The two men in the silver Infiniti were pulled over only for having tinted windows _ so when the driver hit the gas and fled, the state trooper had no choice but to let them speed away.
The trooper was just following an Illinois State Police policy that allows officers to chase drivers only when they believe someone is in danger or when a violent crime has occurred.
After fleeing from the traffic stop, the men inside the car allegedly went on a crime spree in Illinois corn country, fatally shooting a sheriff's deputy and then taking hostages at a small-town bank. They were arrested hours later.
The case illustrates the limitations of the restricted chase policies adopted by many police departments beginning in the mid-1990s, as news helicopters began televising more pursuits and more bystanders got killed.
Troopers chased the Infiniti only after deputy Tommy Martin was shot as he drove by the suspects going the opposite direction. Some officers have questioned whether the suspects could have been stopped earlier if the pursuit policy were less restrictive.
Indiana, for instance, still allows state troopers to chase drivers who flee traffic stops, even if officers know nothing about them.
"If the public knows that you're not going to pursue, you may have a higher incidence of taking off just for the heck of it," said Indiana State Police Lt. Scott Beamon.
Many major cities have wrestled with the same question.
In 1995, the newly elected mayor of Tampa, Fla., grew tired of watching car thieves get away and pledged that officers would chase them down when possible. The aggressive stance improved police morale, but it also quickly led to a series of accidents and injuries.
At about the same time, TV news helicopters began devoting hours of air time to live coverage of police pursuits, most famously when O.J. Simpson fled from Los Angeles officers.
Other chases, not always followed by cameras, ended with deaths.
In 1995 and 1996, almost 800 people died during police chases across the country, according to the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration. More than 30 percent of those killed were bystanders.
Those numbers were dramatically higher than the 250 to 300 people the agency says died each year going back to 1982.
