» The Blame Game

Having looked around the ‘Net, I know I’m not the only one who thinks the survivors and family members of those killed during the street racing accident in Accokeek, Maryland, last weekend are kind of missing the point.

It’s been widely reported in the news that the brother of one of those killed wants the police to look into the driver of the car that hit the spectators, stating “I want justice done”, an opinion others share.

This idea of “justice” seems misplaced however.

1. Two car drivers were involved in an illegal street race.
2. Reportedly around 400 spectators gathered at the location to watch the illegal street race.
3. The spectators moved en masse into the center of the road to watch the cars as they sped off down the road in their illegal street race.
4. The driver of the car that hit the spectators wasn’t involved in the illegal street race.

Now, a few things are pretty obvious. The illegal street race was planned, and the spectators all knew about it - most of them came from outside the area. They treated it as something “normal” and “harmless”, one mother bringing her 13 year old daughter out at 3am in the morning to watch it, another spectator is on record as stating “You come out expecting to see a nice, clean, race”¹. The spectators all decided to walk into the middle of the road to watch the tail-lights disappear into the distance.

It’s strange how the calls for justice aren’t mentioning the organizers of the illegal race, or the drivers of the cars that were involved

Someone who was watching that illegal race knows the identity of the drivers² - why is no-one coming forwards? Did all those spectators just “happen” to be there totally coincidentally?

Personally, I feel the spectators should all be arrested and charged with hindering an investigation or obstruction of justice, or something similar - I’m just amazed that the families of those killed are demanding “justice” against the driver of the car that hit everyone, without any regard for the actions of both the illegal street racers and the spectators. Is it because the driver of the white car was an innocent bystander, and better to go after him than to rat on the illegal street racers?

People aren’t looking for justice.

If they were, the spectators would have identified the drivers of the cars involved in the illegal race, would have identified the organizers of that illegal race, would be calling for illegal street racers to be banned, for people not to support them. The mother of the 13 year old, I believe, lost her father to the incident - why hasn’t she come forwards to identify the illegal racers? She was a spectator, can’t she even remember what the cars she went there to watch look like?³

Eight people died, and that’s unfortunate. But they died because they went to an illegal street race, and stood in the middle of the road. If you really want justice, go after the people responsible for the chain of events that led to the deaths of your loved ones - not the hapless kid that came along behind, blinded by exhaust and burned-rubber smoke, and didn’t expect to find a couple of hundred people in the middle of the road at 3am in the morning. A Ford Crown Victoria traveling the speed limit on that stretch of road, 55mph, takes about 150′ to stop - The driver had precisely zero chance of averting disaster. Hopefully, when the accident investigation is concluded, the police can point to evidence showing he tried his best⁴ - I wonder if that will make any difference to those who need to blame the driver for what happened?

It’s been alleged that he was speeding, driving without lights on, didn’t stop. Alleging he was speeding is kind of hypocritical at best, but the stories that have come out of the spectators (those that hung around rather than ran, abandoning the dead and injured, because they were afraid of being caught) don’t make any sense whatsoever. If the race was over, why was everyone still standing in the middle of the road? If a police car was chasing the white Crown Victoria, why didn’t it have its emergency lights on? How many lame excuses are the spectators going to come up with to cover their own culpability and cowardice, denying the families of the victims true justice? How long will those family members sit back and allow the spectators to lie to cover their own asses and deny those relatives the truth of what happened?

Populist and emotional “justice” isn’t justice, it’s mob rule. The illegal race culture killed those people, justice will only come when the drivers and organizers of that illegal race are in court charged with negligent homicide. If you truly want justice, then you should be advocating people come forwards and identify the real criminals involved in this.

To those who have posted comments on forums and blogs that have said the deaths were somehow “good”, that the dead were “thugs” or other remarks that stink of racism, I’d just like to say one thing: It’s a crying shame you weren’t the ones hit by the car - at least then the deaths would have truly helped purge the gene pool, as some people have laughingly said this incident has done. As criminal as the street race was, as stupid as the spectators were standing in the middle of the road, the way some people have responded is sickening. It’s sometimes said that the most trying of times brings out the best in people - I guess it also brings out the worst sort of people as well.

As for the spectators themselves - they didn’t go to the illegal street race expecting to die, but they did walk into the middle of the road. Their actions resulted in two extra casualties - the driver of the car that hit the spectators and his passenger.

These vilified victims, too, deserve justice.

1. One witness who did not want to be identified said his cousin lost a leg in the crash.

   You come out expecting to see a nice, clean race,” he said. “The next thing you know you’ve got bodies flying 50 and 60 feet, feet, legs, arms, teeth, everything just splattered all over the ground.”
   - MSNBC [back]

2. People who said they knew the racers or were at the race placed flowers at the crash site yesterday, placing some in the spray-painted circles that marked where bodies, body parts and clothing had fallen.
   - Washington Post [back]
3. Investigators in Prince George’s County struggled to extract information yesterday from stunned and reluctant witnesses in the clandestine illegal racing community as police identified six of the eight men killed when a car plowed into a crowd at a street race early Saturday.
   - Washington Post [back]
4. He told relatives that he slammed on the brakes of his white 1999 Ford Crown Victoria but that the car smashed into the crowd, leaving eight people dead and six injured.
   - Washington Post [back]