Harassed by the cops

[RecoveringKinkoid]

No, but it is suspicious behaviour. There may have been a history of illegal activities going on in the area in such a fashion. Thus said history would give the officer probable cause unless a reasonable excuse could be supplied and substantiated.

But the problem with answering the cops questions without a lawyer present, and without knowing what the cop is looking for, the "suspect" could inadvertantly incriminate himself in the crime. He could accidently give the cop reason to lock him up.

The cop has the right to ask questions, of course, but the citizen has the right to refuse to answer without council. He really does have the right to remain silent.

I mean, if you just field dressed a prostitute off a backroad somewhere, and a cop stopped you, would you then lie about it? Of course you would. So saying the cop wants to make sure you don't say "Oh, I'm back here because I am committing a crime" and that is why he is questioning you does not hold water. He wants to see if you incriminate yourself, which you just might do. Even if you are innocent.

Just tooling along on a public road is not probable cause. Anything you say, however, might be. You do not have to prove your innocence if you are just driving along minding your own business.

[draftermatt]

Pretty sure driving down a back road at four thirty am is not illegal behavior. And you don't have satisfy his curiosity on that, either.

He never asked why I was taking those roads or out so early. I think he thought I was drunk or drinking and had taken the back road to get away from him.

I had a cup of coffee with me and had stopped at the light to get out of my neighborhood, took a drink, looked and saw cop sitting in lot. Made right on red, then noticed said cop was right on my ass.

I knew I did nothing wrong so I made my turn and kept driving as per normal (though trying to get the last bit of ice I missed off the windshield).

But to a cop seeing someone take a drink, look at you then turn down a back road? I could see where I looked suspicious.

[taxguykarl]

Back to the OP: There is no such thing as too much documentation in court. FWIW, a lot of cops never show up for traffic court, so you have an edge right there.
Remember the legal maxim:
If the facts are on your side, argue the facts.
If the law is on your side, argue the law.
If neither the facts nor the law is on your side, just argue.

[Mr. Rager!]

Back to the OP: There is no such thing as too much documentation in court. FWIW, a lot of cops never show up for traffic court, so you have an edge right there.

I think that's a myth. Most officers are going to show up because OT. In some departments, they can be reprimanded if they don't show up.

[Broomjockey]

I think that's a myth.

I dunno, the math bears it out. Assume an officer writes about 50 tickets a month, I assume court is only on weekdays, during business hours. Just that alone means he's likely working or sleeping during many ticket hearings. But then spread them out over the month, two tickets a day, on average, I doubt they'd be able to turn up for all of them. They probably pick and choose.

[blas]

I hate that idea that everyone on the road late at night is drunk. Unfortunately, around here, many are, but at lot of people also work really crazy hours....and the overtime where I work doesn't help. There's second shift people staying until 1 or 3 am, weekend people staying until 4 or 5 am......and I'd hate to see my coworkers or even myself getting pulled over just because it's late at night and that means we're drunk.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Used to work second and third shift at WOLO TV. I got hassled by this one ASSHOLE COP so much I ended up calling dispatch at something like three or four in the morning to tell her (thank God it was a woman) what was going on.

She said she had a pretty good idea who that guy was and that it would stop. It did.

I was wondering what night he'd decide to drag me out the car and assault me. No kidding. It was THAT BAD.

[Mr. Rager!]

I dunno, the math bears it out. Assume an officer writes about 50 tickets a month, I assume court is only on weekdays, during business hours. Just that alone means he's likely working or sleeping during many ticket hearings. But then spread them out over the month, two tickets a day, on average, I doubt they'd be able to turn up for all of them. They probably pick and choose.

But your math doesn't take into effect that some people are just going to pay the fine. Some will avoid the fine and not show up at court. Some people will show up to their initial hearing and plead "guilty with an explanation." And that would require no further follow-up. The only time a cop would have to show up to court is if the defendant goes in and pleads "not guilty."

Most people are not going to show up in court; therefore, the officer won't have to show up either.

[Broomjockey]

But your math doesn't take into effect that some people are just going to pay the fine.

The officer doesn't know that ahead of time. As slow as bureaucracy is, you could pay the ticket the next day, and he'd probably never hear about it beforehand.

[Jester]

Just tooling along on a public road is not probable cause.

You do not have to prove your innocence if you are just driving along minding your own business.

Depends on the situation. Depends on the road, the time, and what the driver is doing. Once, during my travels, I was in Minnesota, and pulled into a closed gas station to stop and check my map, using the lights of the gas station to do so. What the cop SAW was a vehicle with dark tinted windows pull into a closed business after hours in an area where they had had a rash of robberies. I was doing nothing wrong. He, however, did not know that when he first pulled up.

As for your second statement, until the cop can determine that you are just minding your own business, and are not engaged in the suspicious activity he may have initially suspected, he is doing his job. How often do we as a society bitch and moan about lazy cops not doing their job and letting criminals slip by? It's a contradiction that we perpetutate: we want cops patrolling and questioning suspicious people, but we ourselves don't want to be inconvenienced by cops stopping is if we look suspicious to them. You cannot have one without the other, and too many people refuse to accept that basic fact.

He never asked why I was taking those roads or out so early. I think he thought I was drunk or drinking and had taken the back road to get away from him.

But to a cop seeing someone take a drink, look at you then turn down a back road? I could see where I looked suspicious.

Late hours. Back roads. Sipping on an unknown beverage. Even if it can clearly be seen to be coffee, how many drunks try to sober up with coffee? Pulling him over is well within the cop's rights. It's AFTER the cop pulled him over that the cop became a douchebag.

I hate that idea that everyone on the road late at night is drunk.

As a night owl, I hate that idea too. But the problem is, at those hours, a lot of drivers ARE drunk. And that combined with the fact that there are a lot less vehicles on the road at that hour increases dramatically the likelihood that one of them is, in fact, a drunk. Once again we face a contradiction: we want cops to get the drunks off the road, but we don't want to be inconvenienced by them pulling us over to see if we are, in fact, drunk.

But your math doesn't take into effect that some people are just going to pay the fine.

And that is what many cops bank on. It is a calculated gamble. Let's say they write 50 tickets in a month. Of those 50, there is a good chance that (for the sake of argument and round number), 40 will pay the fine and avoid court. That leaves ten. Let's say the cop is not a lazy douchebag, but is actually rather diligent in his work, but due to his schedule, he can only make it to 5 of those court dates. That is still a lot of time out of his schedule, remember. If he shows up at those 5 dates and proves his due diligence and shows the judge that he was right, that means that out of his 50 tickets, 45 ended with some kind of fine or punishment for the ticketee, with only 5 getting off scott free. That means our cop has a success rate of 90%. Not too shabby.

Even if the cop is a douchebag, combine the number of people who won't go to court with just a handful of court dates he shows up at, and he still has a good "success" rate.

Cops are just like anyone else. They play the numbers. In the cops' case, the numbers are in their favor.

[Mr. Rager!]

The officer doesn't know that ahead of time. As slow as bureaucracy is, you could pay the ticket the next day, and he'd probably never hear about it beforehand.

I don't think you understand how this goes.

I have a court date on December 30th. The cop does not have to show up to that. If I plead "not guilty" which I will, they will set a date and that's when the cop has to show up. Traffic courts are pretty much all set up on the same days.

Here, if you want to go to court and make a plea, You go in on either Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday at 1:00pm. Then if it goes in front of a judge where you can make statements and question the officer that pulled you over, they pretty much schedule those together too. You might be in a room with 5 or 6 other people that got pulled over by that same cop.

Like I said before, in some areas the cop can be reprimanded if he does not appear in court to defend his ticket. In almost all areas, the cop gets paid OT. And for the most part, they all get paid just to sit in court which is easy for them.

[Shangri-laschild]

This. Quoted for truth. Just say "yes, sir", "no sir," and if it comes to it, "may I go now, sir?"

Anything else you are just asking for trouble.

But the problem with answering the cops questions without a lawyer present, and without knowing what the cop is looking for, the "suspect" could inadvertantly incriminate himself in the crime. He could accidently give the cop reason to lock him up.

The cop has the right to ask questions, of course, but the citizen has the right to refuse to answer without council. He really does have the right to remain silent.

These are both very true. Hell, my best friend who's an officer himself has said that if I ever shoot someone in my home in self defence, I'm to not answer any questions. I'm simply to ask for a lawyer the whole time. There are reasons for it other than not being guilty

I think that's a myth. Most officers are going to show up because OT. In some departments, they can be reprimanded if they don't show up.

I think those departments are doing that to fix the fact that usually the officer doesn't show. But it's true that for the most part except for in those departments, they don't show for the court date. Even if the officer does show, I don't think there will be any problem getting it dropped.

[trailerparkmedic]

As a night owl, I hate that idea too. But the problem is, at those hours, a lot of drivers ARE drunk. And that combined with the fact that there are a lot less vehicles on the road at that hour increases dramatically the likelihood that one of them is, in fact, a drunk. Once again we face a contradiction: we want cops to get the drunks off the road, but we don't want to be inconvenienced by them pulling us over to see if we are, in fact, drunk.

I think cops should at least limit pulling people over who appear to be drunk. Twice in the past 6 months I've left work very late at night (2 am and 3 am) and was pulled over. There was no reason to pull me over either time--no speeding, no expired tickets, no lights out. The cops just wanted to see if I was drunk. This probably wouldn't have made me so angry if I lived in a rural area, but I live in a BIG Texas city. It's not like I was the only one driving at that time of night.

[blas]

Same here medic, except that I was designated driver.

This was late last winter. I had been ill for the better part of that week and had no intention of drinking, and personally offered to take a few friends home so they didn't need to worry about paying $10 for a cab or risking driving drunk or *shudder* walking home.

I purposely take the back way home, even when I haven't drank a sip, just because of the cops.....there was a cop sitting at Papa Murphy's (which had been closed for hours). As soon as I drove past, he immediately pulled out and followed me...followed me all the way to my damn apartment (granted, it was only a couple of miles and I only made 2 turns, the rule is 4 turns all in the same direction). I mean, he followed me until I turned from the street into the parking lot, and he gave up. I wasn't speeding, I didn't blow or roll through any of the several stop signs, my tags are good, no lights out..the only problem being the car isn't registered to be but maybe the cop figured I had a man's name....and he just kept following me anyway.

Meanwhile, people like my former friend Big Sis and my stupid stalker ex drive sports cars and constantly drive drunk. More than drunk....completely shitfaced....and drive AGGRESSIVELY....no attempt to even try to pretend to be sober or try to obey the law......and neither of them have ever gotten stopped once, and they damn well should have by now.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Well, see, I get that if you are the lone car on the road at 3am, and a cop is bored or whatever, the odds are good that you will get pulled.

However, I was getting pulled by the same asshole multiple times A WEEK. This guy was familiar with my vehicle. He knew I was a late night switcher at the nearby TV station because I told him this the first time he pulled me (this was before I knew better than to talk to them). He knew what my situation was, he knew I was a night person on my way back home from my job. He knew I was not some random drunk or some creep casing the neighborhood.

Yeah, you know what? A bored weirdo with a gun and licence to pull me over whenever he wanted, and him knowing my schedule and where I worked, and me being a lone female in a deserted neighborhood did not make me feel safe.

I told the dispatcher that with my schedule, the site of a cruiser should make me feel safer. It should not make me wonder if that was the night I was going to get raped. She put a stop to it, but sheesh.

Stalked by a fucking cop. How nice is that.