
Oculus Rift co-founder killed by gang trying to escape police - ajg1977
http://abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?section=news/local/orange_county&id=9122999
======
Sukotto
I feel badly for his family and coworkers. :(

Make sure you let your family know how much you care about them. Also make
sure they will be taken care of in case you're suddenly gone. Firstly by
picking up enough term life insurance to cover your dependents' needs until
adulthood. Secondly by writing up a will and giving it to someone you trust.
[1][2]

We joke about "getting hit by a bus" and a project's "bus factor"[3] but it
really does happen. It could happen to you or to a critically important person
on your project team. Make it a policy to have all critical info recorded in
some systematic way. You don't have to get all iso9000 but you should, at the
very least, have everyone do a brain dump into a wiki once a month and keep it
in a central location (along with the password file, list of client info,
etc.)

-

[1] DIY will: [http://www.wikihow.com/Write-Your-Own-Last-Will-and-
Testamen...](http://www.wikihow.com/Write-Your-Own-Last-Will-and-Testament)

[2] Reasonably priced template: <http://www.legalzoom.com/legal-wills/wills-
overview.html>

[3] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus_factor>

------
InclinedPlane
This is a good reminder to always be a defensive and aware pedestrian. Just
because you have the light or the right-of-way doesn't mean you are guaranteed
a safe crossing of the street. Whenever I cross an intersection as a
pedestrian I always look both ways (even on one way streets) and I always keep
an eye on cars that are still in motion, especially those that don't appear to
be slowing down. It's good to make these sorts of things just an innate habit,
it could safe your life one day.

~~~
entropy_
I've grown up in Lebanon -- a third world country still recovering from a 15
year civil war(1975-1990). Traffic lights and rules are merely suggestions to
people around here. If something is physically possible, like a car being able
to fit in an pedestrian-only paved road or two cars being able to fit in a
one-way street you can be sure that people will do it. It becomes an innate
habit to always check both ways and never assume that a car will stop or slow
down or that the driver has even seen you when you're crossing the road. It's
not "you might get hit" if you don't, it's "you _will_ get hit" if you don't.
It's sad, but it's true.

As an anecdote, there's a road that ends in an entrance/exit to a freeway that
I use pretty frequently when driving from my home to Beirut. Two years ago,
because the fact that the road was a 2-way road(people could use it to leave
the freeway as well as enter it) was causing a lot of traffic they changed it
into a 1-way road you could only use to enter the freeway, you had to leave
from an exit further down the line. This reduced traffic jams immensely.
However, before that could happen they had to go through several iterations on
how to enforce this. First, a simple traffic sign was tried, this was largely
ignored. Then they placed plastic barriers(those triangular things that can be
filled with sand or water). Every night somebody would stop, get out of their
car and move them to pass and things went back to how they were before the
next day. Now they've closed it off with concrete barriers. It's working, but
occasionally, especially at night, somebody will stop after the entrance, then
back up into it and then use it as an exit. I once almost rear-ended someone
doing that while I was going onto the freeway.

~~~
dhughes
I live in Canada in a small town with a fairly large (per capita) Lebanese
population (Tweel, Haddad, Rashed, Jabour).

We have bad drivers here but I am willing to bet we exported the behaviour to
Lebanon not the other way around.

~~~
entropy_
I highly doubt it. The behaviour has nothing to do with bad drivers, it's
mostly because of lack of enforcement. The only thing you can get a fine for
is speeding, and even then most speed traps are easy to spot. Otherwise, just
do whatever the fuck you want and you won't get a fine. I'm serious, anything
goes.

I've seen people burn red lights right in front of police officers and get no
reaction. Heck, I've seen police cars burn red lights(for no reason, sirens
weren't on, they were driving pretty slow, they just felt like it). I have a
friend who got rear-ended by a police car and then verbally abused for being
an idiot by stopping at a red light at night.

We didn't use to have speeding tickets a couple of year back. Then they
started enforcing speed limits. Lo-and-behold people started paying attention
and generally trying not to speed. But going the wrong way(even on a highway,
I was once almost killed by a guy doing that because there was a traffic jam
at the only exit and he didn't feel like waiting so he just U-turned and went
the other way, but that's another story) will not get you fined.

I'm pretty sure that if traffic rules were enforced properly then people
wouldn't so easily ignore them. But we don't have the necessary amount of
police to even do a significant fraction of what's needed.

~~~
dhughes
You just described my town.

A lot of ex-hockey goons are police, three cars go through the red light,
people don't signal turns not even police, lines on the road are ignored,
people park anywhere, tailgaters everywhere, cars without license plates, road
crews make the roads stupid because they can't drive so how would they know a
road is wrong and on and on.

I feel your pain.

------
ChrisNorstrom
After watching police chases on TV my whole life, I really want to know:

What's the logical strategy in a police chase? Just keep driving after each
other? It risks the lives of hundreds living and walking in the path of the
chase all for the sake of punishing 1 or 2 individuals. It just doesn't seem
to add up to me.

What a shame we lost someone so brilliant for nothing.

~~~
tnohtyp
According to the article they killed a police officer and ran, if you don't
pursue them how are you going to catch them? Aftersll, they did murder
someone, and apparently they had warrants, so it seems reasonable to assume we
dont want them out running around anymore as they sre likely to commit more
fiolent crimes. Furthermore, if have a policy to not pursue, then every
criminal is always going to run.

The fault is on the criminals, not on the police trying to apprehend them or
the pursuit.

~~~
gtufano
You know, police in EU normally don't chase criminals at high speed and they
normally found them easily after the fact (especially if they wound/killed a
cop). High speed chases are extremely rare, there is no rational need for them
(and the consequent danger for passers by).

~~~
rmc
There isn't a EU wide police or justice system. It's all done at the national
level. Policing standards can vary widely around countries.

~~~
mietek
Your statement is true. The parent poster's statement is also true.

~~~
nawitus
Not really, the typical action in many EU countries is to go for pursuit. This
is case in Finland and Sweden, for example.

~~~
corin_
I don't know enough about all the countries to say either way, but if FI/SE
were the only two countries with this policy (not saying they are - I've no
idea) then it would still be accurate to say that the opposite is true in the
vast majority of the EU.

------
jtchang
It is always sad to lose someone in your community. The Oculus Rift seems like
a pretty cool invention and hope things turn out well.

What do you even say when stuff like this happens? He was a developer and in a
way we never know when each of us will meet our ends.

~~~
enraged_camel
A couple of weeks ago, one of the VPs in my company suddenly passed away. A
day of vomiting and diarrhea, followed by hospitalization, and shortly after
that, gone.

He was 43 years old. Incredibly active, healthy and fit guy. He died of a very
rare staph infection. By the time he was diagnosed, it was too late.

I think the lesson is that life is really short, and you never know when it
will end. So you better make the most out of the time allotted to you, and the
fact that you don't know how long you have left should only fuel your efforts.

R.I.P. Andrew.

~~~
TwoBit
Rare staph infection you say?? Was he recently in the hospital for an
unrelated reason?

------
slacka
It's a sad day. His many contributions to the open source and the gaming
communities will live on, like his work on VBjin-OVR, a Virtual Boy Emulator.

[http://code.google.com/p/vbjin-
ovr/source/browse/oculus/Comm...](http://code.google.com/p/vbjin-
ovr/source/browse/oculus/CommonSrc/Render/Render_Font.h?spec=svn1ee8be125188906dcab23a818641453bc4e52b4e&r=1ee8be125188906dcab23a818641453bc4e52b4e)

------
samatman
Last night, I was walking to the store (the Walgreens next to the Berkeley
Bowl, for you Bay Areans) and a drunk driver shot up onto the pavement about
twenty feet in front of me. It was mere coincidence that my partner and I
avoided the hospital or worse. This is a sobering thing to read the morning
after that.

Seriously: there was nothing I could have done to avoid that. By the time I
was reacting, the car was already on the sidewalk. It was luck. Yeah, be
careful out there, sure. Can we have self-driving cars REALLY SOON PLEASE? I
hear rumors that they work, and don't drink on the job.

~~~
krakensden
I don't know why, but I regularly see drivers who are clearly, obviously
plastered, weaving about between the Ashby BART and the Shattuck/Adeline
split.

~~~
daeken
Get the plate, note the direction they're heading in, and call the police.
That's what they're there for, and you may just save a life (or lives).

------
ck2
Was it responsible for the police to chase them at this time?

 _two vehicles full of people involved in some type of criminal activity_

Was this yet another incident where the police self-escalated the situation?

I sure hope there was a precise reason this happened and not that "they
smelled pot".

~~~
seanmcdirmid
How can we even judge? The police back off often when they sense that a chase
is too dangerous, they make a judgement call. Sometimes they don't have
perfect information however, and shit just happens. It is not like the movies.

I'm sure the officers involved are second guessing their behavior now, its not
like people die every day like this. But really, its a tough job, we aren't
really in a position to judge.

~~~
ck2
Police in the US are notorious for causing chases in dangerously crowded areas
and endangering innocents.

So much so they had to pass laws to make it illegal for police to do chases in
many cities/situations to stop them.

<http://www.pursuitsafety.org/>

<http://kristieslaw.org/>

[http://abcnews.go.com/US/police-chases-california-
injured-10...](http://abcnews.go.com/US/police-chases-california-
injured-10000/story?id=16605443)

 _More bystanders are injured or killed during high-speed police chases than
by stray bullets. In California, more than 10,000 people have been injured and
over 300 people killed because of police chases in the last decade, according
to newly released statistics from the California Highway Patrol._

 _Nationally, it's estimated nearly 300 people die each year as a result of
high speed police chases._

~~~
ramblerman
> Nationally, it's estimated nearly 300 people die each year as a result of
> high speed police chases.

That's a huge number. I'd love to know how many of those 300 are innocent
bystanders. The fact that people involved in the chase (i.e. those running
away) lose their lives seems like it's part of the risk.

~~~
ck2
They don't count those - they don't even count the baby that was in the SUV
one guy stole and it flew out of the window during the police chase.

~~~
Sprint
Are you seriously blaming the police for the death of that? Surely it is the
guy's fault for stealing a car with a child in it and recklessly driving it.

~~~
jakeybob
I think he's just suggesting that the baby definitely should count as an
innocent bystander.

------
Xanza
I just wanted to say two things here. One, this is an incredibly damaging
tragedy. I truly wish the best for the community, for the Reisse and Oculus VR
family.

Secondly, my father has been an officer of the law for more than 25 years --
can we please not turn a thread which is being used to inform the community at
large of a tragedy as a way to defame those who wish to do good in their
community.

I ask out of respect of Reisse, and my good natured father that we keep at the
very least this thread on topic.

~~~
foobarbazqux
So because your father is a cop, you don't even want people to question the
actions of the cops in the story? And anyway, so what? It sounds like the gang
members were the ones out of control, not the police. If the police had struck
Reisse that would be different, but they didn't. But then what if the police
had done something reprehensible? Nothing should be said because we need to
respect your good natured father? It's not about you or your father.

~~~
davidw
This site is about hacking and startups, not political ranting. There are
other sites for that.

~~~
enraged_camel
Sorry, what?

[https://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/all&q=aaron+swar...](https://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/all&q=aaron+swartz)

~~~
mpyne
That particular case was where HN really shifted, but that doesn't make the
parent comment incorrect.

~~~
foobarbazqux
This is a story about the literal intersection of police, guns, gangs,
speeding, pedestrian crosswalks, motor vehicle accidents, and the sudden,
traumatic, and innocent bystander death of the co-founder of a visible
startup. And you guys expect no discussion of politics?

Can you point to a single story since the inception of Hacker News that quite
obviously involved the intersection of hacker/startup culture with the rest of
society where politics were not discussed? What is any discussion about wealth
or economics if not politics? Is it a vanishingly small percentage of PG's
essays that express a strong political opinion?

As far as I'm concerned, discussing politics as they relate to hacker culture
is on topic. Discussing the Boston Marathon bombing, not so on-topic, but
nevertheless people here had interesting things to say from a hacker
perspective. I'll be the first to agree that political extremism is
aggravating, but the solution to political extremism is not the avoidance of
politics altogether.

~~~
mpyne
> I'll be the first to agree that political extremism is aggravating, but the
> solution to political extremism is not the avoidance of politics altogether.

On the contrary, avoidance of all politics is a _wonderful_ individual
solution to political extremism. Which is why so many "normal" people refuse
to get involved at all, which is why all of us "normal" people end up so
surprised every 2 years over a bunch of reactionary representatives being
elected.

At least on HN you were able to have reasoned political discourse, which is
far less aggravating. Even where I disagree with others I love being exposed
to angles I hadn't considered, cultural nuances that might explain why
something would work in the EU that wouldn't work in the U.S. (and vice
versa), and all of that.

But from what I can tell even on HN we're shifting farther and farther away
from that into the creationist mold of "I have decided what the answer must
be, now I need only twist the facts to suit". Even where the answer that's
decided on is actually right, that's no way to conduct a 'debate'.

~~~
davidw
> avoidance of all politics

Who ever said anything about that?

I'm quite interested, and in my own way, involved in politics. I also follow
bicycle racing with a passion, for that matter. But I don't think either one
belongs on _this_ particular web site.

~~~
foobarbazqux
I looked back through your comments and I noticed you've been repeating this
request somewhat frequently. What do you mean by politics, exactly?

~~~
davidw
This site has been a great resource for me in terms of startup material, also
a good place to learn new things about 'computer stuff', and also occasionally
read something genuinely new and interesting. I hate to see it dragged down
into the mud of political debate, which tends to wreck communities such as
this.

~~~
foobarbazqux
Ok, agreed more or less, and the mud slinging is terrible, but by political
debate, what exactly do you mean?

I don't think you mean simply election politics, so my assumption is that you
mean any kind of debate over government policy. In this example it would be a
debate over the US government policy of pursuing suspects in high speed car
chases.

I can understand how these kinds of things are off topic in the general case
(Istanbul protests, Boston marathon, etc.), but are you saying they're still
off topic when there's a fairly clear connection to a hacking / startup story?
Are the discussions about rent control in SF off topic, for instance?

My belief is that there's a grey zone where considered discussion of the pros
and cons is okay, even good. For instance, I wasn't even aware that there were
debates about high speed chases at all, so for me this was something new and
interesting. Most of the community wrecking I've seen has happened due to in-
fighting and drama, but yes political mud fights are a common enough precursor
to that, because they encourage people to hold grudges and take sides, at
least in my experience.

~~~
DanBC
> My belief is that there's a grey zone where considered discussion of the
> pros and cons is okay, even good.

Considered discussion is welcome on HN. Unfortunately there are some topics
where considered discussion is unlikely. Abortion; circumcision; Israel /
Palestine; gun control; etc etc. It'd be fantastic if there was a site like HN
where these topics could be discussed, especially if that site fostered calm
rational discussion.

But these discussions too often deteriorate into noise, and worse into wider
ranging down-voting and derailments in other threads.

~~~
foobarbazqux
Well there's lesswrong I suppose, although I'm not a member. I strongly
believe that if PG changed the policy from upvote agreement, downvote
disagreement to upvote civility, downvote incivility, the quality of
discussions would improve. For example, I was not particularly civil in the
comment that started this sub-thread, but nevertheless I got 42 upvotes.

------
jader201
I've not been following the Oculus Rift very much, other than waiting for its
release and keeping an eye on which games might support it once it's released.
So I don't really know much of the history or the company.

Can someone share how Reisse was involved w/ the Oculus Rift? Looking at the
company's profile[1], it makes no mention of Reisse, and lists Luckey as the
"Founder".

Even searching their site[2] makes no mention of Reisse, other than a recent
discussion[3] about his untimely death. And those discussions seem to only
refer to him as an "employee".

Is calling him "co-founder" in the title truly accurate?

[1] <http://www.oculusvr.com/company/>

[2] <http://www.google.com/search?q=reisse+site%3Aoculusvr.com>

[3]
[https://developer.oculusvr.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=26&...](https://developer.oculusvr.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=1362)

~~~
SolarNet
Many early employees are truly better called founders, just ones that didn't
officially work at the company until after it's founding.

He could have been moonlighting for them, he may have helped come up with the
original idea, or work with the company to solve some of the core design
challenges.

Just because his title wasn't co-founder doesn't mean he wasn't as important
as any other founder or early employee.

~~~
jader201
I agree, and I wasn't trying to diminish his role. I was just trying to
understand where the "co-founder" in the title came from. How did the
submitter know he was truly a co-founder?

I couldn't find mention of this anywhere, so I was assuming the submitter knew
some history of him that I couldn't find on their site.

------
mckoss
I was about to lament how reckless the police were to be in a high-speed
pursuit, but it's hard to fault them when this began with a fatal shooting of
an officer at the beginning of the encounter.

Just a really sad turn of events.

~~~
indrax
>there was a physical altercation between police and 26-year-old Gerardo Diego
Ayala that ended with a fatal officer-involved shooting.

That doesn't necessarily mean the officer was shot.

~~~
guttermaw
It was not. A man got out of the vehicle, the police shot him, and then the
chase began.

[http://blogs.ocweekly.com/navelgazing/2013/05/santa_ana_pede...](http://blogs.ocweekly.com/navelgazing/2013/05/santa_ana_pedestrian_police_ch.php?page=2)

He died of his injuries. His name was Gerardo Diego Ayala.

------
mhartl
People are missing the main point here. This was a terrible, but not a
senseless, tragedy, and there is an important lesson to learn.

It's not "be more careful when crossing the street". Being a super-defensive
pedestrian might have saved Andrew Reisse, but that's not the main point. It's
not "don't have high speed chases". Perhaps different police policies might
have averted this tragedy, but that's not the main point, either.

The main point is that roving paramilitary gangs rule large swathes of Santa
Ana, California, and virtually every other big city in America. These gangs
have not been broken because the police lack the mandate to break them. (My
father consulted for the Santa Ana police department for nearly 30 years; they
feel powerless against the gangs.) The gangs probably wouldn't last a week
against a vigorous application of military-grade force, but such an
application of force is politically untenable at present. This means that _the
current political system itself is complicit_.

Don't blame the pedestrian or the police. Blame the gangs and the system that
protects them.

~~~
bilbo0s
"...The gangs probably wouldn't last a week against a vigorous application of
military-grade force..."

No... they would last much longer than a week. I'm going to recommend some
reading to you:

[http://www.amazon.com/Marine-Corps-Counterinsurgency-
Field-M...](http://www.amazon.com/Marine-Corps-Counterinsurgency-Field-
Manual/dp/0226841510)

You don't go into neighborhoods, kicking in doors with guns blazing. They
recently did that in Detroit to serve a warrant. Post Mortem: 1 dead 6 year
old girl, 1 injured 72 year old grandmother, 0 arrests.

Think of it this way...

For every enemy, or (gang member), you kill, you create one. For every
innocent you kill in pursuit of a gang member, you create 10 enemies. (Keep in
mind, the people in the neighborhood KNOW who is innocent, even if you don't.)

These are hard problems. They defy simple solutions. In fact, the application
of simple solutions to this PARTICULAR class of problems only creates more
problems.

~~~
mhartl
Thanks for the link to a counterinsurgency manual; here is my favorite work in
the genre:

<http://www.civilwarhome.com/liebercode.htm>

It describes the code (developed by Prussian jurist Francis Lieber) used by
the victorious Union to suppress armed opposition ("insurgency") in the
defeated Confederacy after the end of the American Civil War. If you compare
its prescriptions to those in the "modern" counterinsurgency manual you linked
to, you will see why the Union succeeded where present efforts fail.

 _You don't go into neighborhoods, kicking in doors with guns blazing. They
recently did that in Detroit to serve a warrant._

No, you start by declaring martial law and enforcing a curfew. Santa Ana's
gangs are a _military_ problem, and they demand a military solution. If you're
serving warrants, you've already lost the battle.

I understand that this is off the political map. _That's the point._ The kinds
of policies needed to successfully defeat these gangs are anathema to
prevailing civil libertarian views. But civilized 4th Amendment–style
liberties only work when basic conditions of law & order hold; they don't work
in a war. Indeed, when applied in a war, they only make things worse. This is
why the present system, which serves warrants to soldiers in the opposing
army, is complicit in their crimes.

~~~
bilbo0s
It's not off the map.

It just won't work.

For instance... let's say you have a curfew... well gang members already ARE
indoors by curfew! Minding their drug dens, which get maximum business during
evening, (curfew), hours. In fact, drug gangs would LOVE martial law...
because it would rid them of their chief competition... the low level, open
air, street drug dealer. Currently, the only way they can get rid of those
guys is through targeted violence. Which brings them trouble. Your
recommendations would actually CEMENT the gang's hold on a given drug market.

You approach what you see as a war... but everyone else sees as a business.
The police are having a lot of success right now disrupting business. The core
of the strategy in NY was not "quality of life", as so many people parrot.
Rather it was "disrupt business" wherever you see it. Even the "Squeegee-men"
were targeted. And the results have been fantastic.

Now, are innocent people still getting hurt? Of course. But collateral damage
is nowhere NEAR the level it was during the crack wars of the 80's and 90's.
At the same time, violence is WAY down relative the crack wars. That's because
we have gotten MUCH smarter. Well... most of us. Violence is down in places
like NY, LA and even Chicago relative the crack wars. But places like Detroit
persist with old tactics and have not made as much headway. Many of the
"squeegee-men" equivalents still operate with impunity in Detroit. Which tells
you that Detroit is not serious about cleaning up it's city. They only care to
crack down on gangs with military zeal. Which is why they have the problems
they do.

------
djloche
Saddening news aside, this is terrible reporting. Reisse was killed in a car
accident caused by gang members who were fleeing from the police.

------
tyoma
This is extremely sad, but it made me think of an important topic: contingency
planning.

Pretty much every organization I've worked for was missing a "key developer
got hit by bus" plan for at least one major project.

~~~
Buttons840
If that key developer did get hit by a bus then:

1) A new key developer would be hired to maintain the project, and things
would be a little rough for a couple months but the company would survive.

2) Every decent person would care more about the key developers life than the
"major project".

This so called "bus factor" has always bugged me. Documentation is good, but
talk of untimely death by bus is silly.

~~~
cperciva
_This so called "bus factor" has always bugged me. Documentation is good, but
talk of untimely death by bus is silly._

The reference to untimely death by bus strike is an example of macabre geek
humour; not a serious suggestion that the greatest threat to developers is
posed by motorized mass transportation.

Most often developers leave projects -- and especially open source projects --
for far more banal reasons: They move to a different position and don't have
the time or inclination to continue maintaining their old code.

------
vertis
This reminds me of something my dad, a minister of religion, used to repeat
constantly "No-one is promised tomorrow". I'm pretty sure he was trying to
impress on a given audience "Repent now, you may not get another chance".

I tend to approach it from a different angle. Be brilliant and live your life
now, you may not get the chance to do so later. It sounds like he was doing
awesome things, so one can only hope that his work lives on.

My condolences to Andrew's family.

------
dynjo
Terribly sad news, at least he got to experience the VR dream in his lifetime
and see that Oculus is destined for the history books.

------
elleferrer
This is truly upsetting. We just lost a brilliant mind and creative genius.
RIP, Andrew Scott Reisse.

------
znowi
Damn, news like that surely make you note the fragility of our lives. Too bad.
Condolences to the family. Keep yourself safe fellow hackers.

------
joeblau
My prayers go out to the family and his colleagues. I was just watching the
Kickstarter video about Oculus yesterday.

------
csense
The HN headline's grammar is ambiguous and could be improved. It could be read
to mean "The co-founder was killed by a gang while he (the cofounder) was
trying to escape police," or it could mean "The co-founder was killed by a
gang while they (the gang) were trying to escape police." (According to the
article, the latter meaning is intended.)

The HN headline is still many times more informative than the linked article's
headline, "Santa Ana police chase: Pedestrian identified." Even considering
the newspaper's audience (who, unlike HN, might not know or care enough about
Oculus Rift to merit its mention by name in the headline), the fact that the
pedestrian was killed by a gang while the gang was trying to escape police
would presumably still be of interest.

------
navs
My co-worker and I were talking about the Oculus Rift only a few days ago. We
finally got our hands on the Leap motion device and were thinking up wondrous
mashups with the Oculus Rift. What a terrible tragedy. Such a pity he can't be
there to witness the Rift's success.

------
venomsnake
This is sad. Condolences to the friends and family. I do hope that this won't
kill the momentum behind the Oculus Rift - seems like amazing piece of tech
and will be sad to be lost because of that.

~~~
scoot
Unfortunate choice of words...

------
ddispaltro
It's so easy to focus on the bad in a situation like this but I wonder how
many successful police pursuits that resulted in lives being saved. It reminds
me of airbags, if they save 99% of lives but end up causing 1% of deaths then
it is seen as a bad thing, but in reality it is really saving lives. It's just
a terrible situation that's hard to understand, there is no black in white
right answer.

------
sthkr
Seriously? :( this sucks.

------
aespinoza
Wow this is just a couple of miles from our office. This is definitely
shocking, and scary at the same time.

------
moron4hire
You can be a defensive pedestrian, but that's not always going to work.
Something like this, a police chase, it defies predictability. It could happen
so fast that it doesn't matter if you're completely present and aware, you
could still get hit.

------
kurd_debuggr
This is really sad and a great loss to the community over in Santa Monica.
With this sort of thing happening so infrequently in tech, it makes events
like these all the more of a loss, for our entire industry.

Condolences to the family and Oculus team.

~~~
gohrt
This happening so infrequently in tech makes it _less_ of a loss. There are
communities terrorized by criminal- and police-related violence, that lose so
much more. Events like this should be a wake up call to be aware that
tragedies happen all the time outside our bubble. And what can we do to
prevent them?

------
bking
This is horrible. The Oculus is just gearing up to be something great.

It is kind of morbid, but This is going to turn into an interesting case study
on how a company stays afloat when a major influence is removed from the
picture.

RIP Andrew Reisse

------
sjtgraham
It's always sad when someone brilliant loses life at such a young age. It's
even worse that it was at the hands of a piece of shit criminal trying to save
his own skin and is still alive.

Very sad. Rest in peace.

~~~
dataisfun
I totally agree. It's the fact that a degenerate like that can end the life of
someone awesome--the asymmetry--is what is really curse-worthy hard to
understand.

------
haydenevans
Just terrible :( Why does it always seem like the worst and most insignificant
wastes of human beings always take away great ones?

~~~
soheil
Just because he wrote some code that was used so widely doesn't make him more
significant than a janitor who cleans after you, or the "gang" member who was
evading the brutal cops for a chance for his freedom. The sooner we realize
people are equal because they're human fucking beings the greater hope for
humanity to avoid its imminent demise.

~~~
sejje
What makes someone more significant, then? What's your measure?

People aren't equal, you can't make it so by saying it.

The man who died was more significant than the man who killed him.

~~~
soheil
It's like asking what makes 5 greater than 5. Humans are all significant
simply because they have rational minds and are rational beings. A human being
cannot impose on others a value or worthiness, because we are rational beings
and have independent minds. As you probably have noticed by now this is not me
saying these things, it's from Immanuel Kant. I found these lectures on the
topic absolutely amazing to watch:
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBdfcR-8hEY>

~~~
jpgvm
It's worth mentioning that all humans are -humans- just like 5 == 5.

However, the fact humans are humans doesn't make them equal. Unlike a number
humans have dimensionality. They can be taller, shorter, stronger, weaker,
smarter, dumber, richer, poorer etc. Along with any number of other attributes
like job, geographical location, father, mother etc.

Equality is a very precise thing and humans are anything but equal.

------
philliphaydon
RIP Andrew Scott Reisse, you wont be forgotten.

------
mikeflynn
Horrible news. He seemed like a brilliant guy,

------
serf
a guy dies, and the number one comment is a guy spouting off a public PSA
about pedestrian safety?

------
kickingvegas
Rest in peace Andrew Scott Reisse. Cliché but true, nobody is ever promised
tomorrow.

------
boneheadmed
Too sad. What a loss. Condolences for the poor family. We never know the day
or the hour when death will come, which is something to be mindful of. I have
found this an interesting site to reflect on our eternal destiny:
<http://needgod.com/>

------
bjliu
So depressing...a grim reminder that some things are simply out of our control

------
sidcool
Saddened. RIP, sir.

------
felipelalli
legalize the drugs and the gangs will die.

------
tomjen3
And they even let the driver recover in a hospital, at tax payers expense.

And of course no mention of the officers name.

~~~
Joeboy
> And of course no mention of the officers name.

I'm guessing you think a police officer was killed, because of the ambiguous
(I would say misleading) wording of the article. Or are you saying you want
the name of the officer that killed Gerardo Diego Ayala?

~~~
tomjen3
I want the name of the chasing officer.

Not to harm him, I just want to show his family the picture of the guy their
father helped kill.

------
kenrick
This is just awful

------
edo
F __* this.

------
Demiurge
W T F :(

------
flaktrak
so sad!

------
nutate
.

------
kmasters
I believe if I remember correctly, LAPD had a stand down on high speed chases
years ago due to the property damage and personal injuries of innocent
bystanders.

The police have a job to do, but in some areas, the level of aggression with
which they pursue their duties is beyond reasonable and seems like adrenaline
addiction.

------
ninetenel
my heart goes out to his family and friends.

~~~
junkilo
We've lost one of our own. May the oculus team benefit -- not suffer from his
passing. Makes me sad.

------
monocoder
That's what happens when a government gives rights to it's citizens to own
guns!

~~~
venomsnake
<sarcasm>That is what happens when a government gives rights to it's citizens
to own cars and have freedom of movement.<sarcasm/>

He was hit by a car.

