Operation of Police Vehicles

Operation of Police Vehicles

RC Phillips, DDA (Ret.)
October, 2021

Under former statutes governing operation of motor vehicles, where it was provided that exception respecting emergency vehicles should not include primary regulation requiring “due regard for the safety” of public, only reasonable interpretation of act as whole was that because of public necessity for operation of such vehicles in cases of emergency, operators were relieved from general rules of road applicable to other vehicles but that arbitrary exercise of those privileges was not excused. (Armas v. Oakland (Cal. App. Nov. 24, 1933), 135 Cal. App. 411.)

A police vehicle, even if within the exemption from speed limitations, must be operated with due regard for the safety of travelers and the driver is not absolved from the consequences of an arbitrary exercise of privileges pertaining to such a vehicle (Vehicle Act of 1923, § 132). (Spencer v. Schiffman (Cal. App. Jan. 19, 1932), 119 Cal. App. 746.)

Giving signal does not relieve the driver of an emergency vehicle from responsibility for driving without due regard for the safety of others or for an arbitrary exercise of his privileges. An arbitrary exercise of the privileges granted to fire trucks, failure to give due warning, and to drive with due regard for safety could be found from evidence that a truck driver knew intimately a traffic officer, who could not run and walked with a limp, and whom he saw clearly, but drove his truck into a sudden arc without siren signal to hit the crippled officer, who vainly attempted to avoid the impact. (Cavagnaro v. Napa (Cal. App. June 30, 1948), 86 Cal. App. 2d 517.)

The duty of the driver of an emergency vehicle to drive with due regard for the safety of others is met where a suitable ....

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