Vancouver police defend mocking Lamborghini driver after impounding car

The Vancouver Police Department is defending the decision to tweet a photo of a Lamborghini being towed after it was clocked allegedly going more than twice the speed limit.

Since the story was posted Thursday, many commenters on The Globe and Mail website and on Facebook have suggested that the actions of the police were "inappropriate" and unprofessional because of the lack of due process.

"The traffic violation…involved a luxury sports car that was exceeding the posted speed limit by 52 km/h, or double the speed that was allowed under the provincial Motor Vehicle Act," Vancouver Police Department media relations officer Randy Fincham wrote, in an email. "That vehicle would have required approximately 70 metres to stop, in ideal conditions, if someone had stepped into the roadway."

Fincham added that speeding is one of the biggest causes of death on B.C.'s roads with more than 100 people kiiled each year.

One of the dissenting commenters, identified as THS2, wrote: "Funny as the tweet might be, absolutely inappropriate for the police to be making fun of someone. Dosen't sound like impartiality to me. This isn't about having or not having a sense of humor, it's about a lack of professionalism. Think the officer would be upset if someone clocked him/her at being over the speed limit and posted it?"

Vancouver police believe that publicizing the incident will act as a deterrent – the role of the courts, traditionally.

"That tweet… has been viewed over 100,000 times, national and internationally," Fincham added. "Those are 100,000 people who have now engaged in a conversation about the dangers and consequences of speeding. Unfortunately I will have to let you decide if that meets your definition of 'inappropriate' or 'unprofessional'."

Police said the vehicle will be impounded for seven days, but would not disclose the owner or driver. The police fogged out the dealer plates in the picture. Lamborghini Vancouver, the accredited dealership in the city, told the Globe that the vehicle is not theirs.

On Tuesday evening the force tweeted these two photos showing a 2015 Lamborghini Huracan caught speeding and the vehicle being loaded onto a tow truck.

If writing a ticket for the driver, towing the car and tweeting the photo weren't enough, the caption reads like a MasterCard commercial.

The Huracan has a base price of about $250,000 and with 610 horsepower it can go from 0 to 100 km/h in 3.2 seconds. It has a top speed of 325 km/h.

The big problem for the 30-year-old driver? The speed limit on Cambie Street near West 54th Avenue is 50 km/h. The Lamborghini was clocked at 102 km/h, allegedly.

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