I have a friend who was arrested for speeding. He received a penalty that included two days in jail. While there he was assaulted and molested.
For speeding!
Go for it. Fight it like the plague. I did, and won. And… AND… God it felt good, made the cop look like the complete asshole he was.
My situation is much different than yours, but it may give you some insight into what lies ahead.
Go back four years or so. This cop stops me, asks me my name etc., goes to his car for what seemed like an eternity, comes back and accuses me of lying to him and sends me off to the pooky. Charged the Hell out of me (my drivers license middle name, that was at home at that time, was different from my birth certificate. I came up as not existing on his computer. I never new).
One pissed off cop and one guy in cuffs. Scariest thing that’s happened to me to date.
I was released the next day and immediately got an attorney. Told him exactly what happened to the best of my recollection. Waited and waited.
Court date came and we all go before the judge. The cop gets up on the stand and proceeds to lie his ass off before the Judge and prosecutor, saying I was belligerent, gave false information, and became combative! Jerkoff. Had a witness who countered all of the above. Big key to winning, bring in every shred of evidence, even things you don’t think are relevant, people who witnessed the arrest and the like. You can never have too much.
My attorney’s turn, goes up and proceeds to rip the cop a new asshole. My guy: “you were found guilty by the police department administration of seeing a movie while on duty. Is that correct sir? ‘Ahh, well yeah. But that was years ago’. Your report fails to mention blah blah blah, is that procedure? ‘well, no but I…’. You haven’t followed procedure in ___ number of arrests, have you.” It was truly a great day, watching him squirm.
The end result? all charges dismissed and a nice speech from the judge to the cop telling him to knock it off. Ahh, justice.
But it was justice at a price. $2,500.00 for the attorney and his research staff, any number of months to get there, and the fact that they treated me guilty as charged up until that day. It was costly, but worth it. Especially because of the attitude the cop and the department took. Kind of a “yeah, right, sue me you lowly civilian. You wont get anywhere because we’re the law”
I actually thought about settling the damn thing, everyone around me wanted me to (I think that’s there main objective anyway, charge the Hell outta ya and settle) but I didn’t.
Now I know this doesn’t represent your case at all, but my point here is if you feel they were wrong, by all means go for it! It may seem unwinnable (sp?) but so did mine and I won. It’s people that take this shit that allows them to continue to do it their way.
Good luck, you will feel better about it, even if the end result is you only tie them up with dealing with your shit.
SkySlash, you seem to be taking it much better than I would and I commend you for that. I had a somewhat similar situation some months ago upon entering the US returning from Asia. I was held for some hours and questioned and searched and humiliated. I came out feeling totally violated and humiliated. In the end they just let me go because they had nothing but I felt like shit. The guy read every single paper I had and humiliated me by reading some very personal letters from my girlfriend and looking at her photos. I have never felt worse in my life. This is a guy who works for the US government and has the authority to do this…
As I say, if you can avoid feeling like I did i commend you for that. You are much better off.
Feel free to e-mail me, SkySlash. I can help you get in touch with a local media who might be very happy to take note of this…
Yer pal,
Satan
TIME ELAPSED SINCE I QUIT SMOKING:
Three months, two weeks, four days, 1 hour, 53 minutes and 36 seconds.
4363 cigarettes not smoked, saving $545.39.
Life saved: 2 weeks, 1 day, 3 hours, 35 minutes.
Vist the The Fabulous Forums of Fathom
If there’s only a 1,000 people in the town, have you considered running for local office? Seriously. There must be other folks in the town that are pissed that want a change as well.
Were we in the Pit, you would all be treated to a Angry Guy rant about how this sort of thing happened to me, and how I was able to deal with it.
But, since it’s not appropriate in MPSIMS, just use your imagination…
<insert two-page long, expletive laden rant, in the grand tradition of the Angry Guy, about how it sucks to pay a stupid fine and have insult added to injury, here>
"…And they offer you a personal bond
But you don’t stand a chance.
It’s all just talk
Don’t believe you’re gonna walk
Until they give you back your wallet and your pants.
It's Saturday Night In Jail
No one to go your bail
You call your friends on the telephone
Leave a message when you hear the tone
If you ever get back outside
You're never gonna take that ride
Might have been down here before
But you ain't comin' back no more!"
Saturday Night In Jail
Steve James
Boom Chang
I know I’m taking a chance with the moderators but I figure that’s a “fair use” excerpt, not a full transcription.
As for law enforcement–that 99.9% figure is WAY off. When public protection was replaced with the “Code of Silence” and the “Brotherhood of Blue”, I lost the respect I’ve ever had for our “public servants”. Mostly, guys like this are just small-time shake down artists and deserve no more respect than any other common hood. Oh, except for the guys that get their thrill dressing up in body armor and storm-trooping all over hell and gone.
Geez, I’m in a poor mood–should’ve never come out of the Pit. I’ll stand by it, though.
Man, I live in Bedford (another small, forgotten DFW suburb) and I’ve never even heard of this place! Huh…
However, I have nothing to contribute to the subject at hand.
Seriously, call the ACLU. jeez, doesn’t anybody listen. Oh, and if you live in a State that uses a county Civil Grand Jury, complain to them. Write your congresscritter, your assemblyman, your Governor.
That’s crazy SkySlash, really!
I think getting your story aired with the local media is a good idea.
Someday you’ll look back at it and have a good laugh (or a good story at least).
Sky -
You should be thankful it wasn’t the city of Pantego. They would have given you the chair! (Be extra careful if you are ever headed west on Park Row between Fielder and Bowen. When you enter the Pantego city limits at the bottom of the hill, the speed limit suddenly drops to 30 mph. And there’s usually a Pantego cop waiting for you on the other side.)
A little history lesson: Dalworthington Gardens came into existence as part of Franklin Roosevelt’s Subsistence Homestead Program - sort of a Depression Era housing project for the rural areas. It was basically a group of small farms provided by the government to poor farmers. Over time, DWG and Pantego became completely surrounded by Arlington (est. pop. 300,000). So what you have is a couple of hick country towns smack dab in the middle of one of the largest cities in Texas. Naturally you get the Mayberry mentality that goes along with that.
It is absolutely ludicrous for Deputy Dawg to arrest you at work over a mere $10.00 fine.
Sue them, air your complaints, let the world know just exactly how low this excuse for a police department is.
Repeat after me “I am sick of this shit and I will not take anymore!”
I’d just like to mention that this has MAJOR Alice’s Restaurant potential. Something this ridiculous warrants a song written about it.
SkySlash, I second Bill H. on this one. Run for mayor or for town council, or whatever they have. Sounds like this could happen to anyone in town, and in a town that small, it wouldn’t take that many votes to get you elected.
He lives in Texas. George Dubya Bush would probably order him to be taken out and shot.
It’s all part of the Clinton/Gore plan to put 100,00 new officers on the streets. Many of the officers are in place and now the departments have to find something for these guys to do. So the same thing happens in the police department that happens at your place of employment when you’re not busy. They do pointless bullshit. Like tracking down unpaid ten dollar fines and arresting the “miscreant.”
How else can you explain 75 cops for 1000 citizens. That’s ridiculous.
Up here in Sylvania, Ohio, the local police force has doubled in size over the last two years and the budget has increased by 250%. They admit freely it’s all from the funds provided by the federal government (your tax dollars by the way) under their plan to put more cops on the street.
So, what happens up here now? There are two or three patrol cars that show up for most traffic violations. They also have check points set up nearly every weekend. The number of traffic tickets issued has increased dramatically. Rather than have these guys do something useful, like investigations of past crimes, they send them out to do something that generates revenue, like writing traffic tickets. They know the tax dollars aren’t going to last forever, and they’ll need a method to fund all these new officers when the tax money does run out.
And the citizens think this is good (and we’re a very conservative Republican little town). Bite me. It’s a police state.
I’m all for law and order, but it is absolutely outrageous to arrest a person for failing to pay a fine. Being arrested is pretty humiliating, I imagine, and it should be reserved for people who are dangerous or who have done something really bad, like stealing from the school’s athletic booster fund. (We had a guy here do that a couple years ago. HE should have been stoned.)
If I were you, I wouldn’t hire a lawyer unless I had money sitting around doing nothing. Instead, I’d fight it by writing a letter to the editor. And by posting your story on the internet. A lot. Don’t just whine about it, try to CHANGE it to some other poor bastard doesn’t have to go through what you did.
I mean, it would have cost the municipality less than a buck to send you a nice letter. They could have even waited til after the grace period and soaked you for more cash, if they wanted to be nasty. But to show up at your work and arrest you? That’s just outrageous.
Oh God, Sky. I don’t know what to say. I have to tell you I was literally nauseous reading your OP. I cannot even imagine how scared you must have been.
Listen, whatever you choose to do about this situation…and I know you will…be very careful, get good advice and lots of it. Shit, with 75 officers for 1000 citizens, you SHOULD feel safe. And you were thinking they were on your side…
Keep your chin up.
struuter
As someone who’s recieved a couple of tickets in DWG, I feel your pain. I just found out I have a warrant out, but at least they sent me a letter letting me know. Sorry man. All I can say is, AVOID DWG! Nothing to see there. Move along.
I just talked to our Senior Vice President. I was scared shitless because he called me into his office at 8:01 AM and his secretary said it was urgent. I got in his office and his first question was, “Why were you escorted by a police officer by my office yesterday?”
I spilled my guts, told him the whole story, and his reply: “You’re fucking kidding me laughter.”
I kinda laughed and said, “No, its all true, thats what it was all about.”
He laughed a bit, made a few jokes and said, “Do yourself a favor, don’t ever drive through that shithole again.”
I promised I wouldn’t, we laughed a bit more…and I left his office a bit less of a nervous wreck than when I went in.
That was more than I could have hoped for…
-SS 