Road side inspections/DOT inspections

My wife and I were running team coast to coast with this company and one morn. I woke up while my wife was running up I-17 in Az. The intention was to hit I-40 in Flagstaff and head east from there. When I got up my wife told me she had forgotten to send in the paperwork from the previous week at the last pilot and we would have to remember to do it sometime that day.

Our load was light so we were passing most of the other trucks on the steep grades. As most know the state speed limit in Az. is 75mph. Our truck was governed at 72mph. At some point the speed limit went down to 65mph. Didn't see the sighn. We were going 70mph. As we topped one of the hills their was a State DOT officer waiting. As we went by, right befor we passed him, his pick-up pulled forward a couple of feet like he was preparing to pull out. I asked my wife to watch her speed because I didnt know what this guy had on his mind. We went down the hill at 70mph because as I said we never saw a sign lowering the speed to 65mph. Ok so we were at least a mile past him befor I finaly seen the red and blue lights. Im not sure if he is after us or not but we are prepared to pull over if he pulls in behind us. Sure enough. He comes up the pass side and opens the door. He gets up on the running board and announces that he got us doing 70 in a 65 and that he paced us at 80mph coming down the hill. Now he wants to see all of our paperwork for the last eight days including all tolls and reciepts from purchases we have made. Then he asked for our log book.

I had been driving for eight years at the time and never had I ever had reciepts and tolls requested with my log book. Also from the very beginning I knew this guy was out for blood because of the "I paced you at 80mph" comment.

I asked this guy why he would look so hard at us because we are a husband wife team. We live on the road week after week and both have 70hrs to work with for a total of 140hrs we can work in a week. Not only is my wife on top of the log books all the time, we dont want any extra hrs. we have no reason to shave hrs. He said he finds teams all the time that falsify their log book.

Three min. later his eye's lit up like he just found a five dollar bill in the parking lot. "Here!" he says. He points to a log sheet five days prior. We were in Baltimore MD. We had made a delivery that morn. then cruised over to the TA truck stop to get a shower and wait for our next load. The Cust. was no more that five miles from the TA. the problem was that we both showed off duty while moving to the truck stop. How did he know? We went through a tunnel and he had a reciept for the toll we had givin him. I know it took less that 15min to get the the truck stop and tried to use the inner city all stops at once rule but he wasnt letting go of that 5dollar bill for nothin. He said I should have at least flagged it.

We spent the next 45min waiting in the truck on the side of the road while he was in his truck looking for more violations. When he was satisfied he came back up to the pass side of the truck and announced he was shutting us down for ten hrs. because we falsified our log. After escourting us to the next exit and parking us next to a hotel and across the street from a convience store he wrote us both a ticket for falsifing our log and he wrote my wife a ticket for five over. All total almost a thousand dollars in fines. Plus a ten hr. shut down. Then he said he is going to cut us a break on the 80mph ticket.

This all took place around Oct. four years ago. We would have hired a lawyer and took it to court but it would have required us staying on the road through christmas and we didnt want him to mess up our christmas as well.

I asked him if he truly believed that shutting us down was a safty issue and he proudly stated "Yes I Do!"

We made a mistake on our log and so a DOT officer is perfectly in his right to ticket us for doing so, but being that the violation was five day's prior and that we were current on our log to the time of the traffic stop will you agree with the officer and shut us down for ten hrs. as well?

 

The only thing I purchase is fuel.

 

Thank You for your detailed explaination of why we recieved our ticket. My main complaint was not that we were 5min away. We should have logged it and I know we should of logged it. I was just trying to get out of it. We were caught and I knew it. What really T'd me off and still does today when I think about it is that he Shut Us Down as well, 5 days later. When I asked him. He thought is was apropriate for safty reasons. Its all over now but it is just a good example of what an officer can do and get away with. Thanks for your time and response.

 

Look at the CVSA out of service criteria. Preparing a false log book is a 10 hr out of service violation. I can get you the exact wordingin the out of service criteria and post it if you like.

 

It sounds to me like the trip to the truck stop was for personal use. Last I checked, you were legally able to use the truck for personal use on the off-duty line. And if it really only took 5 minutes to get there, who's to say they weren't outside the other 10 minutes where they should legally log off duty for the time?

To me it sounds like the bear was just trying to make the catch of the day and get his name in the paper, hoping to get some sort of promotion. We all know there are the drivers who run 2, 3, or more logbooks, and this simple mistake by the team wasn't somehow a safety issue.

I don't keep receipts most of the time. My tolls are almost ALL paid by the PrePass+. Some places I fuel require me to go in and sign the receipt. They usually ask me if I want my copies stapled, to which I reply "I don't even want them."

I had one of the DOT paperwork checks when I came in from Canada at Derby Line, VT. The officer wasn't a prick about it at all, but it took a while because that was when I was with a trainer. He found 2 things. He said we had logged a stop for a different 15-minute period, but he knew it was just a simple mistake and said he wouldn't write it up. Then he said he was giving me a violation for a missing page. I showed him that I had the page in the back and explained why it was back there. He went back to his vehicle and removed the violation, then was nice enough to warn us of a hill we would be passing that is usually bad in the winter.

 

FMCSA states an unladen vehicle may be driven a reasonable distance for food or lodging while off duty . No allowance for a loaded vehicle .

 

Yes I know but it is not mandatory. Maybe if it was the day befor or somthing. He didnt have to throw the frigging book at me. Thats ok what goes around comes around. Some day if it hasnt already happend someones going to throw the book at him. He just better hope it aint God!

 

Quit your b*tching. Your log book can not be falsified yesterday, today, 7 days ago. If it is you sit for 10 hrs and get your coupon. You need to get a block of cheese with all that whine. Go read the regulation book and you might realize this. Everyone has explained this to you I don't see what your major malfunction is. I understand you feel victimized, but your weren't. The officer, from what you stated, did his job. Unforntunately you haven't done yours.