[legion]

My next door neighbor is a county Sheiff's Deputy. (Nice because I now know which roads to avoid a "spirited" drive on. According to him, what he looks for changes based on why he is in that particular location clocking cars.

If he has gotten complaints about speeding on a certain residential road, he will probably pull everyone over that he can. He wants the news to get out that they are cracking down in that area so he stops getting complaint phone calls.

If he is watching an intersection because of an increase in accidents, he is going to ticket behavior that will cause accidents at that intersection.

If he has been told: "Nothing is going on today, go write some tickets", he is much more likely to be lax on drivers because he is not enforcing due to a specific problem. He will probably only go after the most egregious drivers.