My pleasure <b>Badge</b>. I know there’s a lot of confusion and misinformation on this subject. Especially when TV news seems to always show machine guns firing when they talk about the assault weapons ban.
Well that’s what I get for trying to bold face another user’s name. Anyone have any advice on how to do so? I checked the FAQ but it doesn’t seem to talk about it.
vBcode uses square brackets, not angle brackets: [these], not <these>. Alternatively, you could just use the buttons in the reply window.
You did exactly right, except you need to use “[” instead of “<” (and, obviously “]” instead of “>”)
Thanks, Beltane and Nametag. Hopefully I’ve got it now 
Badge: Why does it seem like so many LEO’s are against a citizen’s right to carry a firearm? In Ohio it is legal to “open carry,” yet people who do so routinely get harassed by LEOs. One guy I know said a cop threatened to charge him with “inducing panic” unless he agreed to no longer open carry.
Hiya Badge, long time reader first time replyer 
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I was wondering, say you pull someone over in a parking lot at night because they have been driving funny. Suddenly stopping, then moving really fast suddenly, going all over the place…you pull over said driver and learn that a mom/dad is teaching their 14-16 kid how to drive, and decided an abandoned parking lot at night was the best time and place to do this. How do you handle this? give them a ticket? Let them continue doing what they were doing, or tell them to go home? What if it’s a 17 year old teaching his 16 year old friend without a license how to drive?
I’m assuming that you don’t go out of your way to stop every jay walker, yellow light runner, and drivers going just a tad bit faster than the speed limit says they should…so what guidlines do you use to decide what laws you will and won’t enforce and when?
Simple: We want to be the only people with guns. When you are constantly aware of the fact that some people want to kill you just because you’re a cop, you would feel better knowing that no one is armed but you.
I wouldn’t have a problem with a parent teaching their kid how to drive if they are well off the roadway and safe (as long as the business doesn’t have a problem with them being there).
With the 17-year old showing his friend how to drive, I would definitely tell them to stop, but I wouldn’t cite anyone.
What I see a lot here is parents letting their 8-12 year old kids drive on the beach. That will often earn Mom or Dad a ticket. It’s just too dangerous.
My decision is usually based on the amount of risk they pose to the public. I usually stop people with a burned out headlight or taillight, mainly because if the other light goes then they will have no lights. I don’t worry too much about a “California stop”, unless the person is obviously ignoring other traffic. It’s all about safety with me.
Badge: All your answers have been excellent, concise, and informative. I wish more LEOs were like you.
When I was 19yo I was driving to the Renault dealership for the very first tuneup on my very first car. The street was VERY foggy and there was a school zone. The auto was manual and I downshifted to 2nd (max possible speed:15mph maybe, with a tailwind) as I entered the SZ which was 15mph limit. Suddenly, a man leaps from the curb in front of my car!! I slammed on the brakes and stopped w/in 1ft. It was a LEO. And he crooked his finger to motion me forward. So I drive up to him(2yards) and roll down the window. He proceeds to bless me out for speeding–threatening to shoot me! I lost it —started crying my eyes out. He continued to scream and yell at me. About 15mins of the beratement later he let me go w/o a ticket. I was NOT exceeding the SZspeed limit in the first place, because if I had been he would have been road kill–that is how suddenly he appeared out of the fog. At any rate I wanted to call and complain but my parents talked me out of it since I had not been given a ticket and did not get his name/badge number.
My question: Was he wrong since I clearly was able to react and stop my car given a sudden pedestrian appearance with room to spare and thus was not speeding in a SZ? Should I have taken his name and badge number and complained about his treatment?
Even if you actually were speeding, he was still wrong. There is no reason to yell at someone like that, and especially no reason to threaten to shoot you!
Yes, you definitely should have complained. Even without his name and ID, you could still file a complaint. The department would probably be able to figure out which Officer was working in that school zone at the time.
Badge, this is a great thread, you’re doing a great service to the LEO community, <additional generic Cop compliment>
a couple of questions, back in my college days, the local law enforcement in the small college town was very tenacious, they’d oftentimes pull students over for no reason and make up one by the time they got to your window, favorite reason “you were weaving”…
it seems to me that they were hoping that the person they ticketed would simply pay the fine and not bother fighting the ticket, since the rumor was that the town was so slow in the summer that they spent their time ticketing the local cows for moving violations
how legal is it to pull over a driver who isn’t doing anything wrong and making up a reason by the time they arrive at the driver’s window, that seems far too much like abuse of power to me…
one other question, i know laws vary from state to state (i’m in Vermont), i have a co-worker who has his laptop open in the car while he’s driving, he says the screen is turned off and he’s only using it to listen to the music he has stored on his hard drive, i told him it’d be safer for him to get an iPod and leave the laptop closed and in the bag, that he’s risking a ticket for distracted driving, he says that he has the display turned off and it’s no more distracting than the radio
lets say you pulled over a driver and when you arrive at the driver’s window, you see an open laptop on the passenger seat, with the screen dark, how would you respond to seeing the laptop open?
great thread Badge, keep up the good work
I agree that the officer was wrong for the way he handled it, but I have always heard that a police officer can give you a speeding ticket even if you are going below the posted speed limit if the conditions are poor enough that you should be going slower (like the fog in the previous posters scenario). Is this true? Is it listed as a speeding ticker or reckless driving or something else?
That is true. In Washington State it is called “Speed Too Fast for Conditions”, and the fine is $101.
Well, since this thread got bumped, I’ve a question.
For the past couple of summers, I’ve seen this boy, starting age 11, walking the streets of my neighborhood during the day. Pushing his little sister in a stroller. I live in Tucson, where the sun is very intense; you can get burned in 5 minutes and become dehydrated very quickly. For hours they’ll go, around and around the neighborhood. I’ve approached the boy and he claims that he does it because he loves his little sister and wants to spend time with her. This is all day, every day! I don’t buy it.
I’ve called CPS, and they didn’t deem it serious enough. I’ve thought of calling for a welfare check from the police. This situation seems very serious to me, ludicrous!! What, if anything, do you think I should do?
A welfare check sounds like a good idea to me. Just tell them that you’ve seen the kids out in the sun for hours with no adults around and you’re concerned about them. Don’t go too much into the history, or they may decide that CPS looked into it so they won’t bother.
Hopefully a cop will take the kids home and make sure that they are being cared for.
Thanks for caring, trublmakr. We need people to watch out for one another.
Here’s a silly question, lets say i was happily driving the speed limit, and some jerk was tailgating me for a few miles, he goes to pass me in a passing zone, obviously speeding (15+ miles over the limit), and lets say that the stars are properly aligned, karma is in full effect, etc, and i see the moron a few miles away on the side of the road with pretty blue lights behind him…
if i wanted to let the officer know that the moron was tailgating me…
a; would it increase the jerk’s fine, or if the officer was planning on letting him off with a warning, would it sway the officer into giving him a ticket
b; would it even be worth the effort, i’ll be honest, this is nothing but pure revenge on the jerk
c; what would be the safest way to notify the officer, i understand getting out of my car would be A Bad Idea™, as the officer wouldn’t know my intent and may assume the worst (he might think i’m going to attack him)
another tailgating question, assume i’m being tailgated at night, and an officer is driving in the opposite lane, is there some way to signal the officer’s attention so he can pull over the tailgater, some headlight signal, or wait till the officer passes and flash my brakelights at the tailgater in the hopes the officer will see the “please back off” signal
and yes, i know that pulling over and letting the idiot pass is the safest bet, but that feels like i’m rewarding bad behavior/giving in to the tailgater’s demands
Hey Badge! This might seem like a strange question but here goes…
I’m a graphic designer and illustrator with fine arts training and am especially good at drawing faces, with a good knowledge of anatomy. I’ve always had a huge interest in being a forensic artist (one of those people who draw suspect descriptions, recreate faces of dead people from their skulls, etc.) I even called my local precinct to see if there were any positions available for anyone like that. From what they said though, most of that work was now done on computers with programs that any schmuck can use. So is there really any application for the kind of skills I have anymore, or should I just forget about it?
[QUOTE=MacTech]
if i wanted to let the officer know that the moron was tailgating me…
An officer has to actually witness an infraction while it is occurring - your reporting it to him will accomplish nothing. And, as you said, pulling up behind a cop on a traffic stop is just going to cause everyone a lot of unnecessary stress.
No, there is no recognized signal to get our attention. You can only hope that the officer will notice the tailgating, isn’t on his way to something else, is interesting in making a stop, etc.
Keep looking! I don’t think computer programs will ever match the detail and skill of a real artist. Try contacting any crime labs in your state or the attorney general’s office (they often have an investigative unit that helps small agencies). I would hate to see you miss out on an opportunity to use your skills.
Hey! 500th post in the thread that will not die!