classy seattlest, making fun of a driver who was assaulted by a bunch of yes asshole white cyclists. no harm no foul right?

it's the cyclists that should be sorry for disregarding traffic laws and punching a guy in the face.
it's a wonder more people don't get their well informed news coverage here

John, westcoastn, Jeremy--I'm declaring you all off-topic. It's just not germane that Critical Mass are or are not assholes, when the action taken is driving your car at them, hitting them, and fleeing. I don't know if this guy had a map or not, but there are many more streets besides Aloha that get you over Capitol Hill.

This post is about bad reporting: the KING 5 and Times reports don't even agree with each other, glossing over the exact number of cyclists "bumped" or hit, while taking the driver's side.

Moral responsibility between cyclists and drivers is asymmetric in the sense that a car getting "bumped" by a bicyclist might leave a dent or a scratch--a bicyclist getting "bumped" by a car could have been killed. In this case, there are pictures of bicycles crushed by the car as it drove over them. It bothers me when these distinctions aren't made in the news.

They also fudge the chronology so the driver sounds like he was trying to escape an ongoing attack, when he was physically touched only after running over a number of cyclists with his car. It is highly illegal to hit or run over people with your car, even if they are making you late, or you find them scary or annoying.

Sounds like there is bias and spin on both sides of the story. Sure, King 5 didn't do a good job, but neither does this blog post. You put "assaulted" in quotes, as if you do not consider what happened to the driver to be an assault (and yet they broke his window and he had blood on his neck, which pretty much meets the definition for assault).

And you mock the driver as if there's no way he possibly could have genuinely felt fearful of the bikes surrounding him, when clearly his fear was at least partly warranted given how much they damaged the car after he hit the 2 bicyclists.

Two wrongs don't make a right - a bike accident is no excuse for attacking someone or damaging their property. They should have just gotten the plate number and called the police (and if he drove off, then he could be charged which hit-and-run, which is an even bigger offense).

I'm not defending the driver - he should certainly be punished for what he did. But so should the bikers who attacked his car.

and yet in all reports so far the driver was the only one from the incident to be hospitalized. from this i seriously doubt he hit anyone with a ton of force.

for someone supposedly critiquing bad reporting perhaps you shouldn't be so touchy when others point out the flaws in your own yes, mocking, post.

and last i checked, the idea that witnesses and reports will differ isn't shockingly a new thing.

This is just all sorts of messed up. The only solution: close Aloha St.

As a biker (but not a CM participant), I got a deep down horrible feeling when I read the first reports from the Times and the PI.

What scares me is that both newspaper reports immediately assumed and presented the "facts" such that the bikers were the aggressors and that the driver was nothing but an intimidated and confused victim. I've spent a while now today following this story and every eye witness account I've read (from riders and onlookers alike) makes it seem like the driver instigated and escalated the situation, and that then riders f*cked it all up by going ballistic on him. I'm not saying I could have held my temper better.

In all likelihood, the truth lives somewhere in the grey area, but I agree with the original premise of the post, that the media was all to willing to demonize the bikers without fulfilling their journalistic duty to fully investigate the story.

Sorry, but the bikers brought all of this on themselves. I don't have any sympathy here -- they should have had the good sense to call the cops and take down the pertinent information on the vehicle, instead of going ballistic, busting windows and slashing tires like the bunch of yahoos that they are. They did absolutely nothing to help their cause or their side of the story by denying to comment to ANY media outlet whatsoever -- that's usually what guilty people do.

Sure, maybe the guy was a jerk, but frankly, so are most holier-than-thou bicyclists in Seattle, a constant terror to both drivers and pedestrians -- instead of thinking that they're sharing the road, they act like they own it, not obeying traffic laws as they want cars to do while on the road and constantly wreaking havoc on sidewalks, and God forbid you ever get into an argument with one. I'd sooner argue with an angry driver brandishing a pistol than one of these kooks.

I hope the jerks from CM they did arrest get the book thrown at them.

Maybe this will be just the (unfortunate) push that "Critical Manners" needs to gain support in Seattle.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/04/14/MNGB6P8R1U1.DTL

bikehugger.com organized one last year.

I've read reports from several sources, including one of the bikers that was blocking the guy from moving into the road.

Apparently he was pretty pissed off and reasonably frightened by being surrounded by a bunch of beligerent assholes who were blocking him in - which is possibly a kind of illegal restraint. When they heard he was arguing a bunch more started to surround the car and he backed into them and then ran over one guy and another jumped onto his hood while he was trying to drive away.

Some of the other bikers managed to slash his tires while he was moving (neat trick that) and then proceeded to smash the windows in his car, punch him in the face and when he managed to get out of his now smashed up car, someone clocked him with a bike lock in the back of the head.

There is some amopunt of arrogance on all sides, but having witnessed CM "interactions" on two occasions myself, I have zero sympathy for the bikers - I hope the guy that clocked him with a bike lock does long hard time and the driver sues the assholes who blocked him for unlawful restraint, including the lawyer whose leg he ran over.

I hope the driver walks.

You don't surround people in their cars in an attempt to provoke them into a fear / anger response and then get to play victim when you manage to get a reaction.

I cycle and drive a really wish we could emulate cities like Amsterdam where they've built an amazing infrastructire around bikes. (And NO ONE wears a helmet) This kind of crap does nothing to help change the lanscape. I hope the bikers get fines and jail time.

I've been riding bicycles and quadracycles for 50 years. The folks in the photos are riding left of the center lane and, therefore, are driving illegally. They should be ticketed.

When there are court cases with eyewitnesses, the most accurate version of the truth possible will come out. (Hopefully!) After reading eyewitnesses and news outlets, it seems to me that this was not "us vs them" but really just asshole vs assholes.

The driver was unjustified in driving his car through/over bicyclists. I'm not a lawyer but I doubt standing in front of someone's car constitutes "unlawful restraint." My experiences with CM is that "corking" a car is a quiet and peaceful interaction, usually the bicyclists explain what is happening and that the bicyclists will likely all be gone in a couple minutes. So from the situation as I understand it, the driver was unjustified. He should have waited it out, and if he felt his rights were being violated, called the police and taken pictures. He should be held accountable to the law for vehicular assault and any hospital/repair bills he incurred.

The bicyclists were also unjustified in property damage and in striking the man in the head with the lock or whatever object it was. That is totally inapropriate behavior, no matter what the driver had done before. Those cyclists should have taken pictures, written down a license plate number, and called the police. All involved in the property damage/assault should be held accountable to the law and any hospital/repair bills incurred.

jabailo, I think you pasted in the wrong link. When I clicked on your link it directed me to page 2 of a Washington Post article on China's economy.

In regards to unlawful restraint...

"From what I understand, purposefully surrounding someone after they ask to get by does. It happens in cases where employers are doing things like investigating theft - if someone wants to leave a room and you block the door, or touch them to restrain them, you've committed a crime."

Agreed that preventing people from being able to leave an area is restraint ... but to me there is a distinction between blocking a car and blocking the people. The critical issue here would be whether the driver and passenger of the car would have been able to exit their car and walk away. The answer to that question can be debated by non-experts on an internet thread ad nauseum... the courts can decide.

My point here, rather than trying to weigh in a speculated answer on the question, is to illuminate the question. To give a real world example, surely you must have seen a parking garage where they post that after a certain late hour of the night cars may not enter or leave... meaning the gate won't open. But the garages do leave doors unlocked, to avoid trapping people inside (unlawful restraint). While the cars may be blocked, as long as people can exit by foot there is no law broken.

Your experience with the bicyclist stopping abruptly in front of you on a hill sounds dangerous and annoying, and I'm glad that nothing happened. I don't think that his actions represent all bicyclists or critical mass riders any more than I think that the driver in the current incident represents all motorists. They are both assholes.

I have personally been hit by a car while I was bicycling (the woman was looking back over her left shoulder as she made a right hand turn onto an arterial street and into me). I've been verbally threatened by motorists numerous times, and once had a guy behind me at a light rev his engine in threat. Those people were assholes, and the incidents made me angry, but I don't judge all motorists based on those people. Most people are reasonable, but there are jerks out there ... in cars and on bicycles.

But regardless of whether any individual is kind or unkind, and whatever their intentions, the law still applies to their actions. Somebody can verbally taunt me, but I can't just punch him in the face with impunity. If this motorist did indeed drive over people, it's vehicular assault - regardless of if the people he drove over were jerks. Their retaliation toward him is illegal - regardless of whether or not he had broken the law beforehand.

=v= The "bumped" wording reminds me of an incident in San Francisco last year, where an SUV "inched" into a bicyclist and "tapped" him.

@frinkahedron

"Agreed that preventing people from being able to leave an area is restraint ... but to me there is a distinction between blocking a car and blocking the people."

the car here is an extension of the people. saying that someone should just abandon their vehicle in the street is a flawed argument and sounds to me like you're stretching to excuse the behavior of these CM members.

your point about garages speaks to an implied contract. i doubt seriously that this driver and the cyclists got into any sort of contract that said after a certain time the driver would be unable to use his car on a public street. not sure why you are looking to defend the cyclists who blocked in the driver. what they did was uncalled for and unnecessary if they wanted to get across a message of peacefully co-existing with one another. you don't detain people, or their cars, on a public street, unless you are a member of law enforcement - period.

oh, and corking, unless you are a cop is illegal. nobody except the police has the right to impede the flow of traffic.

A bicycle traveling at less than the speed of the traffic flow should ride as near as is safe to the right side of the right lane except when preparing to turn, passing another vehicle or on a one way street where it is legal to ride on the left side of the roadway. (RCW 46.61.770)

Bicyclists may ride on the right shoulder, but this is only required on limited access roadways, (such as freeways).

A bicyclist should ride in the middle of the right lane when the lane is too narrow to permit side by side sharing of the lane with motor vehicles and hazards prevent safe operation of the bicycle on the shoulder or at the right edge of the lane.

A bicyclist must pull off of a 2-lane roadway, like any other slow moving vehicle, when 5 or more vehicles are lined up behind it, if there is sufficient area for a safe turnout. (RCW 46.61.427)

Now tell me does CM ever follow any of these laws?

I just want to point out that in the context of Critical Mass, the arguments against corking, while technically true, sort of don't apply. The entire point of Critical Mass is a "reclaiming of the roads" or whatever. It's a protest, and things like blocking traffic (car or foot) and disrupting operations (marches, sit ins, etc) pretty much define a successful protest. In that context, corking is one of the few responsible, safe things that Seattle CM does. I don't feel like its always done correctly in Seattle rides, but when it is done right, it's nothing but good.

Also to move on in an angrier tone, I heard this argument a few years ago with the transit cop/CM fiasco, and it's bullshit. Corking is about on par with that old man who takes longer than the walk signal to cross the street. It doesn't put anyone in danger, just inconveniences you for a few minutes and in this case is actually protecting people. To those of you saying you "hope the driver walks" because they were being corked and thus justified in RUNNING OVER PEOPLE, you fucking horrify me. Unlawful restraint? That is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard in my life. You're also not allowed to assault someone for unlawful restraint, much less run them over.

That said, I fully agree that Seattle CM kids are total douches. Not that that really relates to the case.

From Chicago, and I agree, many times the critical mass people have been total jerks. And I have waited and missed reservations or been late due to waiting to cross the street as a pedestrian, or cross the intersection as a car. I do this b/c I know if I get near the guys in bikes, I'll get massivly hit by the bikers. . .Plus, well, reservations aren't that big of a deal.

While I think the monthly organized event is cool, I do think it is important to emphasize the need to obey traffic signals by all parties. Had all parties in the situation obeyed signals, then none of this would have happened.