Driving Force, a year-long study of police vehicle accidents by the USA Today Network New York and Syracuse University, found that officers rarely face substantial discipline in serious crashes, even when they are at fault. and that civilians injured in those clashes fare poorly in court against powerful departments.
While citizens suffer years of permanent physical or mental pain as a result of these accidents, the officers involved are often immediately put back on the road with little to no punishment or reprimand.
In the event that a civilian is killed by a police vehicle, the incident is investigated by the New York Attorney General’s office, but those investigations also rarely result in punishment for officers.
Driving Force is a police accountability project intended to expose and document the prevalence of police vehicle crashes in New York.
This joint investigation between USA TODAY Network-New York and Syracuse University’s SI Newhouse School of Public Communications was supported by funding from the Data-Driven Reporting Project. That project is funded by the Google News Initiative in partnership with Northwestern University-Medill.
This reporting was completed in partnership with The Central Current, a Syracuse-based nonprofit newsroom.
Reporters, visual journalists, editors, designers and project partners include Maria Birnell, Evan Butow, Kayla Canne, Daniel DeLoach, Jamie Germano, Anna Ginelli, Jon Glass, Seth Harrison, Nausheen Husain, Hayden Kim, Chris Libonati, Finn Lincoln, Beryl Lipton, Tina MacIntyre-Yee, Laura Nichols, Peter Pietrangelo, William Ramsey, David Robinson, Kyle Slagle, Eden Stratton, Sarah Taddeo, Jodi Upton and Marili Vaca.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Police crash in New York: What our investigation has revealed so far
