Dane Halovich can hardly complain that justice is slow or distant in Nevada. This week, Supreme Court Justice Kris Pickering drove her Mercedes into his UPS Store.
Pickering, a Republican just elected in November, says that she was pulling into a parking space wen here accelerator stuck — propelling her through the front window of the store. She barely missed a customer, but no one was injured. Pickering was driving with her two dogs.
For her bio, click here. I wish to note that she is a Georgetown not a George Washington grad. We specifically include “driving while a jurist” courses as part of our standard curriculum.
For the full story, click here.
Mercedes E-Class scored 126/152 in a reliability ranking by Top Gear (the most respected TV car show). Merc’s performance of late has been poor, especially when it comes to their electronics reliability. I think she has grounds for reasonable doubt that her actions are not the cause…
getplaning:
Based on my history with the cars, I have to agree with you. Nice to hear from a real expert on the blog.
I just saw the photos- She has either an E55 AMG, which has some 475 hp under the hood, or an E63, which has an eyeball-rupturing 510. I can’t quite make out the badging on the back. There are dozens of cases where people driving such powerful cars claim stuck throttles at the scenes of accidents.
Her accelerator stuck? Not a chance. Mercedes Benz uses an electronic servo to actuate the throttle plate on its engines. For obvious reasons, the design (by Bosch) has been tested over millions and millions of hours. I have never, in 25 years of servicing Bosch sytems, seen one fail. The Bosch engine management system runs an active, full-time diagnostic, that, if it WERE to detect a problem with the electronics governing throttle opening, would cut the signal to the throttle servo, the throttle plate would close, and the engine would simply idle at 600rpm.
Judge Pickering seems very attractive in this photo. I’ll bet she dresses well. Perhaps her high heel got caught on something, but the throttle did not stick.
This judge may need to lawyer up before she gets herself in trouble. Prof. Turley, I think she needs to sit in on George Washington’s “driving while a jurist” classes before she is allowed to drive again.
Not a very elegant segue but … speaking of blind justice:
“Houston police mum on marijuana prisoner’s death”
http://rawstory.com/08/news/2009/06/23/houston-police-mum-on-marijuana-prisoners-death/
Harris county is about the most blind there is, this is an atrocity:
“It is hardly the first time serious questions surrounded the death of a Harris County inmate.
On 4 June 2009, the Justice Department concluded a 15 months-long investigation into the Harris County facility and determined in the subsequent 27-page report that over 142 prisoners had died there since 2001. Most expired due to lack of medical care, the report claims.
The Associated Press noted that after the Justice Department declined to make its findings public, The Houston Chronicle was able to obtain a copy, which it released on the Internet.”
Without a warrant no less …
“The way I see it… If you need both of your hands for whatever it is you’re doing, then your brain should probably be in on it too.
Ellen DeGeneres, On Cell phones and driving”
Which brings up a good point.
Is it a negligence case for allowing the dogs to help her drive or is a products liability case because Mercedes didn’t design properly full well knowing that a certain percentage of their vehicles could be driven by non-human operators? Were the dogs drunk? Did the dogs have a vendetta against UPS?
There are a lot of unanswered questions . . .
Was she handling the stick while they were operating a pedal each?
Well what did she have to do at the UPS place? Was she mailing state secrets? Was she, or now did she have a Bad Hair day? Did the dogs now, they were probably Puddles involved in this K-9 caper? Was the sidewalk too inconvenient to park at? This has a lot of questions.