying "sorry" after it is revealed that a police officer lost his life while chasing a vehicle that failed to stop for the lights and siren does not take away the pain inflicted onto a young widow's shoulders, nor the month-old child who will never know his father.

I believe in freedom of the press, but not at the expense of innocent victims of crime. None of these comments should have been posted, but they were -- and the survivors of victims in both accidents read them, based on their posted reactions to the lies, half-truths, and accusations that somehow these incidents were the victims' fault. It's one thing to post an opinion based on the facts about an issue or event to provide another point of view, but to comment on the news as it unfolds, projecting one's bigotry in the process, is vile. The Bill of Rights does protect free speech, but why is any speech protected when it is a hate-filled violation of an individual's right to privacy? to protection from libel? to grieve a loved one's loss?

The bloggers assume they know what happened and why it happened, based on where it happened, but they don't have factual information to support their wild accusations. The online newspaper did crack down on the bloggers about 6 months ago, but not this past weekend, allowing the blogger allegations to stand for the truth in the absence of evidence to the contrary. When the paper did publish the facts as they were known, a full 8 hours after the police officer died during the car chase, the bloggers came back with the "endangering innocent lives" argument, rather than compassion for the officer, his family and friends, and his colleagues.

There is a time and a place to have the discussion about whether law enforcement should engage in high-speed chases, but that occurs after the officer's body has been removed from the crime scene.