Brickbat: Stop and Go

In Auckland, New Zealand, police officer Morne de Lange was convicted for carelessly driving and assaulting a motorcyclist after a chaotic incident at a gas station in April 2024. De Lange, responding to a report of a helmetless rider, approached the motorcyclist without activating his patrol car's lights or siren and didn't indicate he was stopping him until after he accidentally pressed the accelerator instead of the brake, crashing into the motorbike and pinning it against a bollard. When the rider fled, de Lange unlawfully declared him under arrest, commandeered a bystander's vehicle to chase him about 1,000 feet, and used pepper spray and a Taser to subdue him. Despite his lawyer's plea for no conviction to save his job, Judge Stephen Bonnar noted that de Lange's serious misconduct would likely impact his employment regardless; he sentenced de Lange to 100 hours of community service and ordered him to pay the victim $1,000 (U.S. $596) in restitution for emotional harm.

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