One thing we police are required to do in my city is show the driver we have cited the actual readout on the particular unit that "nabbed 'em". That one action stops a lot of arguments. Otherwise, your only action other than paying the fine is to appear in court, well dressed, speaking respectfully, and acting like a responsible adult. Judges are human and lots of 'em have kids too. "56 in a 30" is a bit excessive, though.

BTW, your version of the story is probably going to differ a lot from the officer's. Most cops learn real quick how to write tickets that are "bullet proof". You can also hope that the officer misses his court date...the judge's usually toss those cases out. Good luck.[sm=smiley9.gif]

 

I got pulled over tonight as I was taking my nephew home from his job. Here is exactly what transpired. It was around 12:30AM and I had stopped at a stop sign and I was going to go straight, the road that I was going to cross doesn't have any stop signs it's straight through. I do like I always do and check both ways twice. First off I look to my right and see a car coming, then I look left and the entire road is empty in that direction. Once again I look to the right to see where the car that is coming is and to see if there is anymore cars coming and it is just the one car, but it slowed down nearly to a stop at an entrance to an apartment complex. There was no signal to indicate that it was turning, but not many people do seem to ever signal anything especially late at night. Needless to say I figure that it has slowed way down to turn into the apartments, so I then look to the left for the second time before I cross the road and it is still completely empty in that direction. Now I start to pull forward to cross the road and when I face straight ahead the car from the right is right in front of me, so I hit the brakes to keep from hitting it. That car had to have accelerated quite rapidly from where it was when it slowed way down to have gotten right in front of me that fast. As it passes by me I see that it is a police car and he also then slammed on his breaks, I proceed ahead and I knew he was going to back up and follow me and pull me over, so I was only going 15 MPH so I could pull over right away. Sure enough I was right and he did, I expected no less. He gets out and comes up out of sight behind my door and tells me to put my hands on the dash and I told him that they already were on the steering wheel, then he tells my nephew to and he does. He then asks me what that was all about and I told him that when I looked that direction I saw that he was slowing down like he was going to pull into the apartments. Then he asks, "didn't you see that there wasn't a turn signal on" in a very condecending way. And I reply, " I see people do that stupid kinda **** all the time, not using their turn signals". Next he asks if this is my car and I of course reply, yes. After that he asks," how many accidents have you been in?", I then tell him none. He asked to see my ID and I asked if I could get out of the car to get it out, he then askes where it was and I told him that it is in my back pocket and that the seats are rather tight and it would be rather hard to get to it without getting out and he said that I didn't need to get out. After that he asked what the tag in the back window was and I told him that it was a temporary tag for my personalized plates. Then he told me to keep from getting in any accidents and to have a good night.

I believe that he was in a hurry to get somewhere all of the sudden when this happened and that that is why he got from where he was to right in front of me that fast. It would also explain why he kept it as short as he did and why he didn't bother to run my license or temp tags. I'm not going to complain about that though and I fully understand why he pulled me over, but he seemed to understand why I pulled out when I did and that part of it was that he did slow down and then took off rather quickly.

I cannot count the number of times that people have turned or changed lanes without signaling and if I'm in a car with someone and they do this I jump in their s[sm=smiley35.gif] about it. I also see plenty of people signaling a turn and slow down, but then they decide not to turn and they just keep going, thats why I wait until they actually start making the turn before I'll go, at least 90% of the time.[sm=smiley2.gif]

 

I have more tickets than this whole forum combined (stopped counting at 32, probably around 40 now in 6yrs). stupidest - drag raced a honda with a cop one lane over & three cars back (pulled me over, only got a lecture). worst - went through a 15 @ 103 (got a ticket). fastest - ticket said 140+ lies!, had to be closer to 150 in a 55 (got thrown on a hood & arrested). most expensive - $1600. Yea it's a waist of $ but who wants to sit in traffic going 50??? If you're not doing at least 100 it shouldn't be considered driving...

 

Who's your insurance company (if you have one)?[sm=smiley5.gif]

 

71RoadRunner,
You ran into a cop with too much time on his hands. During most of a typical shift, officers are too busy responding to calls, eating donuts, writing reports, eating donuts, taking statements, eating donuts, etc. to cite every traffic violation they witness. Much of the "minor stuff" like no signals goes unnoticed until the officer gets bored and has nothing else to do. If somebody wants to set a new land speed record on a city street, the best time to do it is right before or right at shift change time. It usually takes about 15-20 minutes to turn a shift around....[sm=smiley4.gif]

 

I'm on my dad's insurance<- yea laugh it up, I put my cars in his name, he (then me) pays a little extra for multiple drivers & as long as I don't wreck the rates don't go up (Farmers).

When I raced in front of that cop I gave him the "I just got my licence", "I didn't think about how dangerous it is", "where can I go to improove my driving skills" spheal. It worked damn good untill I got older (got me out of at least 9 tickets). Now I've slowed down ...a bit

 

The older you get, the more you'll slow down...in more ways than one!![sm=smiley36.gif]

 

Our resource officer at school told us why cops are stereotyped to be eating doughnuts all the time. In the late 50's the doughnut shops were open really late, so they would often get robbed. They asked that police be sent to sit there until closing time, in return they let the cops eat for free. That's not too bad of a deal!

 

Some of the state troopers here in south Illinois will tailgate you to try to get you to speed up so they have an excuse to stop you. It worked on me once. I got a $70 ticket for no seat belt,$75 no proof of insurance, (had canceled chack at home so I beat that one) warning for 64 in a 55, warning for improper lane use (I crossed white line at right side of lane, there was 2 feet of road on other side of line) warning for trailer hitch sticking up 2 inches in center of license plate. This was at 3 AM of the morning, no body but me, the cop, and the good Lord around. 3 weeks later, exact same place and time a car got on my *** and I slowed to 50 MPH and the car passed me. Trooper in unmarked trying the same crap. Come to find out my son played ball with one that gave me the ticket. I told my son to tell him that if he ever got up on my rear end like that again and I knew it was a trooper he was going to eat the back end of a dodge. I normally drive around 60 on this 2 lane road and the troopers blow my doors off.

 

Actually it's still going on!! We often pull into all night gas stations and convenience stores in the wee hours of the morning to chit-chat with the clerks and show the "bad guys" that we're out and about. In return, we get free coffee and sodas and sometimes free hotdogs/nachos/burgers as well. It makes the night (mid) shift a lot more easy to tolerate and with less crime, there's less paperwork for us...[sm=smiley5.gif]