Surprise! Officer's Investigation Clears Fellow Officer who Drove into a House

Two days ago, a Flint police officer driving in a residential zone goes off the road, through a fence and squarely into the side of a house.  His buddies on the force conduct an investigation that clears him of wrongdoing, blaming a pothole and a pickup driver instead.  No details are released of the investigation, you just have to believe it on faith.  Or be skeptical and realistic, here's the original story, with the surprised homeowner's remarks and officer's non-serious injuries left out:

Flint police cruiser crashes into house

A Flint Police cruiser crashed into a house in Flint on Tuesday.  It happened at the intersection of Atherton and Brunswick. 

Authorities say a Flint police officer on patrol was sideswiped by another vehicle on Atherton Road.
The impact sent his cruiser into Alexander’s home on Brunswick Avenue.  Investigators believe the driver that caused the crash swerved to avoid a pothole.  The investigation is ongoing.

The preliminary investigation came out earlier today, made by Flint's own crack team of reconstruction (of the facts?) experts:  

Officer not at fault for crash into Flint home, police say

A Flint police officer was not at fault for a crash Tuesday morning (at 9:15 AM) that left his patrol vehicle in the side of a home on the city’s south side, officials said.  

A preliminary investigation has revealed the officer was not at fault for the crash, police said.  Interim Flint Police Chief Phil Hart said alcohol, drugs, or texting and driving do not appear to have played factors in the crash.  Hart added it appears there was a pothole the driver of the Silverado was trying to avoid and did not see the patrol vehicle.  The officer -- who police said was not responding to a call at the time of the crash -- suffered a concussion, but Hart said he was released later the same day.

The above picture shows Atherton Road from the vantage point of the two drivers before this incident, you can see the blue house in the background in the upper right of the picture and the Google timestamp in the bottom right from two years ago.  Atherton Road had just been repaved throughout this length of road, you can see the red and white barrels here and further down the road where the construction is fresher.  

This is a residential area with a speed limit of 25 mph posted just a block away.  Pictures show the road was clear of ice and snow two days ago, no precipitation was in progress, and it was broad daylight, albeit cloudy so that the sun couldn't be blamed.

The public is supposed to believe the investigating authority has conducted a fair investigation of one of their own people and came up with the cause being a pothole and a swerving pickup throwing the officer off the road and into the house.  No fault at all of the FPD officer.

In all the 16 pictures taken by Mlive, you cannot see any crack or pothole in that two year old road surface.  The damage appearing on the side of the pickup looks inconsistent with what would happen if a swerve happened on his part.  The police car situated unwisely to his right in the truck's blind spot, should have noticed a simple lane change and adjusted.  The caroming effect that happened seems to indicate the officer was going faster than he should have, and was not wary of it until after the impact.  

If this was a thorough and fair investigation, they would look at the police car's crash computer and find what speed and direction the car was going many seconds before the ultimate crash into the house; it will record and store that.   Instead it appears to the inherently skeptical that they have made a deal with the truck driver to not charge him with anything if he/she doesn't admit to the media what the real story behind this crash is-- because it would surely clash greatly with the 'official' story. 

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If the truck swerved to his right and hit the driver's side of the FPD car, shouldn't there be damages to that side of the car? I can't see any in that pic. of the car, just severe front end damages. Anyone else?

I'm just guessing that the truck was at least a half cars length ahead of the car and the contact was made to the left front of the car and the front of the passenger door of the truck. The officer may have swerved fast enough to avoid a side to side contact during the accident. As far as the pothole goes, didn't anyone check to see if it actually exists. I'm sure the police have a picture of it. If the pothole exists they must acquit.

The media put up 16 on-scene pics but not one of them shows the road where the alleged pothole was or enough of the crash debris to be able to formulate who swerved into who on analysis.  From the above pic of the truck, you see a lot of pieces of the police car still in the road in the lane where the car was.  

The physics of collisions works against the 'official' story, for if the truck swerved in front of the car, most of this debris would come off at a vector which would carry it off the road towards the house.  A swerve collision would have also taken away a lot of the forward momentum of the car making it very unlikely that it would hit the house hard as it did. 

I think the most likely scenario is that the pickup driver was in the process of changing lanes and didn't see the police car in his blind spot.  The encroachment wasn't caught by the officer who must have been distracted and/or driving over the speed limit to have ran into the house with that much of an impact.  

I'll bet more distracted drivers will now start using the "pothole dodging" excuse! Great gr-raffic Willy!

 If you look at the truck fender you will see it is pushed forward. So the vehicle [ police car ] was going at a higher speed than the truck. Pot hole or not the truck attempted to change lanes  causing the police car to strike the truck ,ver off the roadway through a fence and into a house. My question is , don't police cars have brakes ? or did the impact cause the officer to spill his coffee and drop his donut and he had his priorities mixed up. Lets see, pick up donut or hit the brakes LOL

Maybe his hot coffee spilt between his legs and he had other priorities.

There was no mention of any use of police cameras. Funny how scarce they are when a situation arises where they are needed,

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