Just some of the stupid things I see

No one gets your point!



The last warning I got was last year from a Texas Trooper, a real young guy to say the least. I was running 74 at night and the limit was 65 and the hell of it is I had been doing under 60 most of the night up to that point. As I blew by him setting on the shoulder he hit the lights and I seen what I was doing and hit the shoulder. When I seen this was a young cat I thought I'm a mucked duck. He asked, I guess you know why I stopped ya?, yeah you wanted to see how I was driving this thing with my head so far up my arse, right? He kinda laughed and asked why I was in a hurry, told him I really wasnt just wasn't thinkin and as I started up the hill I just mashed on it like I was loaded and I'm not. He checks my logs then tells me to come with him, hes checkin my license and ask if there is anything on it. I said other then your thumb no, your right its clean he said. Writes me a warning, tells me to keep it under 69mph shakes my hand and off I went.

But the best one was in South Dakota. Late at night and not a soul out. I'm buzzing along at around 90mph and a car way off to my right is coming up the road headed for the freeway. I think nothin of it and way back I see it getting on and in no time hes behind me but not to close like a bear would do. He says over the CB hey driver whats your hurry, but his voice is a little less than manly if you will. I dont reply thinking gezz way out here and its just him and I, GREAT. Again he asked, driver I know you can here me, whats your hurry? I said I'm just cruising. He said why dont you slow down, and at this point I got a little faster and told him I really dont see a need to slow down buddy. He flips the lights on and said do you see a reason now? I'm thinkin CHEET. Yeah I do now. I back down to 65 and he said thats fast enough right there(this was still in the 55 days) then he does a U turn and goes the other way while I'm pullin cotton out my b hole.
When your cough your cough, anit no need to be a dick to the man or woman to cough ya, cause it can only go down hill further.

 

Just proves...crime does not pay....if you would have written the tickets, gotten the revenue to the county....the judge might have been more lenient in his sentencing on you.....marriage and especially in-laws can get really expensive!

 

Sure it does... just has to be the right crime. Ask the partners of Goldman Sachs.

 

Just imagine how different that second meeting of your future in-laws would have been if you had wrote them tickets instead of warnings!!!

Poor Diselbear got a LIFE SENTENCE!!!

 

My hats off to the bears guys....I've had way more breaks then I deserved and most of them came from my attitude.....

The one that stands out was in Corsicanna, Texas....went head to head with LEO across the interstate and on a curve....he flips and runs me down....no problem, it's a trooper and a rookie....seaty belt violation Trooper John says....from across the interstate I ask? He says yep and I fess up. The guy sees me not wearing a belt in a 379 Pete across the interstate?.... that's too good for me and it's true.

Trooper John gave me a warning much to the loud objection of the rookie. Thanks John for the warning and keeping the rookie on a short chain.....

 

So much of it out there is a judgement call. People tend to think that the law is "black and white." But it really isn't. That is why you see so many cases overturned on appeal.

There is the letter of the law.

and

There is the spirit of the law.

They may be the same, but often they are not. So much is left to interpretation. And it is a fluid thing, it is always changing.

Good case in point, is the law relating to search and seizure. Particularly involving vehicle searches. These laws of course are based on "statute," but evolve with the changing of case law by the various courts. What constitutes a legal search today, may be ruled an illegal search tomorrow.

As far as traffic violations are concerned, it is more of a black and white type situation. But there is a tremendous amount of officer discretion available there.

And there are as many different personalities in LE as there are LEOs. What may make one LEO do a traffic stop and issue a citation, may not even catch the attention of another LEO.

There are a lot of other things that can influence the situation as well. Time, location, weather, traffic conditions etc. Also just because a copper is in a marked car, does NOT necessarily mean that traffic is his priority. Yeah, even though he CAN make the stop and write the ticket, if he is actively working on something else, it's gonna take a lot bigger screw up to catch his attention than it is if he is concentrating on traffic.

 

If I re-word it a bit, can I qoute you and put a sign up in the scale house here?

"When you are caught, you're caught. No need to be a #*@! about it to the man or woman who caught you, because it can only go downhill from there."

 

Which is one of the problems I have with our court system. Much like gossip, where the more times a story is told from one person to the next the more it changes, and the less recognizable it is when compared to the original event being described...court decisions have the same effect. For example, the court makes "decision A" ruling that a law is Constitutional. Another court bases "decision B" on the precident set by "decision A". Then another court uses the precident set in "decision B" to make up their minds how to rule on "decision C"....and so on and so on until there have been so many nuanced little changes and "interpretations" that the Constitution is no longer the basis for their decision and the law being upheld if compared to the Constitution would be struck down....but oh the "precident" set by previous cases allows this bad law to stand. Legislators and regulators have been using this to inch their way into more and more power and control over what is supposed to be a society of free people for so long, and the courts allow it because they have set "precident" to follow rather than the Constitution. Take the health care law for example...seems every other month another ruling comes down from another federal court...some rule based upon precident which uphold the law...others rule based upon the Constitution and overturn the law....but they ALL can find legal justification for ruling in the manner which they do.

So I guess the short-version of an otherwise long-winded rant would be to say that it isn't so much that the law itself is changing as it is the continual nuanced interpretation of that law allowing more and more encroachment into our individual liberties by those in government.

 

My $.02 on the law being black and white.

The law is Black and White. There is a fine line drawn by statute or regulation which, if you are on the wrong side of it, you are in violation.

You are either overweight, or not. You are either overlength, or not. Your CDL is either valid, or it is not. A brake is either in adjustment, or out of adjustment. Etc....

A Grey area is just a fog where some are either unable or unwilling to find the fine line below it. But that fine line is there, none the less.

As you and Bulldog pointed out, the courts and legislators get in there and change things. They do not create the foggy grey area, they move the line! That makes it hard for both you and I to keep track of it.

The kind of LEO that neither you nor I like to see is the mirrored sunglasses "Buford Justice" type, making up his own laws on the side of the highway.

 

I agree with you on this point. So, what can we do about it? A very serious question here.

OK, and do you always enforce it to the exact letter? If so, HOW do you enforce it. Do you always give a warning? Do you always cite? Do you always make a physical arrest? Or do you use one or a combination of all of the above, depending on circumstances?

I realize that you and I have a totally different background. We may both be (or in my case have been) LEOs. But our jobs are/were quite different. Traffic enforcement, for me, was strictly a peripheral duty for most of my career.