Only in the Hub City could a routine 11:30 a.m. traffic stop at 34th and Frankford escalate into a full-blown Fast & Furious audition. 65-year-old Gene Davis decided he wasn’t in the mood for a citation and “aggressively sped away,” because nothing says “I have a clean record” like drag racing the cops through the city in broad daylight.
Naturally, the Lubbock Police Department gave us a five-minute teaser of a chase before a supervisor—briefly possessed by a rare moment of common sense—called it off. But don’t worry, they didn’t just let it go. They called in a Texas DPS helicopter to hover over the city like we were in a war zone, just to make sure they didn’t lose sight of the senior citizen they’d already identified.
Then comes the tactical masterstroke. Despite “calling off” the pursuit for safety, an unmarked LPD unit and a Lubbock County Sheriff’s deputy spotted Davis near 82nd and Knoxville and decided, “Screw it, let’s go again!” Because why settle for a safe arrest later at the guy’s house when you can re-initiate a high-speed chase through South Lubbock at noon? Public safety is just a suggestion when there’s an ego to satisfy.
The result of this brilliant logic? 70-year-old Francis Romanofski, who was just trying to walk his dog near 93rd and Memphis, was struck and killed. But hey, the Sheriff’s deputy managed a “containment maneuver” after the man was hit, so I guess we’re supposed to give them a gold star for finally stopping the guy they stirred into a frenzy in the first place.
We’re all so much safer now that a man is dead and a dog is traumatized, all because our local heroes couldn’t just jot down a license plate and show up at the suspect’s front door with a warrant once the helicopter had him pinned, right?
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