Unbelievable. A police officer stopped an ambulance transporting a patient. The confrontation is caught on cellphone camera by the patients family, who were following the ambulance.

http://www.ktul.com/news/stories/0509/626636.html

officer D-bag reporting for duty, what an ass.

I can't imagine his justification. Can anyone make out what they're saying? Between their accent and the audio quality, I can barely make out what's wrong.

Apparently the first thing to assume when seeing an ambulance speeding around is that the driver is on a joy-ride of some kind.

On CNN they explained the traffic violation was that the Ambulance didn't give the right of way, and the driver explained it was because the cop came up on them too fast for him to react.

So, ambulance drivers driving skills aside, the cop was being a colossal ass. The traffic violation wasn't even serious, and it's one I shrug off every time I'm cut off in traffic. While I wouldn't expect a cop to shrug off some random asshole cutting him off, this was a fucking emergency vehicle for chrissakes.

It was a bizarre situation to observe. Police officers and EMTs both have certain things they can legally do while on duty that the average civilian cannot. Before this, I had actually never heard of something like this happening. If an EMT commits a glaring traffic violation without emergency lights on, I suppose he or she should be held responsible, but as soon as it's made known that there is a patient in that ambulance, the first priority should be to get them on their way. Eventually, after the scuffle, the officer said he would let them get to the hospital then arrest the man there, but I think that should have been the first resort.

If the officer had been calm and collected during the stop, I may have taken his side for the first part of this situation. Unfortunately, as soon as he left his vehicle, he was abrasive and confrontational.

Also, one of the medics mentioned in passing that the officer could have radioed the medics and either explained his side of the situation (why he wanted to pull them over), or asked them to explain theirs (why they failed to yield without activating their emergency lights). I think this would have been the most obvious and beneficial course of action, since the ambulance would have been able to continue toward its destination as the situation was figured out.

That said, if the medics did fail to yield without emergency lights, that could have caused a severe accident and should be addressed. It's just a shame that the trooper addressed it in such an improper way.

Trooper says he was himself in an emergency situation, going to the scene of a crime or whatever, and the ambulance cut HIM off, without the lights on. Then when he pulled the ambulance over, the ambulance driver gave him the finger. That's when the trooper lost his shit.

If it sounds like I'm defending the Trooper, keep in mind that his entire job - his ENTIRE job - hinges on not losing his shit when people do irritating things. See, that's why they trust you with that gun, officer, it's because you are supposed to have the ability to not throw a tantrum like a toddler when things get stressful and people cross you.

From my limited view of the situation, he is dangerous to have on the job. If knowing he was keeping a patient away from the emergency room wasn't enough to get his rational mind working, then one of these days he's going to do a lot worse.

Believe it or not, you may be paying for the lights/siren when you're transported via ambulance.  At least, this was true a number of years ago.  My mom and sister were in a collision and they went in separate vehicles.  Mom got the sirens, Kim did not.  When the statement came, the charge for Mom's ambulance was higher.  And it's not like they provided Mom with more care while she was in the ambulance, either. 

I think the trooper was way out of line, once the situation was explained to him.  If he was on an emergency call of his own, I'm wondering how that situation played out while he was dicking around with the ambulance crew.

What depresses me though is how complacent drivers are nowadays when it comes to pulling over for emergency vehicles.  They're all la-de-da and very lackadaisical when it comes to moving over.  I am guessing that they're all wearing iPods and don't hear the sirens, or texting and don't see the flashing lights.

I am glad that the woman suffered no ill effects for the delay in getting treatment, and I hope that her family doesn't come away with a distorted view of the police based on one cracker cop giving them a hard time.

His wife was probably banging an EMT or something.

It's odd that he would invoke his own emergency as an excuse, seeing as he decided to pull over an ambulance instead of, you know, continuing to drive towards that emergency of his.