How does a law-enforcement action like a police chase become televised entertainment?
Helicopter pilots from eight news channels sit on the ground at two airports in the San Fernando Valley, listening to police scanners. As soon as they hear “pursuit in progress,” they and their cameramen check in with their stations and then run to their helicopters and take off toward the sirens. If one station goes, almost all of them do, because pursuits draw very high ratings. Channel surfers seem to find them by magic, but there is also a local service, PursuitAlert.net, that notifies its subscribers when a chase is on. What are some of the most famous pursuits? You mention O. J. Simpson’s slow-speed chase as a watershed moment. Are there others? I describe several of the “classic” pursuits in the article, including one in which a guy stole a 7UP truck and fishtailed around, spilling soda onto the street, and one in which a motorcyclist serpentined around six vigilante pedestrians who were trying to stop him on Ventura Boulevard, finally broke free, and then T-boned a Mercedes at
