Op-Ed: What Prompted a High Speed Chase After Alleged Rape in Ottawa?

When a woman stumbled across their path late Friday, pointing at a car that was speeding away and accusing the driver of rape, two men proceeded to chase the suspect through slumbering Ottawa streets at speeds of up to 170 km/h.

Ryan O'Connor was driving a 2008 Porsche 997 and the car he was chasing is described as a blue Pontiac Wave. The distraught victim was in the back seat of the Porsche 997 while her alleged saviors were chasing down her alleged attacker through the sleepy residential streets of Ottawa at speeds of up to 170 kilometers per hour. The victim had called 911 and the driver of the vehicle, Mr. O'Connor, snatched the phone away from her when she got into his car and had a conversation with the dispatcher. All this while driving at speeds of up to 170 km/hr through residential streets, through parking lots and through a McDonald's drive-through, going the wrong way. Apparently, the police dispatcher, after being told the make of car and the license plate number, never told Mr. O'Connor to break off his pursuit of the Pontiac Wave. The other man in the car, Matt Spezza, is brother to Ottawa Senators hockey star Jason Spezza. Mr. O'Connor and Mr. Spezza are roommates and told police that they were on their way to a Kim Mitchell concert around 11 p.m. when they realized that they had left their tickets behind. Mr. O'Connor turned his car around and headed home for the tickets when suddenly, a woman jumped in front of their car. After relating her horrifying story and getting into the back seat of the Porsche, the chase was on and after about 20-minutes of a cat-and-mouse that took the two vehicles through residential streets, parking lots and the going through the aforementioned McDonald's drive-thru the wrong way, the Pontiac Wave drove onto Highway 416, right into a police barricade. When commenting on the "what if" possibility, Ottawa Police Chief Vern White said, according to The Toronto Star:

If this had been a police pursuit, we would have stopped it. You don't do that with a victim in the back seat. Our operator did not do what he should have done ... . Thank God nothing happened.

So can a Pontiac Wave even get up to 170 km/hr? And what must this woman have been thinking after being attacked, getting into a stranger's car with two men in it and seeing the driver of her car whaling around the streets of Ottawa at high rates of speed, talking on the phone and driving with one hand. Also, what was the dispatcher thinking and is he or she still employed by the City of Ottawa? Finally, The Star is reporting that a man from Brockville was arrested at the scene and was subsequently charged with sexual assault, forcible confinement, uttering death threats, dangerous driving and two counts of impaired driving.