Fighting a speeding ticket when the cop lies about factors related to the ticket.

In My Humble Opinion
41

Around these parts the judge listens to both sides. If the stories are totally different, the judge asks the following questions;

  1. Do you know the cop/defendant?
  2. Did you have an encounter with the cop/defendant prior to the citation.

If you, or the cop answers no to those, you’re guilty. Obviously he’s looking for something that relates to bias. Absent bias, the judge assumes the defendant has the motivation to lie, and the cop does not.

42

Around 1990 or so, I was driving across the desert on a rarely used highway in SoCal. There wasn’t another car in sight, or so I thought. I was cruising along at 80+ MPH when a black and white CHP cruiser came flying up and stopped me. I had seen him coming about a quarter mile back and slowed down way before he got close enough to clock me, but he still issued me a ticket.

I was polite to the cop, and figured I earned the ticket anyway. When he was done I asked him how he knew how fast I was going. He told me he didn’t but he knew it was slightly over 80. Then he explained how he clocked me.

It seems there are overpasses every so often on this road. And when you break the shadow of one of those overpasses, he would start timing you until you broke the shadow of the next one. Then he’d drive at your estimated speed, and time his trip through the same distance. If you beat him, you were exceeding his speed. I exceeded his estimated 80 MPH. The interesting thing is that he did this without stopping, following about a mile behind me.

I didn’t bother fighting it, he was right. Moral of the story…The cop said that normally he does not tell people how he clocked them, but since I had been polite, he’d share his strategy with me. I filed that information for future use.

43

Each judge is as unique as a snowflake. You can’t really predict one’s behavior from another’s.

In my state all judges are appointed. None are elected. The appointment judge. Will check on the municipal court judges. By necessity a large number of tickets are downgraded in plea bargains. Of the ones that go to trial the judge can not be seen to always side with one party. A judge with a 100% conviction rate will not last long. The same goes the other way. In my jurisdiction it is laughable to say that no one has a chance to win. Most don’t win because their argument hinges on some irrelevant point like they OP. Either the “yes but” defense or the “ah-hah!” defense. Something a lawyer would never go forward with.