cop question...

[Hammerhead]

A buddy'o'mine in NC a few years ago passed a trooper at a high rate of speed on his motorcycle and then bolted rather than pull over. He tho't he'd gotten clean away. Nope. At about 4am he was arrested at home for his hooliganism. Dash cams are very effective.

[randlemanboater]

tsubaki,

I am sorry that you had a bad experience with the cops.

I would guess that these things happened in a small town.

Unfortunately there are some cops who stretch their authority, often because of bordom.

Feel confident that the vast majority of the cops in this country stick to the constitution while enforcing the laws of our states and nation.

[randlemanboater]

Originally Posted by parishht

Ok, isn't an unmarked police car entrapment?

Its more like "trapment".

I wear their tails out with my unmarked Tahoe. And when I stop a violator, there is no doubt in my mind or theirs that they were doing wrong. (I wrote 4 for speeding over 90 mph in a 65 yesterday).

Now if I got in the car with you and egged you on until you started speeding, and then I wrote you a ticket, that would be entrapment.

[randlemanboater]

Originally Posted by tsubaki

And let's get into the subject of "weaveing". This is the act of moving left and right with your car inside of the yellow and white lines. In Georgia there is no such probable cause for pulling people over without crossing over either of these lines in the road. Yet it has been the common practice to stop people for said weaveing. At a party I had the opportunity to hear a retired policeman tell of a rookie he chastised for pulling a driver for it. The reason for the correction was, if it went to court it could possibly thrown out because there is no law against "weaveing" inside the lines.

You are correct that weaving within your lane is not illegal, but weaving in your lane is one of the things that an impaired driver will do.

I would not stop you for weaving in your lane, but if you were weaving, and swung wide on a turn, and were traveling below the speed limit, and took several seconds longer than normal to leave a stop light, then based on my TRAINING and 19 years of EXPERIENCE, I would stop you because it is REASONABLE for me to believe that you could be impaired.


I do not have PROBABLE CAUSE to arrest at that point, but REASONABLE SUSPICION to stop.

I am not out there to "MESS" with people, I am out there to try to prevent the daily tragedies that occur on our roads every day.

In the last month in my city I have been called out to 4 crashes involving death, 3 were the result of combining alcohol and high speed. One was inattention, possible cellphone use.

[parishht]

"cellphone use"

It is a tradgedy that someone died,
but I can't resist,
Everyone should byuy the $1 handsfree cellphone kit:

[reelapeelin]

I ain't sayin' NOTHIN' ::) ...

[tsubaki]

Randle, you have covered everything perfectly as best as I could describe it. My "bad experiences" are (almost)nothing of the sort. Every reason that I have been stopped (except one) was justifiable, even if it wasen't legal. *Like I implied earlier if the police were allowed to do as they did in the 1950's (in my mind) there would be far less overall problems. The use of a cell phone driving really gets up my butt, except right now it's only illegal on federal property. I don't want more laws, ideally we need more authority given back to the police.
Driving while useing a phone should fall under a vague description like wreckless driving or something.
Oh the only definate unjustified reason I was ever ticketed was "speeding in a school zone". It was 30 minutes after the posted time , no children were present, no lights flashing, I was 5 mph under the posted speed limit and the response from the nice officer was "well they are going to change it in the next few weeks". I went to court four times (the officer never showed) the judge finally threw it out.

[tsubaki]

Oh man I thought I was thru.
During my teenage years my father warned me about going to a neighboring city because the police were so tight.
Well I went there and took a date from there to the drive-in. Well while exiting the drive-in a nice couple of resident police pulled us over. Now I have my shirt half on, the girls blouse is still open and after being questioned as to if I had been drinking, smokeing dope or anything else they look in the car and both snicker. I'm a nervous wreck by now and the nice (sincerely) officer asks while handing my license to me "why are you so nervous ?" My only responce was "man ya'll scare me". They smiled some more and let us procede on our way.
No honestly I don't call these bad experiances.
Oh and the only dead giveaway on the unmarked vehicles is the tires and rims.

[tsubaki]

There is absolutely no way possible that I could even imagine being a police officer. Seriously and sincerely these guys keeping us safe get so little and give so much. Hell now I'm lost for words.

[randlemanboater]

Well it sure beats WORKING for a living. ;D