An officer ran a red light without emergency siren and lights turned on, slamming a two-ton police vehicle into Deshane Levere’s tiny sedan.
The officer, however, never faced discipline for breaking the rules of the road on duty in Syracuse, New York. Levere, a 52-year-old Black woman who suffered life-altering neck and back injuries in the crash, also lost a lengthy court battle seeking to hold the officer accountable.
But Levere is far from the only New Yorker haunted by the hundreds of police vehicle crashes that have happened over the last decade. Some of them have left residents gravely injured and fighting for justice in court. Others have killed civilian drivers or pedestrians.
Few crashes have resulted in any discipline for officers involved, even for some officers who have multiple crashes on their records over a few years.
A USA TODAY Network-New York investigation, launching Feb. 13 in partnership with Syracuse University and with support from The Central Current, shows the prevalence of these crashes, the lack of driving training New York officers receive and what little has been done to discipline officers who’ve made dubious decisions behind the wheel.