Police pursuits, fleeing drivers: Commissioner Andrew Coster on death risk increase after policy revision

Police Commissioner Andrew Coster accepts there is a greater risk of people dying after a change to police’s pursuit policy, but is confident the new settings strike the right balance.

The Herald today reported the policy would become less restrictive after a review, prompted by a doubling of the number of fleeing drivers since 2020 when the policy was tightened after a series of high-profile deaths.

Last year when he initiated the review, Coster signalled the policy settings at the time were not adequate because offenders were becoming more brazen in their driving habits.

Now, officers would be more likely to be pursuing fleeing drivers, taking into account the risk of the driver or those in the vehicle carrying out further offending.

However, it risked more people dying in police chases. Between 2010 and 2020, 75 people died during pursuits.

Coster, speaking to the Herald, accepted the odds of someone dying increased if pursuits became more frequent.

“Look, I think we have to acknowledge that when pursuits increase, that will increase the chances of negative outcomes.”

Fleeing driver incidents have doubled since 2020, when the policy was made more restrictive. Photo / Hayden Woodward

However, he was confident the right balance had been struck between preventing those negative outcomes and limiting future offending.

“We’ve framed the permission to initiate a pursuit around serious offending, where there’s a likelihood of further serious offending.

“It’s quite a high threshold and I have confidence that the frontline will get these judgments right.

“There’s a big picture here too, which is if you have a doubling of the number of drivers fleeing, then the safety outcomes are significantly worse than they have been, at least in the broader sense of preventing crime.”

An example of a situation where a pursuit might now be initiated could be a car-load of offenders who had been committing aggravated robberies.

“Under the policy revision, if the officer believes that there is a risk of ongoing serious offending by that vehicle, then a pursuit will be a possibility,” Coster said.

Under the old policy, officers wouldn’t have been able to pursue the vehicle unless there was an immediate public safety risk, such as they were driving so dangerously it put people at risk.

Coster said officers would be encouraged to plan ahead before encountering a vehicle they might have to pursue - to consider whether road spikes could be used and how they could coordinate with other nearby officers.

“That’s the kind of thing that they’ve been doing exceptionally well over the last couple of years where we haven’t been pursuing, looking for other ways of apprehending the vehicle.”

The change comes amid a politically charged public debate about the level of crime in New Zealand, largely centred around the increase in violent youth crime, which often manifested in ram raids and aggravated burglaries.

While public perception was not the motivation behind the policy revision, Coster hoped it would send a message to offenders.

“I think there’s been a clear demand from the public to see offenders held to account.

“So partly what we’re doing here is sending a message to offenders that they can expect to be caught and therefore they might want to revisit their [decisions].”