Police encounters

[csraine86]

I've been pulled over twice. Tickets for stupid things both times.

[LucidMomentum]

Originally Posted by Tcoat

Fully marked cruisers are getting rare up here. The ones with any markings at all are frequently the light grey reflective "stealth" stickers.
They use all sorts of weird and wonderful vehicles and you had better stop when they flash you!

The problem with that is you get a lot of "vigilante" people trying to pretend that they're cops. Stuff like sketchy road blocks, harassment, etc.

I comply fully with the law, but I prefer marked vehicles so I at least have more confidence of who I'm dealing with.

[Target70]

I have been driving this car for over a year now and only gotten pulled over for kicking the back out when turning left on a wet road. They let me go when they realized it was a manual and I had just bought it. In other words they thought it was an accident, and my fear of them was good cover for the "scary unexpected" slide.

I have been pulled over on my bike (single speed 20'' bmx). I tucked to gain speed going down one hill to help me crank my way up the next: a ~25-30 degree incline
of about 400 yards. His official reason for pulling me over half way up the hill is: I looked like I was running away from something.

A friend and I were parked in the lot at the local park that shares the parking lot with a police station/courthouse/tax commissioner/DMV etc.. Your basic govt building. We were walking around on one side of the large field when we saw a bunch of flashing lights, and walked through the trees to see what was going on. They had set up a full road DUI checkpoint in a dip of the road on a bridge so you couldn't see it. And this was on the main road (4 lane plus turning) through our town, on a Saturday Night at around 6PM. Traffic was backed up for miles in either direction. As we were standing by the road, a cop going the wrong way rolled up to us and told us to keep walking to the checkpoint, well we are young, about 20, don't know any better and so well why not? We get about half way across the bridge on the side median before one cop yells out HEY! and we are swarmed from all sides. We are then grilled, patted down, made to take off our shoes our mouths are checked, intimidate, bully the works. When we explain we were told to keep waking, they mock us saying we made up some the story about "phantom cop". They accuse us of carrying drugs, and trying to avoid the checkpoint by parking our car and walking through the checkpoint. We explain that this makes no sense, and I have never done drugs in my life and he calls me a liar. Eventually they badger my friend into giving them his car keys to check his car which we have to tell them where it is in their own parking lot. And one of them drives off with the keys to check out the car and If they find nothing then we are free to go. After they say they found nothing, we start walking back to the car only to find that it has been towed. And we are now miles away from home with no car. After walking home, and calling the cops to figure out what the deal is, they tell us 4 different stores, from there being a gun or drugs in the car, to it being abandoned. This car is my friends ~90 8 series BMW. Well we try to call the tow truck company only to find out we now owe a towing fee before we can get the car back, but since it is Saturday, and they don't open till Monday, we will also have to pay for 3 days of storage fees. So we call the cops till we are told that the officer in charge cant talk to us because he is at the checkpoint. We find the new DUI checkpoint further down the road. We get in his other car (Lexus sc300), and pull up on the side of the road in front of the checkpoint and are swarmed again. Why are we pulling to the side of the road! We could be a threat. We explain we would like to talk to the officer in charge, but instead they decide to run a dog around the car, who runs around the car, then when he gets to my friends side, he jumps up and licks him on the nose, and proceeds to scratch the hell out of the door on his way down. Well this is enough for the cops to say that the dog alerted on the car and here we go for strip search number 2. Now at this stop it is getting late and is winter, and I am made to stand outside without shoes or a jacket while my friend goes inside the big police van thing, and I am left to chat with the MP's. No we are not on govt property, but apparently to my local police, they see no problem using military personnel for a city policing function. At the end of it they find no drugs on us or in the car, and give us the shaft about everything else. The best we can do is go back the next Monday and file a complaint (while being intimidated and ignored) and pay the tow fees to get his car back. No lawyer we call will touch it. Now If you swapped our roles, and we did to them what they did to us how fast would we be in jail?

Some cops are ok, some are not. The real problem is that we now have an unequal class system that they are on the top tier of, unequal rights if you will. Those that are not good can an will use their superior rights against you. If the "good" cops try to stand against the abuse by their coworkers, they are removed. It's funny how fast it is for a cop to be removed or hounded from office after ticketing another cop, vs how long if even possible it is to remove a cop who kills innocent civilians.

[Ammonia]

Originally Posted by Target70

story.

holy crap that is ridiculous.

[Tcoat]

Never seen cops?
Is there ever a person they pull over that doesn't say "I have nothing, I have never done drugs and why are you harassing me"?
Then when they search they find drugs, guns, rocket launchers, tactical nuclear weapons, etc.
I for one am glade they don't take everybody's word for it even if it means the occasional innocent person may be inconvenienced.
Now it certainly seems like Target had more then a minor inconvenience but I can see in a second how the cops would be suspicious when a two guys come "out of the trees" near a road block.
Same reason when they set up checkpoints and have a car hidden well back to grab the guys that turn around when they see it!

[Target70]

Originally Posted by Tcoat

Never seen cops?
Is there ever a person they pull over that doesn't say "I have nothing, I have never done drugs and why are you harassing me"?
Then when they search they find drugs, guns, rocket launchers, tactical nuclear weapons, etc.
I for one am glade they don't take everybody's word for it even if it means the occasional innocent person may be inconvenienced.
Now it certainly seems like Target had more then a minor inconvenience but I can see in a second how the cops would be suspicious when a two guys come "out of the trees" near a road block.
Same reason when they set up checkpoints and have a car hidden well back to grab the guys that turn around when they see it!

I try not to watch cops, it makes me angry. But I have noticed a distinct difference in the behavior of the cops I have seen in person vs the ones that are being followed by a camera crew

There is a difference between having a suspicion of something and searching for evidence, and being so jaded that everyone is guilty and everything they say is a lie even when you have no proof. Falsely accusing someone with no proof is if nothing else unprofessional. It's really easy to support the violation of other people (inconvenience) as long as it satisfies your own outlook on the situation (get the bad guy) and doesn't affect you in a negative way. The only problem, at least in merika is that it can often times lead not to a minor inconvenience, but to a life changing or ending scenario. Many people have pointed out their suspicion of being pulled over just so the cop can look at their car. They have no right to do so, and you have every right to go about your business unmolested, yet if you dare stand up for yourself, you soon see who the master is. You are on their time, you will do what they say when they say it. If they give you two different orders you had better pick the right one to follow, and anything that will be discussed, will be discussed after you have been rendered helpless. Until such time that they deem you no longer a threat and now a waste of their time.

And If the one who saw us "coming out of the trees" was suspicious, that's one thing, although I would disagree that walking out from between some trees in a park to the main road in town, 500 yards from a road block to stand a few feet away from a full husband wife 2.5 kids family outside their backyard is suspicious. It is still another matter for the other 10 or so of the 50 at the road block, (who claim no knowledge of the phantom cop) to see two people walking on the side of the main road through town and decide they were up to no good. When you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail, and when you are looking for bad guys...

[Tcoat]

Originally Posted by Target70

I try not to watch cops, it makes me angry. But I have noticed a distinct difference in the behavior of the cops I have seen in person vs the ones that are being followed by a camera crew

There is a difference between having a suspicion of something and searching for evidence, and being so jaded that everyone is guilty and everything they say is a lie even when you have no proof. Falsely accusing someone with no proof is if nothing else unprofessional. It's really easy to support the violation of other people (inconvenience) as long as it satisfies your own outlook on the situation (get the bad guy) and doesn't affect you in a negative way. The only problem, at least in merika is that it can often times lead not to a minor inconvenience, but to a life changing or ending scenario. Many people have pointed out their suspicion of being pulled over just so the cop can look at their car. They have no right to do so, and you have every right to go about your business unmolested, yet if you dare stand up for yourself, you soon see who the master is. You are on their time, you will do what they say when they say it. If they give you two different orders you had better pick the right one to follow, and anything that will be discussed, will be discussed after you have been rendered helpless. Until such time that they deem you no longer a threat and now a waste of their time.

And If the one who saw us "coming out of the trees" was suspicious, that's one thing, although I would disagree that walking out from between some trees in a park to the main road in town, 500 yards from a road block to stand a few feet away from a full husband wife 2.5 kids family outside their backyard is suspicious. It is still another matter for the other 10 or so of the 50 at the road block, (who claim no knowledge of the phantom cop) to see two people walking on the side of the main road through town and decide they were up to no good. When you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail, and when you are looking for bad guys...

Guess I have just always been lucky with them (and have never dealt with one in the States may help)

[Hotrodheart]

If you get pulled over, just handle it like I do.... tell the cop that Krispy Kreme just dunked some fresh glazed....

[RFB]

Originally Posted by Bergen23

I'm not a cop. I simply have prior knowledge from a past career choice I wasn't fond of. But hey, by all means wear your tinfoil hat if that's what makes you feel empowered and safe.

Just saying, you won't be taken advantage of if you aren't a plug. Every ticket I've gotten, with one exception (out of province ticket, and I was lazy) I've fought and won. My dog tags have saved me from a few tickets (speeding and one more a touch more serious than just a HTA offence) and because I know the HTA quite well, as well as federal law I don't get taken advantage of.

AAHH - A meathead ! I knew it -


I trained with some of them at Borden -

[Bergen23]

Originally Posted by RFB

AAHH - A meathead ! I knew it -


I trained with some of them at Borden -

Good try, but no. I'm a gunner.

[Target70]

Originally Posted by Tcoat

Guess I have just always been lucky with them (and have never dealt with one in the States may help)

there is that mental thing where once you buy something, you start to see it everywhere, well all it takes is one or two personal examples of something like this to cause you to see it everywhere and give you a whole righteous fury thing. It really doesn't help when we have the whole 24/7 news cycle. but the real problem:

A cop can lie to you, it is illegal to lie to a cop.
A cop can as procedure threaten you with violence or death, and they are armed! do I need to say what will happen if you threaten a cop?
As the link pointed out earlier, cops (in the US) can take your property without charging you of any crime (under asset forfeiture), and they have been caught on camera laughing and bragging to each other what they will do with your stuff when they take it.
A cop can be in the process of beating a handcuffed prone person offering no resistance, which is outright assault/torture, which may be found to be illegal later in a court of law. However, if you step in to stop it you are now interfering with police(illegal). So It is illegal to stop the cop from committing an illegal act, unless you are a cop...
Hell in some municipalities, cops have been given legal authority to have sex with prostitutes in the process of gathering evidence to arrest them for having sex.
...etc, etc.

Cops are people, and as most people will do, they will take any advantage that provides them with benefits. This system that grants them more rights than the ones they are supposed to serve is only Begging them to take advantage of it.

[Target70]

Originally Posted by Hotrodheart

If you get pulled over, just handle it like I do.... tell the cop that Krispy Kreme just dunked some fresh glazed....

Sorry, I can't help this.

That same friend and I were in a large empty parking lot, of the main strip. Bored, Saturday night, maybe 9pm. he has the wheel turned full lock and we are in first gear driving in a circle at idle speed. No burning rubber, no engine revving, just a slow circle. We do this for about 30-40 seconds till a cop rolls up to us and lights up. We roll up beside him with the window down. He tells us to stop doing donuts in the parking lot.. my friend said: Why is it making you hungry?... The cop started laughing and told us to get the F out of there.

[FR-S_ATL]

Originally Posted by PhantomX

Myth. My dealership sells red cars all the time. One of the objections customers would usually have is "my insurance will be more with that color," then we'd have them call their insurance to verify, and they always say "no, not true." If you don't believe, I urge you to call your insurance right now to verify.

I agree with this. I looked at and almost bought a silver frs and called insurance to see how much it was going to raise. Once I bought a red one, my insurance went up that exact amount

[Bergen23]

Originally Posted by Target70

Sorry, I can't help this.

That same friend and I were in a large empty parking lot, of the main strip. Bored, Saturday night, maybe 9pm. he has the wheel turned full lock and we are in first gear driving in a circle at idle speed. No burning rubber, no engine revving, just a slow circle. We do this for about 30-40 seconds till a cop rolls up to us and lights up. We roll up beside him with the window down. He tells us to stop doing donuts in the parking lot.. my friend said: Why is it making you hungry?... The cop started laughing and told us to get the F out of there.

How old are you?