CRIMINAL LAW
Court of Appeals of Alaska (2022)
Flora Lipsky
In Ambacher v. State, 521 P.3d 604 (Alaska Ct. App. 2022), the court of appeals held that driving
twenty to thirty miles per hour above the speed limit and briefly crossing the median did not
constitute a gross deviation from the standard of care a reasonable driver would observe, and,
therefore, that it could not support a finding of reckless driving. (Id. at 606). A driver did not pull
over after a state trooper turned on his lights and sirens indicating that the driver should stop. (Id.
at 605). The driver was driving between seventy and eighty miles per hour on a stretch of road
with a speed limit of fifty–five miles per hour, on a clear day with limited traffic and few
pedestrians on the street. (Id.). The trooper followed the driver for 1.8 miles and observed the
driver navigate an S–curve before the driver finally pulled over, and the trooper’s camera footage
captured the driver crossing the double–yellow median and the fog line briefly at different points.
(Id.). A trial court entered a verdict of guilty of first–degree failure to stop at the discretion of a
peace officer, a felony. (Id. at 606). The driver challenged the conviction, arguing that the evidence
did not support a finding of reckless driving as required for the first–degree conviction. (Id.). The
statute defining reckless driving provides that a driver is guilty of reckless driving when they drive
in such a way that poses a “substantial and unjustifiable risk of harm to a person or to property.”
(Id.). The court of appeals explained that the relevant inquiry was whether the driver’s behavior
constituted a gross deviation from the standard of care that a reasonable driver would observe.
(Id.). Here, the court reasoned that the clear day, limited traffic, relatively insignificant deviation
from the speed limit, and absence of pedestrians foreclosed a finding that the driver’s actions
constituted reckless driving based on the evidence at trial. (Id. at 610). Reversing the trial court
and remanding the case for entry of a conviction of failure to stop at the discretion of a peace
officer in the second degree, the court of appeals concluded that driving twenty to thirty miles per
hour above the speed limit and briefly crossing the median did not constitute a gross deviation
from the standard of care, and therefore could not support a finding of reckless driving. (Id. at
612).
