Failing to sign your registration is a citable offense in a lot of jurisdictions.
It’s also what in my last jurisdiction was called a “chippy ticket” – one of a number of completely discretionary bullshit citations that, yes, were put in place largely to generate revenue. The officers I knew used to issue chippy ticket violations to people who mouthed off. People who were nice were just told to sign the back. I don’t have any problem with that at all.
I am glad to see that no one thinks I am inventing stories. Tom, do you happen to know offhand how I can look up police records from the entire state to show that my co-worker has not received a conviction somewhere? Because his position is that attorney fees (and the time without a license) would cost WAY WAY more than simply taking it in the ass and going to the 2-day course. He’s a married man with a couple of kids, and he’s the breadwinner for the family. He can’t afford to hire attorneys out the wazoo and fight this all the while waiting for his driver’s license to be reinstated.
I know the guy in question, he’s about as stand-up as you can be. I seriously doubt he’d be walking around playing the victim if this were his fault. He’s simply be taking his lumps quietly.
criminal records are public info. If the crime is a misdemeanor punishable by more than 93 days in jail, the info is available to the public for a fee through the State of Michigan State police website (also linked through the official state of mi website). cost is $10. you need the person’s name and date of birth at least.
Here is where I think your point is made, and supported by lots of evidence. There have been many critics of the forfeiture laws. Created, likely, with the good intent of depriving illicit actors of their ill-gotten gains (and helping to offset the huge costs of the war on drugs), many police departments became notoriously famous for lining their pockets. Since the burden of proof, to get back your property, fell upon the accused not the accuser, there were many cases of people who were never found guilty of crimes still having their property taken. I recall one story (could not find a link) of a particularly zealous attorney general who made their name by vigorously exercising forfeiture powers. Then, their son was caught dealing drugs from their property and they amazingly did not push for that property to be seized.
Thus, although the anecdotal evidence you outlined here is questioned, there is some truth to this aspect of your argument.
Note that the whole village had only 60 people, the police had 14 members, and the police were acting with the explicit connivance of the village council. The dissolution of the village had as much to do with the council fraud as the police fraud.
I noted early on that
Linndale, OH on Cleveland’s west side is a similar village with a shady mayor/council combination (with fewer than 120 residents) that uses the police force to raise most of their income. (They avoided New Rome’s fate when the mayor took the fall for the last round of corruption charges. In addition, while they have their own traffic court, that court is subordinate to another court in the county and traffic stops are routinely pled in the superior court that routinely dismisses them. It should be noted, too, that the police fines primarily go to fund services for the aging population and crumbling infrastructure rather than directly to the police.)
The reason that this thread got moved out of Great Debates is that it consisted of little more than unsubstantiated anecdotes that never identified a specific police force or demonstrated that the police were the ones responsible for the purported evils in the anecdotes and there was no issue proposed to debate.
Yeah, I’m always a little pissed when I see hotrods painted up as cop cars in local parades, with painted statements bragging “This car seized from a drug dealer.”
No it’s not, “in effect” or otherwise. If it wasn’t a citable offense – not really “a crime” IMO – then they wouldn’t be able to “use the law” to “punish” it. They have the discretion to cite you for breaking this law, but they can also give you a break on it. If you act like an asshole and don’t deserve the break, I’m not going to fault the cop for not giving it to you.
That said, excessive ticketing of piddly shit is discouraged by many departments, which no longer directly tie officer performance to the number of tickets you write. Over-ticketing is not really consistent with the positive public face of policing that so many law enforcement agencies are trying to cultivate. I don’t think a overzealous chippy ticketer is a “bad cop” in the sense of being dirty, but it is IMO an indication of someone who is not a great cop – someone who is too invested in throwing his weight around, who is too rigid in his thinking, and who doesn’t mind being oppositional to the public he is supposed to serve. Officers who are really out there to protect and serve, who cultivate relationships with the people they serve, don’t write a lot of chippy tickets.