I wish that the cops would police the other laws that are consistently broken on the highway. It just doesn't ever happen, people only ever get pulled over for speeding.

The other thing that makes me mad is that each of the 4 times I was pulled over, I was driving my 924S. I really don't drive my Xterra any slower or faster than the P-car, and yet (even though the X is bright yellow) I can seem to slip right by speed traps, but going 7 over in the red porsche draws the iron fist of justice.

Make more sense then why you would have this attitude.

When your average Joe makes less than 1/5 of what you made, do you have trouble seeing why they REALLY get pissed off when they have to lay out more than 1days wages just because they were moving with the flow of traffic and the "LAW" says they can't? Sounds to me like you are using the rational of the ultra-rich. "I can afford not to have to be like the rest of you."

K9 still doesn't get it.....he will never get it.

as I said in my previous post, it's all about the money.

maybe K9 should have read it too, as he might be enlightened as to what really goes on in the real world, not just cop land.

call it tax revenue, call it accident prevention, call it safety enforcement, call it whatever....

cops are always talking about how speed kills, yet they themselves are the absolute worst drivers when it comes to obeying the traffic laws.

this leads me to this question for our fabulous law enforcement official pelican friend:

when was the last time you actually obeyed ever single traffic law while you were driving that wreck of a police cruiser you operate in?

when was the last time: you drove the speed limit, you drove in the right hand lane--not the left lane, you used a turn signal, you didn't use your emergency lights to go thru an intersection while you had the red light (just so you didn't have to wait your turn),you did a pre-work inspection on your junky police cruiser, -------

I could go on and on about the lousy hypocrisy of officers not doing what the preach (or ticket), but it would take up the rest of this forum for the next millenium. I can assure you it makes no difference of locality or rank when speaking bout how these folks operate.


cops are nothing but underpaid control freaks, collecting revenue for government agencies that can't control themselves or their budgets.

the only reason they have a job is because they aren't smart enough to do anything else. just like politicians.

my experience:

27 years and over 3.5 million miles of safe driving
48 states and Canada in all kinds of weather

maybe K9 should lead by example, not argue with someone who has considerably more experience than he......



enough said.


regards---rhjameshttp://www.pelicanparts.com/support/smileys/pc2.gif

rhjames - nice personal attack!

I wanna know how a cop makes $500+K a year?

And how do I get that job?

Selling drugs, just like the rest of us. :p

Once again, you folks are going after the wrong people. The cops are not the problem; neither are they the solution. They enforce the law as directed to by whomever it is (city, county, state) that employs them. If we re-vamp traffic law, enforcement will change. It's as simple as that.

+1 My gripe is not with the face behind the ticket. I am not trying to attack K9torro in any way. I am, however, trying to show him the view from the other side of the badge.

K9torro, congratulations on the income. I am not jealous or anything like that. I do want you to see what that $200-$300 ticket looks like to some when it can make the difference between being able to pay all the monthly bills and have a few dollars and having to lean on the credit card or overdraft protection.

One other question I don't quite understand. Why, if everything is equal and not left to the officers judgment, are there official warning forms?

I love my Valentine 1 radar detector!

And I love my Escort 8500 and Solo S2! They pay for themselves all the time AND they're illegal in VA. I am such a criminal.

First let me say that I really appreciate the good comments that people have made , as to the personal related stuff that some of you have chosen to slam me with, can't say the same.

I will try and give some of my thoughts to a couple of items in no particular order,

Rick & Azasadny - Radar detectors are a great thing , they don't bother me a bit, if you like them more power to you , sometimes they work and sometimes they don't, I use " instant on radar " or " lidar " most of the time, in these cases the detectors no matter what the brand have a hard time.

Jeff - we have written warning forms to track the number of contacts we make in addition to the written citations, I personally (you can believe it or not,) write a ratio of 3 to 1, that is 3 warnings to one citation, I average about 15 citations a day and about 2.5 to 3 times as many warnings, some days it varies due to accident investigations and what not, I do work a 12 hour day fourteen days a month.

Jeff - I do try and take the situation in as best I can , for instance if I stop a mom with several kid's in the car and the car is a POS and the kid's look hungry they get warnings, when I stop a 30K to 100K auto and the guy gets out wearing a Rolex President on his wrist I figure that paying a citation will not faze him much , and believe it or not most of them will tell me " hurry up with the ticket, I got someplace to be ".

StomachMonkey - send me a PM and I will be glad to help you out in the money making department, but only if you are serious and not out to bust my chops some more, if that is the case I really don't have the time for it.

SuperJ - thanks for the words

RhJames - to tell the truth I dont know where to begin to address your particular post and be civil about it which if you read every post I have ever made you will see curtesy and civility in each and every one.

I will say a couple of things : Firstly about my car , it is a 2007 with just over 4000 miles on it , I have had it about 6 weeks and it had 23 miles on it when I picked it up, it is hardly what you call a " wreck ", prior to that my last car was two years old and had just turned 40K miles again not what you call a wreck, our cars are maintained to a higher standard than the manufacturer suggests by agency employees who are ASE and Manufacturer certified mech's. As to inspections of my vehicle it is done at the beginning of every patrol day believe it or not...

Unless I am proceeding to a call or attempting to make a stop I do my best to obey each and every traffic law out there however I am human and tend to make a mistake here and there, that is what is expected of me and my marked car with its number displayed on the rear, both sides, roof and front bumper which will get me a complaint in a heart beat, which in my job unlike yours will get me day's off without pay and or fired, as to my driving habits in my POV as I said earlier yes I speed on occasion and yes I have gotten ticketed and paid them, the last was in NC by an unmarked Trooper lol ,

As to preaching at the public , I don't, if you read back through this posting you will not find where I have ever told anyone they had to obey the speed limit or any other law for that matter, that is the choice people have in this country they can make it for themselves.

As to being an underpaid control freak , I find my pay is pretty decent when you add in the benefits that are provided, as to being a control freak hmmm don't think so but if you want to you could ask my wife, I generally do what she tells me (only when I have to lol)

As to my not "being smart enough to do anything else " well thats a tough one after all I do live in Georgia (see the red neck, backwoods, no branch on the family tree etc.. comment from my earlier posting above) I did manage to get through high school, college and about 3000 hours of on the job training classes, plus I can tie my shoes all by myself, But you may have something about the job the only ones I have had since the age of 17 is the U.S. Military and Law Enforcement.

As to experience I don't know how many miles I have driven but I will say this, I put in 24 years in the military, 10 years active and 14 reserve with mobilizations for all middle East conflicts, I am a combat decorated veteran with active service in Beruit, Grenada, Panama, Iran, Afghanistan, and lastly Iraq. As to Law Enforcement I have just over 15 years of that, and some of the not so nice people on the roads here have managed to do me more physical damage (stabbed once, shot twice) than the ones that I visited in the military.

As to leading by example, I try and set the example for my younger officers to follow, I do not try and lead anyone else anywhere, I believe that people should make their own life choice's.

Tobster - I am sorry if that was the way it sounded when I said if you can't afford a ticket you cant afford to speed, I am very fortunate with my situation right now, it has not been that way my whole life, I do not consider myself "ultra rich " and have worked for everything I have, I was not left anything and I have not hit the lottery.

Todd SmileWavy

PS... to all who are reading this, out of all the comments made on this topic in the past years I have restrained from making any comments, and having seen the way this has went it appears that would have been the best choice in this situation as it was only a matter of time before personal attacks began, having said that this will be my last post on this topic, which is why it has been so lengthy. lol

Todd - great write up!! I don’t think you need to justify anything to these guys. My brother is a policeman and so is a friend of mine. My respect for the Police was truly gained when I did a ride along a few years ago. It was definitely an eye opening experience of what you guys have to deal with and you have my profound respect.

Just dont give me any damn tickets!! :)

Did anyone mention Traffic Camera's? If so I missed it. But they're really getting bad and they are strictly about money. Visited a friend in Phoenix couple of months ago. Driving around Chandler, Tempe, Mesa, seemed like there was a camera at every intersection, always with the sign, the camera's are for your safety, yeah right. Opened some little rag newspaper around Chandler, COP reports we only made $550,000+ on traffic camera's last month, right, it's about safety. They also fired up traffic cameras on the freeway too, think it was 101 loop? Brought in $6,000 the 1st day.

Also heard Sheriff Joe likes to park vans on different streets with cameras too.

It's Big brother out there already and it just seems chickens**t. But trying to convince me it's all about safety just isn't going to fly. We all know it's about the money. They must think we're all just so stupid to think we're going to accept the safety argument as gospel.

I don't deliberately speed, but if you're doing less than 75-80 in the slow lane here in SD, you're getting run over. Don't know about AR driving laws, but do know that in CA, 85 is the max speed limit based on conditions and keeping up with traffic is a valid defense. But you'd getter get a lawyer to try that one.

Thanks God for Mr. Ticket, $99 fee for traffic tickets, and he wins too.

Later, Don

Generally speaking society lacks the capacity to police themselves and that's why extreme measures are being taken in the name of public safety. Does it generate income? Probably, but not enough to cover all of the cost of administration. I don't like it one bit but if it saves lives then I think the costs justify the means.
Highly traveled intersections and school zones are areas that justify the use of exteme measures. I'm hearing that some prefer manual enforcement but this doesn't resolve the problem because it doesn't catch every violation. The use of cameras is equitable because it catches every violater and I'm okay with that.
IMHO, society isn't safe when patrol officers are making value judgements in determining who does and who doesn't get ticketed.

WRONG! If cops parked a squad car at intersections, no one would even think of running a red light. Those who know about the cameras there may think twice about it. But plenty of people who don't know about the cameras get snagged because the county also shortens the amount of time between yellow and red. This has been documented a lot in VA and DC, which is what prompted VA to do away with the cameras. It's got nothing to do with safety whatsoever. In fact, I think there some intersections with cameras in VA where accidents increased because people saw the cameras too late and panic stopped, which is pretty dangerous is the road is at all wet.

Taking the "human element" out of the system is stupid at best - tyranny at worst.

This can be either (1) technology, things like red light cameras (most of which are owned/operated by independent third-party FOR PROFIT corporations and then leased to the communities, yes it's true - look it up) or (2) "robo-fying" the uniformed police officers or tying their hands procedurally to the point where they're unable to apply common sense judgment to a situation (e.g. a person going 1 mph over the speed limit on a deserted country road in good weather doesn't pose a threat to anyone and can probably be disregarded without it being a "breach of duty" whereas a nutcase whipping in and out of traffic at 30 mph over the limit in rush hour traffic probably does and should almost certainly be cited).

Either is bad.

There used to be a day in this country not too long ago when people liked and trusted their local P.D. and public servants to use common sense and good judgment in their noble profession of keeping our society safe and operating smoothly. No more. Now (sadly) they seem to be preoccupied with how to best dismantle the lives of the public they supposedly "serve" by saddling them with more and more needless restrictions, regulations, laws, ordinances, fines, levies and penalties.

We've gone wrong somewhere.

I'd think it's ALL of our responsibility to (1) figure out where and (2) fix it. Most so the people closest to the problem. Condoning/defending a corrupt system when one is in a position to change it is no better than creating such a system, IMO.

Jeff, when you fight a radar camera or red light ticket in DC, a rep. from Lockheed shows up in court instead of a cop. I haven't had to fight one yet, since I rarely drive here and most of the cameras are in less crowded parts of town so they can surprise unsuspecting folks better. But I would LOVE to cross examine someone from Lockheed about when/how they saw me commit whatever crime.

Not here. The cameras they put up locally in a few busy intersections have ELIMINATED the gridlock and deliberate redlight running that used to occur there. Far more civilized. And plenty of warning signs too. I'd like to see more!

OK K9---

So you MAY be the one in ten thousand officers that might put forth some effort in obeying the traffic laws you enforce, but I can say from considerable experience you MAY be only one in ten thousand........Truly rare.

So, you may have a new(er) ride, but I only base my comment on what I hear from Houston (Texas) PD every day. Sure, many departments are spending our tax dollars on new and updated equipment, but HPD has a habit of running their cars to near 200,000 miles before cycling them to the graveyard, maintenance or not.

Sometimes you might see an officer that might use a turn signal (unlikely), that might make a proper lane change (unlikely again), that might use the right hand lane (oops, he's making the next exit, but was in the left lane for the previous ten miles), that might do the speed limit (Nah, if he is, it's because he's making the next exit....).

As for your assertion that call in's on me are not an issue, YOU ARE DEAD WRONG. Trucks are regularly called in on, when they misbehave. In fact, I have called in on bad trucks myself. If I get called in on, it's my lease that will be terminated, not just a few days off without pay. It would be equal to your being fired from your job, and a severe black mark being put on your resume. Do your homework and you will find that trucking companies are becoming less tolerant of traffic altercations....


Your mantra from your side of the badge is predictable.


Put yourself in tractor/trailer, drive 11 hours a day, and in one week come back to us and tell us how many incidents you counted where all of the above is true. I've got a 2 dollar bill that says you'll see it more times than you can count on your fingers and toes.....Mmm, I was on the road only three hours today, and counted at least 4 violations by 3 officers from 3 different agencies.

(I don't purposely violate the traffic laws, as my living is dependent upon keeping my license absolutely clean. But after 27 years and over 3.5 million safe miles of driving in all 48 states and Canada, on just about every highway and city in this country, I think I have a pretty good idea what the real score is.)


Example:

I was blown, literally (into the lane beside me while driving my Tahoe) by one of our county's finest recently. I was running the posted (60mph) limit, but just for my own education I paced him, and he was running at speeds over 98mph. He went thru a construction zone at better than 75mph (posted 50mph) and then tore into his own residential neighborhood (posted 30mph) at better than 60mph. NO turn signals for lane changes, whipping in and out of traffic, tailgating people who didn't get out of his way quick enough, mostly all left lane, failure to come to a complete stop at several stop signs, and the list goes on. His destination: His own residence. No CODE 3, no family emergency, just a drive home from work.....


I called all of this in, faxed and snail mailed a written report of this to his superiors.

2 weeks later I received a call from his captain, first questioning me as if it didn't actually happen, then telling me that his division was "informed" that violating traffic laws would not be tolerated. OH, boy.....

2 weeks later, the same officer passed me again, running 25 mph over the limit, exited for a highway change (I was going the same route by coincidence), and then proceeded to literally run fast enough that I lost sight of him in less than 3 miles. All this while "off duty", on his way to work at an off duty job. (yes, I verified his off duty status)


K9, this is by no means an isolated event.


You (maybe) and your fellow officers take full advantage of the fact that you have a gun and a badge, and that NO ONE will ticket you (unless they are just a bigger A**hole than you--and apparently you found one...), prosecute you, or arrest you, unless there is an accident involving a fatality due to the officer's reckless driving.


Don't try to BS everyone here.....most of us aren't that ignorant.

I suggest you try this for one month:

Do not write ANY traffic tickets. Only write "warning" tickets. Then see how long you still have a job. Be sure to let us know the results.....

You may be a shinning example of great practices of law enforcement, but the rest of your colleagues shouldn't even have driver's license, much less a firearm.

If you still feel the need for speed (or other seriously reckless activities) at least do us the courtesy of going CODE 3 while your doing it..... Maybe you won't kill an innocent bystander in the process. Maybe......


This whole discussion has gone on entirely too far, as the original issue was revenue collecting by law enforcement to supplement government budgets.


Those of us who see this for what it is, know where we stand. Those of you who are on the other side, are just following directions from somebody who doesn't give a damn about your safety or mine, just how many tickets you can write to get more money into their yearly budgets.

By the way, do you know where Lowndes County is??

Tell the K9 officer that passed me up on I-85 last month (that's right, he was OFF DUTY in his marked patrol car), that I don't appreciate him tailgating me, and then running right up the back end of every other four wheeler that was in his reckless driving path at speeds over 100mph+ !!!!!

(I sure do hope it wasn't you, because if it was, your credibility here was just blown to bits......)



Enough said. Entirely too much said.



regards---rhjameshttp://www.pelicanparts.com/support/smileys/pc2.gif

Re: F*ckin' tax collectors masquerading as cops
 

Baseless thread with regard to California, and specifically your city, Long Beach, CA.

California Cities recieve less than 15% of the fine amount for traffic citations. A typical $241 speeding ticket nets the city about $12 bucks. Yipee.

Traffic enforcement, money wise, is a loser for California cities. They HAVE to fund it because the citizens DEMAND it. They dont complain about murders, they dont complain about robberies, they dont complain about burglaries. They complain about SPEEDERS and BUMS.

Re: Re: F*ckin' tax collectors masquerading as cops
 

This is probably misleading in CA and would certainly be so in many other states. Sure, the county or city may only get $12 of the actual ticket. But then EMS, the firemen, drug prevention, youth rec. centers, etc. all get their cut. It's been a long time, but the last ticket I got in PA had a laundry list of of places on the back of it that got the majority of the amount i had to pay. I really don't care if the city or county get a penny or the whole amount. Either way I'M paying for it because I was the unlucky one who got pulled over when I was going with the flow of traffic.