Let’s leave the tears and hollow eulogies for the family…
Because when it comes right down to it, the blame for the death of Fast & Furious star Paul Walker lies directly at the feet of the slain movie star. Walker was a passenger in a ridiculously fast and ridiculously driven 2005 Porsche Carerra GT this past weekend. The car burst into flames with Walker and his race car driver pal on board after striking a streetlamp in Santa Clarita, just north of Los Angeles a 45 MPH zone.
After which friends and associates of Walker, 40, and his race car driver pal, 38, played dumb for CNN and other news networks when asked if they thought speed was a contributing factor in the crash and Walker’s death.
“Don’t give me that shit, he was going too fast” says local race car driver Brian Haupt of Carriage & Motor Works on Southwest Boulevard. “They’re denying the obvious, because he was going really fast. You don’t wad a car up like that and kill yourself without going just incredibly fast.”
As for suggestions by some of Walker’s friends who blame a possible leak in the power steering fluid for causing the crash, “Well, you could try and make that case and it could have been a contributing factor,” Haupt says. “But the only contributing factor I can see that would have been reasonable was if the throttle was stuck wide open, but I doubt that. The reason the throttle was probably wide open was someone’s foot was on it.
“He was driving too fast in an inappropriate venue. If you’re going to drive over 100 miles-per-hour, you need to do it out in Nevada or on a race track. I don’t care if you’re out on the highway, there are still other people there and they’re going about their business and they’re not expecting a car that’s traveling that fast.”
How fast might Walker’s car have been traveling?
“He was doing over 100 and maybe well over 100,” Haupt says. “To wad a car up that way you have to be going really fast.”
What’s more Walker’s glorifying of ridiculous, in-town drag events for teenagers and young men in the Fast & Furious movies was bogus, Haupt says.
“He’s glorifying risk taking without safeguards,” Haupt says. “When I go on the racetrack, yes, I’m taking risks, but they’re calculated risks. And I have safety protection in a controlled situation. But you go out on the street and people aren’t doing the same thing – they aren’t even going in the same direction you are – and that’s just stupid.”
The silver lining in Walker’s dark demise: after years of setting a terrible example for young drivers, in death, he finally set a good one.
“Yeah, I suppose you could say that,” Haupt muses. “It’s kind of a pretty dark way of looking at it. It’s unfortunate that this happened, but another dark way of looking at it is, he’s taken his DNA out of the gene pool. There’s a book about taking DNA out of the gene pool; it’s called The Dawin Awards.”
Haupt’s take on moviemaker’s celebration of illegal street racing:
“They’re fucking stupid – I don’t know any other way to categorize it – it’s just fucking stupid. I realize that when we were 20 years old we thought we were indestructible and all that kind of stuff. And I’ve driven cars pretty fast on highways, but not in town (like Walker). The race car guy who was driving was just showing off for his buddy and look what it got him.”
Movies like Fast & Furious set the worst kind of example, Haupt says.
“Absolutely, no question about it,” he says. “I think there is a very real connection the violence we see on the big screen and the little screen and what people act out. I mean, people are going into schools and shooting up kids. These people are seriously sick, but where did they get the idea? I’m not into censorship butI think the people who make movies and television shows have a very serious responsibility to the public. And I understand that they make big money on these movies, but what price is a life?”
Pretty much on target except for the movies and video games cause it stuff. How many people see/play them and don’t act like a jagoff compared to the few whose reality is warped already.
You don’t lose control of a car, you throw it away.
Put the blame on the ease of obtaining a license to drive. Toughest part of the test is parallel parking. How many people die parking?
Graduated licenses would help, have to qualify for the vehicle you drive rather than taking the test in Granny’s Rambler and getting a Vette.
Taking a driving course at a race track where they put you into panic situations to teach you what to do in one would be much better than drivers’ ed.
Rather than getting your cherry busted as your ability is over come by horsepower.
There were only about 1,200 of these made if I remember correctly, less than half of them are in the US and they are not for the faint of heart.
A V-10 with 650+ horsepower, midengine true race car having no real business on the street if not in the hands of a trained driver. This isn’t something a layman with a fat checkbook tackles, its a race car drivers race car on the street.
They are almost impossible to see out of, poor visibility all the way around, except for the windshield, not simple to shift, drive or maintain.
Ive only seen one of these in person and that was at Symbolic in LaJolla. If you’re out that way, this is NOT a place to miss. Having a love of vintage race cars, this store has more one/two/three of a kind, exotic vintage race cars in the million dollar range than anyplace on earth, not to mention every other form of current exotic there is. Look um up.
A quick look shows a tiny handful available ranging from the high $300 to the high 400’s in that model.
Nothing to see here, everyone go home. He punched it, tried to see 150mph, saw God instead!
Really great everyone and their mother can speculate and give their judgement without having THE ACTUAL RESULTS OF THE OFFICIAL INVESTIGATION.
Were they going too fast? Probably, BUT I DON’T KNOW and I am not willing to make a call on it at this point.
Realise this though, the GT frame is completely made of carbon fiber, a wreck at 45mph could potentially cause this amount of damage if you hit a tree and lightpost. Carbon fiber frames do not react to collision the same way a metal-framed car does. But if we are being sensational, go big I guess.
And realize this, carbon fiber can go up in flames pretty spectacularly like in this case, that’s why the car looks like it disintigrated because it burned up.
Speed was a factor according to the police. How fast? The black box in the car will tell them.
Cars rarely burst into flames following a normal accident.
Yeah, jumping the gun a bit but I’ll take the over on 45mph.
Apparently you missed the video of the explosion dude.
This is no wait for the investigation to see if they were maybe going slow kind of a deal. The one friend who watched them drive off said he could hear each shift as they went thru the gears.
They were rocking, dude – don’t kid yourself.
I’m with Orphan
Why did you delete the comment Hearne? LOL. Jeez
And since I did not cuss in that post, and it is awaiting moderation….I see you flagged my IP. well played. It is ok, I made fun of your “page view cash cow”, you need him happy to have a site. I get it.
I don’t, but whatever.
Wow. See Hearne, I gave you credit yesterday for the Disney post and now I’m going to argue again with this one.
If you’re going to go down the path of movies make people do stupid things, why haven’t there been an outbreak of kids with spinal injuries when they roughhouse with their friends and try to do a Bane-on-Batman style takedown? C’mon. Like anything else, we’re talking about personal responsibility and, yes, Roger Rodas was taking a stupid, gigantic risk in driving that car the way he did. By all accounts, it’s one of the scariest production cars ever made because it’s so raw and powerful. Here’s a decent list from CNN of why it’s different: http://www.cnn.com/2013/12/03/us/paul-walker-crash-car/.
But for you to pretty much say he deserved to die is way over the top. From everything I’ve read, he was one of the most down-to-Earth, normal, friendly people in Hollywood and that’s pretty damn rare in that town. He was there that day raising money for typhoon victims through his own charity, one of many charitable events he contributed to. I don’t ever remember hearing about him getting DUIs, having drug problems, abusing his wife/girlfriend, or any of that crap.
It’s a sad reminder and ironic lesson to be sure, but stomping all over the man’s grave is unnecessary and over-the-top.
Kyle, I enjoy your takes whether you agree with me or not. And don’t think it’s escaped my attention that you’re a car guy (like me).
However, nice guy or not, driving that fast in that kind of car in town where he could have taken out any number of decent, law abiding people is not only stoopid – like Haupt said – it’s dangerous, thoughtless, selfish and unforgivable.
Do you honestly disagree with me on that point? Just curious.
No, I don’t disagree and I said that. I just disagree with you basically saying he deserved it, especially since he wasn’t even the one driving,
Did I say he deserved it?
I think his death sets a far better example for younger Fast & Furious fans. You know, a cautionary tale.
He wasn’t behind the wheel but he was a party to that ridiculously dangerous joy ride is my take.
All that said, he wasn’t driving, maybe they were speeding…but damn the man is dead, a good person from what I hear, so his movies promoted racing???? In the streets????WTF, ok…so now thats a crime…like he ‘desreved to die’…my God…Paul did some great films besides those, one of my fav’s RUNNING SCARRED and the save the dog movie I think it was 8 Below? Fine young actor, nice family. So sorry to see this happend to a good person..a cool guy…I feel bad about it.
THANK YOU!
Glaze hits it out of the park.
He was NOT fu*kin drivin.
He might have been pickin his fu*kin nose and lookin at the clouds.
Speculation on his “guilt” is fu*kin stupid.
The man was a passenger in a car, that hit a tree and exploded into flames.
Jesus…
There’s quite a little more to it than Walker just sliding into the passenger seat on a friend’s car, Chuck. Dig a little deeper, I suggest.
Meanwhile, I’m the one who turned Craig on to Running Scared a few years back. Great underrated action flick.
And yes, Walker wasn’t driving but the race car driver that worked with him was, so he undoubtedly was a willing party to recklessly breaking the law and putting any number of innocent people at extreme risk on city streets.
And for what, I ask?
“Undoubtedly”??
He. Was. Not. Driving. The. Car.
He was an enabler in this case.
When you defy the odds when doing stupid things, it emboldens you to keep doing it.
Eventually it will catch up to you.
He hopped in that car with his race car driver buddy for what he undoubtedly knew was going to be a wild ride in a wild car.
Tell me you don’t think he hopped in there for a quiet drive to Quick Trip and back to a couple Red Bulls. Tell me he was shocked and horrified that when he and his racing pal jumped in that particular car and said, we’ll be back in a few minutes, he was unaware of the fact that it would be a wilding.
Tell me, that he sat there in the passenger seat like somebodies grandmother shouting for his buddy to slow down.
And they still have not made a final determination on who was driving, FYI
Here is a picture of him getting into the car minutes before his death.
http://l2.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/XyC2l3kDgi1JAaZk_3648w–/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Y2g9MjQ3Mjtjcj0xO2N3PTQ1MDA7ZHg9MDtkeT0wO2ZpPXVsY3JvcDtoPTM0NztxPTg1O3c9NjMx/http://l.yimg.com/os/publish-images/movies/2013-12-02/d6d061e6-2fb8-4dbd-99f1-0691d7eb217f_paul-walker-last-photo.jpg
Hey, this is a little off subject Hearne, but have you ever read “Findadeath.com”?
I have read it for years. Hooked. It is so interesting, the guy is named Scott Michaels and he lists the deaths of celebrities, goes to their houses, takes pictures and all kinds of stupid stuff that I can’t beleive. It is actually interesting as heck. He also does tours out in Hollywood and knows all the minutia related to dead movie stars etc.
Really a guilty, guilty pleasure. I always feel creepy after I read it, but I can’t stop, it is too interesting.
http://www.findadeath.com
FINDADEATH. Yes! That website is bizarre, yet wildly intriguing.
There is some great stuff on Walt Disney that he jsut posted on Findadeath.
Running Scarred? Haven’t seen, or heard, of that one. Must be about Paul Walker’s character training for a marathon after a botched surgery or something.
Where does freedom begin, and end? Responsibility? An ‘I gots my rights man’ crowd would tell you one thing… others would beg to differ, not defer.
I agree with the sentiments expressed by Mr. Haupt. An oversimplification perhaps, cars don’t kill people…people/speed does. Yes, mechanical failures too but not usually. Speed(ing) on a race track is one thing – even there the innocent have been maimed / killed by collateral damage as it were, accidents, though they were willingly present; the expectation is different in other venues.
Ralph Nader’s vintage 1965 book ‘Unsafe at Any Speed’ comes to mind; while to some he may have been a precursor to an over-reaching New York Mayor Bloomberg (“I’m with the government & we’re here to help”), Nader’s moral imperative was in the right place if not success in courting consent.
Whether 200+ mph or a ‘mere’ 75+ what rationale availability street-legal cars which can exceed a maximum posted speed limit? I say all that while offering that I’ve sped in vintage muscle cars when younger. For the record, did so on tracks and on deserted stretches highway in the middle nowhere, no one else around – never in any populated area. If had died, would’ve been no hostages taken along with me. Still not very bright, regardless – illegal/speeding upon public thoroughfares – but, as the old adage implies ‘youth is wasted on the young’.
Can regulate speed, if not persons: 120 – 200 + mph (or any speed in excess a legal limit upon a public thoroughfare) courtesy auto manufacturers is tantamount asking fox guard hen house, Eve not to partake a delicious red. Be no need nor rationale for building ones can go faster the posted speed limit. Course, having a governor (say 75 mph top speed) on a vehicle doesn’t deny a person so inclined to drive 75 in a 25 mph ‘school zone’; be no cure for ‘stupid’. Withal, consequences of doing so sufficient (death penalty having been known cure killers & prevent future casualties theirs one life at a time), the desire to do so is just not there appears, the public as well judicial sentiment – and probably never will be.
So keep peeling ’em off the asphalt… and making lawyers rich, civil court.
Here’s my take, guys…
Like Haupt, I’m not saying that censorship is the way to go here, but let’s get real.
Censorship exists pretty much everywhere. From me editing down or deleting the odd 10,000 word, repetitive rant by Harley to Tony making Glazer remove my name from his posts on that site. Petty, huh?
From the Kansas City Star not allowing comments on racially sensitive stories and the like to not allowing columnists to air opinions and/or cover stories that some editor has a petty gripe about.
To a former Pitch editor killing a comment by former Pitch staff writer Nadia Pflaum.
It happens, OK?
But again like Haupt, I question the merit of celebrating reckless, dangerous, illegal over-the-top street racing. Much of those Fast & Furious movies are needless shout outs to young, impressionable kids, some of whom think the kind of thing Walker did this past weekend is cool if you can get away with it.
Obviously most people who see those movies are not going to participate, but some will, inspired by the realistic lunacy. Obviously, Walker thought he was above the law in real life and he paid the price for his idiocy. Not a bad example to set actually; certainly better than the ones he set in his Fast & Furious movies.
That said, unlike the Pitch, I’m not calling for these movies to be banned…like the Pitch did in calling for MU to continue eject the Antlers for using bad words at MU sporting events.
Like Haupt, I’m merely suggesting people take this opportunity to give the matter some thought and focus on what actually happened, rather than romanticizing Walker’s death.
Wow, some strong opinions on a guy who wasn’t driving the car. Of course they were speeding, of course it was dangerous, but why the need to stomp on his grave?
To quote Hearne “However, nice guy or not, driving that fast in that kind of car in town where he could have taken out any number of decent, law abiding people is not only stoopid – like Haupt said – it’s dangerous, thoughtless, selfish and unforgivable.”
Is what happened in (your DUI was) also “dangerous, thoughtless, selfish and unforgivable?”
I myself am in no position to throw stones, but if this is your opinion of this accident, then I would imagine this is the same thing you’d say about every DUI ever!!
Love the site, just a story wanting to push blame on a passenger, because he’s a star, is a little too much. We’ve all done dumb stuff….
Please look into this story a little further. Walker wasn’t merely a passenger…more like co-pilot, co-conspirator on a wildly illegal joy ride.
I got stopped in my own driveway – cop didn’t turn on the lights until I turned in – for crying out loud. By a State Line squatting cop watching for cars from Mo. coming to Kansas. TRust me, there was zero drama. Probably should have fought it, but I didn’t.
Remember how wasted Star publisher mark Zieman’s wife was on that Pitch police video. And she got off!
I was drinking coffee up until 10 p.m. and made the mistake of having a couple of tequila shots with Tony at closing time while he jammed his hand down some older woman’s butt. Technically I was over a bit; but that was it.
I wanna hear the story of “Tony tames a Couger”.
🙂
Yeah, that’s the way more interesting story hearne. More on this please.
The funny part was when he found out how old she was the next day, he was like, “”OMG, she’s older than my mom!”
Who is Paul Walker?
One of Tony’s nom de plumes when he goes cougar hunting and shoves his hands down their pants.
“Absolutely, no question about it,” he says. “I think there is a very real connection the violence we see on the big screen and the little screen and what people act out.”
Uh, no, there actually isn’t. That Haupt guy completely lost me when he blamed the movies/video games. And why only shift the blame there? Maybe Walker and his pal were at the time jamming to a mixtape featuring Ozzy, Judas Priest and Rammstein.
I know what you’re saying, PB but I think the truth lies somewhere in between.
Clearly there have been widely reported instances of people committing crimes and claiming that they were inspired by movies, music or other things.
Equally clear is the fact that the vast majority of people don’t watch or listen or read about something ridiculous and then go out and do it.
I think it’s naive though to assume that people are not influenced by pop culture and events. I can tell you that I was and have known many people – including my kids – who also were and still are.
And if you’ve watched many (or any) of those Fast & Furious flicks and seen the core audience who goes to them, they include a ton of teenagers and young men who watch something very real seeming and very much glorified in the way of driving souped up cars on city streets at stoopid speeds.
And while things are far from black and white, clearly some kids are going to be…shall we say, inspired.
It’s different that just playing a video game too. Why don’t you go see one?
Fair enough, but I still think the connection is tenuous, at best. Way too many other factors come into play in all these instances to just point the finger at the influence of pop culture when it comes to unlawful/dangerous acts.
The fact that Hearne is so ready willing and able to talk sh!t about the dead so shortly after rigor mortis has set in is one of the guilty pleasures that keeps me coming back!
Uh…guess I’m happy for you
Who cares. Tough shit.
I spoke with Hearne on this subject after my comments. One I don’t like throwing crap on a dead man’s grave who seems to be quite a decent person. The fact he did racing, street racing pix, does not make him a bad guy people. He is AN ACTOR IN A MOVIE, just like the actors in the GODFATHER, are they promoting being in the mob? No. Its a movie. Paul did many other films and in my opinion was worthy of bigger roles in mainline pix. Running Scared,which Hearne did tell me about, was one of the best action, crime drama’s of the decade, it was. Paul played a hood, who in the end, which fools you in this one, is an undercover cop. Violent and dealt with Child porn, and some very evil people who Paul destroyed. If you like action pix that are for real, this is the one, like HISTORY OF VIOLENCE. Rent it.
I see Hearne’s kinda point. I feel its a strech, I don’t see tons of kids racing in the streets cause of his movies. Yes Paul was a dare devil, so what. So were Steve and Paul Newman…and many other actors, Errol Flynn too.
Yes there is a link between violence and film/tv…but I find Hip-Hop and Rap way worse.
I just don’t like pissing on this man’s grave when he was one of the better people in the biz of Hollywood. I never met him, don’t know him, wish I did, seems a cool person. I’m sure his family and friends are torn up over this accident and tragedy. Who hasn’t gone too fast in their car now and again…I know they were winding it out with an expensive sports car that failed to perform, still a crying shame to lose a young star like that. Very James Dean like. Hey Paul had more hits. I say let him rest in peace.
Yeah man, from what I heard about him after reading a little he was a standup guy. I agree, stop pooping on the man’s work.
I’m not “pooping” on his overall work…
Just noting that, in particular, his Fast & Furious flicks (where he made his nut), set dramatically poor exampled for their target audiences.
More importantly, that he participated as well – yes, even as a willing passenger along for a ridiculously dangerous joyride with his race driver / teammate / employee – set an even worse example – and an illegal one.
Walker didn’t just happen to be sitting in the passenger seat of a car someone else happened to be driving. They were at a high speed, race car facility, hanging with other racing nuts at a charity function, and at 3:30 pm on a Saturday hopped in a hopped up Porsche race car and said they’d be back in five.
After burning through the gears to loudly that a witness at the event could hear all of the shifts as they drove off, they hit the light pole on a city street designed to be driven at 45 mph max to hard their car literally exploded (watch the video).
As Craig said in his comment, movies and music do influence youth. All I’m really saying is Walker set a better example for his car crazy fans in death than he did in life by providing a real life lesson that speed kills.
Steve McQueen and others appearing in race car movies or driving in police / good guy / bad guy chase scenes were far different that fast and furious. People don’t imitate police chases for the fun of it. And if they imitate auto racing, that puts them in a controlled environment alongside Haupt.
Not on city streets endangering unsuspecting civilians with wildly outrageous, illegal antics.
Fyi, paul walker is a passenger!!!
it’s a sad place we live in
it doesn’t really matter who they were, two people died.
and you people are arguing about how and why.
who gives a fuck what kind of car it was, who gives a fuck how fast it was going.
it’s over, two people were killed, whether any of us knew them or not, they still deserve our respect.
and as far as setting a bad example goes
an example is only as bad as the ones following said example
he also started and ran many charitable organizations, performed god knows how many random acts of kindness, and left behind a daughter.
and all of you are arguing about how fast they were going
people like you killed my faith in humanity
people like him, whether i knew them or not restored it
you should all be ashamed of yourselves
Very well said, E.
You sound like a very nice person and your points are well taken.
That said, there is such a thing as setting a terrible example for impressionable teenagers and young adults. And when you are driving at a rate that some experts believe was many times the leal speed limit and endangering the general public on city streets, that’s just wrong.