Video Changes Everything: Motorcycles vs SUV

This widely-viewed video of the biker gang chasing the Range Rover through New York City is terrifying and illuminating. And without the video, it’s easily possible that there would be no criminal charges except for felony charges against the SUV driver. With the video, a very different picture is painted that all but clears the SUV driver of any wrongdoing, and makes possible serious assault prosecutions that would have been utterly impossible without it.

First off, the way the gang appears to mob and terrorize the family in the SUV is fascinating– one wonders if the riders are as brazen and evil individually as they collectively acted that day. People often feel liberated in group settings and ignore their usual moral or social boundaries. But I’m not a psychologist, I’m a criminal defense lawyer, so I’d note that there is a practical benefit to the criminal acting in large, mostly spontaneous groups: it is very difficult to get caught and prosecuted in a mob.

Even if the police are able to identify and capture all potential suspects in a crime such as this (unlikely), it is exceptionally difficult to untangle who did exactly what. Eyewitness testimony is unreliable in reconstructing even simple action sequences, let alone chaotic sequences with numerous assailants. Moreover, I’d guess that this gang is likely filled with a lot of people who don’t know each other, and maybe can’t ID one another. Those who do know each other would in any case be unlikely to “rat” on one another.

Without video, how does the DA prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, which people are guilty of the “big ticket items” of slashing the victim’s face, dragging him out of the car, of kicking him in the face when he’s on the ground? Even with the video, it will be a challenge to get the evidence together for those bigger charges (the video is imperfect, there are still numerous suspects dressed similarly, the video cuts out before the important moments of the assault, etc.). But without the video, the DA wouldn’t even have a chance of piecing this together.

As a criminal defense lawyer, I’d also note how important this video is to keep an innocent person like the SUV driver out of trouble for felony hit and run and felony vehicular assault. Now, to be clear, even without the video he’d have a defensible case at trial: he’d have his wife to testify to the threat they were enduring when the panicked SUV driver ran over a couple of the gangmembers. And he’d have his injuries to corroborate that he was dealing with dangerous people and that it was likely reasonable for him to drive through the bikers and flee the scene. But how many of the other drivers on the road would have made themselves available to testify for the SUV driver? Probably none. But the bikers, that would be a big group of people who were sure that the SUV driver was driving recklessly or even intentionally when it ran over the bikers, paralyzing one. Without this video, this driver might be the victim in one trial (if at all), and defendant in another, with an acquittal far from guaranteed.