I mean, the police were right, though.The ideologies part was aimed at people who take the word of police as gossip regardless of circumstance. Which happens a lot especially on this board. My point is there are a lot of nuances here at play and to completely say “see I knew the police were correct” is shortsighted. Especially when you factor in a cop coercing witnesses which is another issue in itself. Multiple things can be true. It sounds like he was passing vehicles and the other driver panicked and swerved. Based on the video posted earlier it would seem they had plenty of time to react. However I am willing to understand how it can be intimidating to see someone in your lane, but being from Mississippi, I’m sure most of us have dealt with that before, or have been the one passing vehicles on similar roads. This person reacted poorly. Not saying they are at fault either, it’s just the unfortunate situation. But to dismiss prior evidence and quickly just say that “police right, everyone else wrong” is another example of why I didn’t feel like posting a long reaction, and while 90% of the time I avoid the thread entirely. But I figured this time I would least spoke my mind a little.
If you look at the video, I think it's a fair question of whether he should have jail time over it and if so, how much. But if you are speeding that much in a no passing zone, you are going to spook oncoming traffic. It takes about 2.56 seconds to go 300 ft at 80 mph. If you assume that the driver was going the speed limit of 40 mph, it would be 1.7 seconds for them to collide. It's going to take more than 300 feet to stop a car going 80 mph most of the time. So even his lawyer (or whoever's lawyer that put out the video) makes a pretty damning case against him.
I think it's definitely a mitigating factor that the other driver reacted poorly. But it's pretty foreseeable that some driver is going to react poorly if you put them in that situation. Going 80 in a 40 mph zone, crossing a solid yellow line and passing four cars in an area with businesses where people are entering and exiting the road way and making turns across traffic is pretty clearly reckless indifference to the lives of others. If he was only going 70, that doesn't look much better for him. Certainly there is an argument that it was the other driver and not him that was the direct cause of the accident. I'm guessing that would probably be viewed as something more like a defendant in a felony homicide case saying a victim defending himself with the use of a gun is the direct cause of another participant in the crime or bystander getting shot and killed. At the very least, it seems to clearly be a question for the court and/or jury and not anything the police got wrong.