Do cops assume you have an attorney on speed dial when you drive an MBZ/Jag/BMW

Absolutely; I (and every other honest cop) will be the first one to condemn them. They make my job more difficult.

3 hours and 15 minutes to go for the "saved". If people start disappearing at 1800 hours, I'm bypassing alcohol and going straight to crack and heroin.

 

They are wonderful but keep terrible time! Both of mine and my wife's loses about 5 minutes every 2-3 weeks.

 

Do you think maybe they need a tune up from a certified Rolex watch repair tech? I have been wearing my for about a year now, and it keeps good time. Maybe it's because I don't take it off at night. I now motion keep them running smoothly.

Abner

 

I have an automatic watch winder so it goes in there when I am not wearing it. They are all pretty new and I spoke to the sales person and he said, "Yeah, that is pretty common for a Rolex...but they look GOOD!"

 

That's ridiculous. When you were a child and did something wrong was your punishment less severe if you copped to what you did as opposed to arguing or worse, flat out denied what you did? Bruce's policy seems consistent with how a parent disciplines a child. Good for him.

 

I think what Steve is saying is that although cops are human beings with emotions, predispositions, attitudes and even prejudices as unique as any officer, the fact that they are acting in an official capacity, in an enforcement function on behalf of the government, their conduct is to be of a higher standard than to act upon individual "feelings" but instead represent a uniform, systematic, procedural approach towards enforcement of the law guided by procedure using good judgment.

I understand where Bruce is coming from, without their infractions of the law, he has no power to really do anything to them. However should Bruce use his discretion to see wrongs where there is gray area then that could be viewed as unethical by some. In fact the very searching for infractions to stack tickets could be considered harassment by some and in some cases that person would be right.

I did not work patrol, never have and never will but I did have situations where people pissed me off and setting aside my emotions was difficult. The fact is that it can never be done 100% because cops are human and often act human. Writing a ticket because someone got under your skin is wrong. Writing a ticket because they broke the law is right. The argument that they would not have a ticket if they did not break the law is correct however the notion of all are equal under justice is right out the window with what Bruce posted earlier and though I like the idealistic viewpoint that "justice is blind" the fact of the matter is it is not.

Cops have their own subculture that is often not understood by people who have never been part of it. Someone who stacks charges on a traffic offense routinely is often looked down upon. Case in point was a guy in a local department where I lived who became infamous as "Chicken Charlie" because he wrote so many "chicken sh*t" tickets that after a while even judges were cracking on a ticket being "covered in feathers" when discussing it in private. The guy had a reputation, had worked traffic for 2 decades and viewed his doing a good job as writing every infraction he saw, uniformly and without using discretion, he may as well have been a meter maid. So the idea that Bruce should treat everyone uniformly, without prejudice and yet enforce the law to the fullest extent is not reasonable in my opinion. That said I don't agree with stacking on someone just because they piss you off either but I understand the feelings involved and cannot condemn someone for doing so.

If you remove discretion from the officers in my opinion you remove an element of due process. This is why I am not a fan of red light cameras (that and I do not believe that private companies should profit from civil and criminal offenses).

The truth of the matter is that a ticket is nothing more than a court summons, it is an accusation...that's all. The problem is that many judges treat a citation as a revenue builder and almost every defendant is guilty until proven otherwise (this is the problem I have with the whole system at least in Texas). If every offender would simply plead "not guilty" and lawyer up (for a nominal fee) you'd likely see more careful review of tickets as they are processed through the courthouse and the revenue stream would suddenly become much leaner. A cop can write whatever the heck they like, people need to get over the feeling that cops are then judge and jury as well (though the sentiment is understandable).

 

Then I suppose just about every police officer in the country is shameful, because that's standard practice everywhere I know.

As I said, it's about educating the motorist. If someone admits they screwed up, there's no need for further punitive action on my part, so they get a warning. If they want to debate the infraction (and if *I* stop you, there's no doubt whatsoever) and especially start tossing insults, then they obviously don't "get it", so they get a civil infraction to remind them they were in the wrong.

A couple of years ago I went to a citation appeal, and the motorist admitted she argued with me, and the magistrate basically told her she wasn't too bright for arguing with the police, and upheld the fine.

 

Bruce...I have to point out one flaw in your argument, you do not take "punitive" action whatsoever. The courts and corrections systems are punitive arms of the government. If the police begin to view their jobs as taking punitive action then they will be usurping the authority of the judicial system and violating the Constitution in doing so. Instead a citation is an accusation and nothing more. The defendant has the Constitutional right to disagree with your accusation in a court of law (though it doesn't make sense to argue it on the side of the road). If you are handing out tickets with the intention of "punishing" someone then your attitude regarding your role in the justice system is flawed, but I do not believe this to be the case.

Perhaps you simply worded that statement incorrectly. Besides, like I said before, if they are not in violation of the law then you have no power over them legally speaking unless you are abusing your position (which is a whole different can of worms). There are cops of course who make things up or stretch the limits of discretion to "punish" people such as those officers in Fort Worth Texas at the Rainbow Lounge (google it) but those types of officers draw highly negative attention, destroy public confidence in the police, bring about results that limit the discretion of other officers and make life for officers in general very uncomfortable. Those kinds of cops usually (not always but usually) end up paying the price in the end.

 

I don't think it matters what car you drive to the police but I do think they expect a smart a$$ when they pull over certain types of cars.

I got pulled over a few weeks ago (I have never had a ticket!) and I was clocked at doing 73 in a 65.....I totally admitted that I was speeding to merge into traffic. I had just turned off of my highway to merge into traffic that was going 65.... So I hit the gas a little harder....lol. I hate when people merge into traffic going 65-70mph and they merge at 45....seriously? Anyway he didn't give me a ticket but instead told me make sure next time I go a bit slower merging and that was that.

As for Bruce's comments.... I don't see anything wrong with how Bruce handles things. To say that all cops will treat everyone exactly equal 100% of the time is ridiculous. That is just not how our legal system works. It might say it should be that way but in reality it is not.

 

Are people without law degrees, legal experience or law enforcement experience really condemning a cop for using his judgment on traffic stops?

The law is the law and there's a wide range of latitude allotted those who are deemed worthy enough over time to enforce it. In the case of judges it's working within sentencing guidelines. In the case of police its the context of the infraction and situation. In the case of lawyers it's the decision as to whether or not to take a client.

Without this latitude, people get hurt by the law. That isn't the point. Simple enough.

 

When ticket finance comes into the court it is broken down. I.E. $100 ticket for what ever $75 goes directly to DMV, $15 to road construction and other areas such as that and $10 might go to the actual court. This is what I have been told from attorneys and state attorneys who I work with. So why is this wrong?
Are some people incorrectly pulled over? Sure it can happen.

 

People who used to spout off to me when I pulled them over, but I don't their choice in automobile had anything to do with it. Most of them just thought they were slick and they could talk their ways out of a ticket by feeding me a line of B.S.

Prior to entering law enforcement I was military, so being honest and admitting when you screw up was something I valued and respected. But that was just me and I cannot speak for every LEO out there.

 

Why is this so wrong? Well even assuming your math is correct and all factors have been considered, the entity that is responsible for determining guilt should not profit by a guilty verdict either financially or otherwise, it’s a conflict of interest. Imagine for example banking regulators who can manipulate factors determining a banks fiscal stability or profitability who also have direct investments in that bank, this would be a conflict of interest, no difference here.

That said I think your math also could use some additional thought. The city of Arlington, Texas recently boasted that they raised over a million dollars in “extra” revenue through citations and the city council was happy. What they did not factor in is in order to raise that “extra” revenue (read: profit by municipal government standards) they had to put paid, trained and equipped police officers on the streets for 12 months with the sole purpose of traffic. In Arlington you are generally going to have pretty close if not over 2 years experience on average by the time you are unleashed upon the public, this means that the officers who are not bilingual or who do not have advanced educations will still have a base salary of $57,313 per year. The city will also have to pay into that officer’s health care benefits, retirement, social security, medicare, medicade, dental, vision, uniform allotment, training, etc. It’s safe to say that per officer the city could easily reach $100,000 in expenses annually by the time that officer is compensated, trained and equipped (to include a car but excluding gasoline). Now that $100,000 investment will sit on the side of the road for maybe 6 hours with a car running burning gasoline at near $4 a gallon (though the cities usually get better rates). I say “6 hours” because usually there is a briefing before shift, paperwork between citations, a lunch hour and of course any breaks taken.

Arlington is a huge city, it’s probably safe to say that at any given time they have at least 10 dedicated traffic enforcement officers though it’s more likely they have more than double that number. These officers cost money, their cars cost money, the tickets they write cost money to process through the courts, (court clerks, judges, attorneys, etc.). Yet these costs are often dismissed as “fixed” or inevitable costs because you would have these officers anyway, but this is not true. I know at least in Fort Worth, TX officers were hired strictly for traffic enforcement because of political contributions to politician by the lobbyist group MADD, heck they even donated a DUI trailer but the tax payers are on the hook for these expenses. The fact is the police are viewed as a fiscal drain, a budget loss and many city council folks would like to see some revenue generated to recoup some of these losses and demand ticket revenues as at least in TX I believe the county and city are in on the “cut”. The courts get a piece, the state gets a piece and everyone is happy except that the cost to generate the “extra” revenue is never examined in totality. Instead you get “more cops on the street” promises, lobby groups satisfied and money exchanging hands but in the name of generating revenue, not justice and this is wrong. Crime should not pay, for the bad guys or for the good guys. Creating criminal offenses to generate revenue costs more in the long run than just sticking with the police department’s core competencies (which shouldn’t include freeway tax collections). This money would be better spent expanding investigations units, intelligence units, gang enforcement units and even general patrol (as opposed to traffic enforcement).

 

I never said I was infallible, what I said was that traffic enforcement isn't my "thang", so if *I* pull you over, then the infraction was so blatant, there is no room for argument. If my light is green when you come bombing through the intersection the other way, what is the basis for argument? If I stop someone going 20mph over the posted speed limit, is my calibrated speedometer really that far off?

I consider it a success if I can make it through an entire shift without stopping a car, but if I do stop someone, it's for a damn good reason, and the last thing I want is an argument about it.

I'm sorry you don't believe me, and I'm also sorry that you seem to have a negative opinion of the police. However, I speak the truth; I can't speak for other states, but in Massachusetts, ticket quotas are illegal, and the decision to cite or warn lies solely with the officer making the traffic stop, and no one else. This was upheld by a state Appeals Court decision, Newton Police Association vs. Police Chief of Newton;

http://caselaw.findlaw.com/ma-court-of-appeals/1469368.html

And, like it or not, during a traffic stop, the police officer IS the boss. Argue with them at your own peril.....the place for argument is the appeal hearing in front of the magistrate, not on the side of the road.

I think it's semantics, but when I hand someone a triple-digit citation, and their only recourse is to take a day off work & pay the $25 appeal fee to fight it, that's punitive to me.

 

Cops have a sucky job so try to keep that in mind. I feel bad for them. I also admire them but I couldn't do what they do.
I drive a new Corvette and I don't think I get any different treatment. I have had tickets in many cars at many stages of my life and my age/car/income had nothing to do with the doling out of tickets.

 

The last time I got a speeding ticket was a little over 16 years ago.

I was 20 and learned to slow down.

 

Ditto.

Abner

 

It shouldn't be however and that is a flaw in your state's system. Texas has court costs but they are waived if found not guilty of an offense or if the offense is dismissed. As for the "...punitive to me" thing, in my opinion that is a dangerous line of thinking. I'm not saying you are the kind of guy who would for example, work over a domestic violence suspect who kicked the crap out of their young child but the cops who do that sort of thing view "punishing" crime and "fighting" crime as one and the same and are doing no evil in their own eyes. There are a lot of cops who use force when they do not need to or use their discretion to exert more force than required for a given situation and I would bet that to a man, none of them view themselves as being "corrupt". One difference between you and them however is that they often act outside of departmental policy/procedure and the law whether they are caught or not, you on the otherhand are using the pointed end of a broken system within the confines of your procedures and state. It might be legal but it's not entirely ethical if your motivation for issuing a citation is to punish the offender for pissing you off.

As for the "cops have it tough" or "cops have a sucky job" this is true. No profession is less appreciated for what they do than cops. That said last time I checked nobody was drafted into being a cop and despite how some cops may feel, there is life outside of the force.