The last time I got pulled over was in Romania. I was riding a motorcycle with plates from the UK. Motorcycles are rare in Romania and most are from out of the country so he knew I wasn’t from there. I know I wasn’t going over the 40kms he said I was as I knew about getting tickets in other countries.
It was an expensive ticket, and would have been a really bad problem if I didn’t have the money. It was something like 50 euros, or 2 million leas or whatever they are there. I had just enough to cover it, and as it was a Saturday or some such I couldn’t have gone to the bank to get more to pay it. He had also kept my passport so I couldn’t have exchanged money either. I would have been stuck. The worst part is he didn’t even write me a ticket. I would have loved to have had a ticket from Romania. I wonder how much he pocketed.
A few years ago I got stopped for an expired inspection sticker. It was expired by quite a bit, so I can’t say I didn’t deserve it. There was nothing wrong with the car, I’d just procrastinated about getting it done until I forgot about it. I remembered pretty quick though when I saw the cop car whip around to follow me. Oops.
The only time I have ever been pulled over was when I was in college. It was around 3am in the morning, and some friends and I were driving back from the grocery store to our apartment. We were driving in incoming lanes, swerving a lot, and just generally being dumb. A cop pulled us over, asked for insurance and whatnot, but let us go. He was exceedingly nice, and he just told us to be really careful because even if it seems a road is deserted, accidents can happen.
I still have no idea why he let us go or didn’t at least test us for intoxication, but I appreciate it.
I was speeding on the 395 last time. I have no excuse. Fortunately, speeding tickets are cheap in the city of Independence, CA. I admitted to speeding and the cop seemed to appreciate it and was very nice to me. Even wrote down a lower speed then what he got me for. My friend, on the other hand, once got pulled over for speeding. He mentioned he donates to some cop golf charity. Seemed a little cheesy to me and I think the cop thought so too.
I got a seat belt ticket once about 10 seconds after I left my house. That was annoying. I pulled out of the driveway, turned onto a small street that connects to the bigger street and reach to put my seat belt on before I turn. A cop saw me and gave me a ticket.
After crashing my Camry, I had to use my mom’s Range Rover, aka The Worst Car Evar, I got pulled over because the lights in the back were out. I got a ticket for that, and for not having insurance in the car (would have been nice to know before I went out driving). Both of those tickets were “fix it” tickets though and I did just that. Funny thing is, the light had just decided to short out for the time I was driving and while the cop was inspecting it. When I took the car home, a simple tap on the light got it working again.
One time, while towing my boat back home, the cop told me to slow down over the megaphone. I was going 55 at the time, which is the speed limit for cars with trailers. He sped past me and parked a few miles up the freeway waiting for me. Fortunately, I had slowed down to 50mph.
Last summer. Driving up to my parents house with my kids in my brand new (used - new to me) Mustang. I was apparently doing 65 in a 40. Completely possible. I got a warning. I’m just glad it wasn’t Christmas Eve.
I was pulled over a couple of weeks ago just before Christmas. I was the third car in line at the light next to a semi in the other lane. As the light turned green I didn’t really accelerate hard just enough to eventually come up to the speed limit.
I was talking to my buddy and didn’t notice that the lanes were merging just as I got in front of the semi. My friend turned to me and said “I think that truck is trying to get over” I didn’t even look at the truck just tapped the gas and pulled ahead of him and as I did he honked at me. As he honked I saw a CHP on the side of the road with another car pulled over and watched the chippy stare at my car. Unfortunately, my truck in from New Mexico and so doesn’t have a front license plate.
I figured that that would get the cops attention so I turned to my buddy and told him that we were probably about to get pulled over. I pulled on to the free way and My friend moved his ID around. About 5 min later the chippy came screaming up behind me and pulled me over. I’m pretty sure he let his other stop off with a warning to catch me.
I exited the freeway and pulled over as the officer walked up to the car my friend rolled down him window and the chippy accused me of passing the truck over a double yellow. I barely managed to not tell him exactly how wrong he was only because I had had him beat and I knew it, see my buddy is a cop.
Any how, he tells the officer that he has a loaded gun on his hip and that he has both his badge and license with him in the officer needs to see it. I hand over my license and registration and the Chippy asks my buddy if he informed me I was doing something illegal during my maneuver and of course my friend responded to the affirmative. At which point I was let off. So I don’t think I deserved it and I didn’t get one.
2 years ago, with my then 5 yr old in the back, coming back from Kindergarten.
Totally deserved it. Totally got off…
Got caught in a notorious speed trap, where a highway goes down from 80 kph to 50, and it was a construction zone with workers present, which doubles the fines. The day before, my son had been playing cops give tickets with his in-home therapist. To add variety to the play scenario, she would sometimes have the cops “impound” cars or arrest drivers who had done bad things. So now my son burst into tears, complete with quivering lower lip, puppy eyes to shame Lassy, and great big fat globular tears dropping off his eyelashes. I lower both driver side windows, have my wallet on my dash, hands on the wheel. The cop explains that I was clocked at 78. I agree, and said I totally forgot about the construction zone, all the while trying to reassure the boy that we were not going to jail, our car was not going to be taken away, that the officer was a nice man just doing his job, and that he would just give Papa a paper and then we could go home. The squirt was having none of it. I totally wasn’t getting through, which can happen when he’s scared.
Cop comes back, and explains to me that, with the construction zone rule, the fine for 28 above is $672. And three points. I nod. He then explains to me that I am going to get an unusual ticket. My fine is to take the boy immediately, before lunch, somewhere where he can have an ice cream. At this point, I’m willing to buy the kid a pint of hagen dasz. I explain this to my son. This is so not like the script he had in his head that he doesn’t understand it until he’s halfway through the first scoop of double chocolate fudge chunk.
For a year after or so, whenever he saw a cop car, he would say: “Faster Papa! I want to get a ticket…”
In 1996, for doing 14 over the 55 limit on a rural expressway at night after having exited from a 70 mph freeway. Paid the $64 fine by mail vs. going 80 mile to the court, got 3 license points and paid hefty insurance surcharge for 3 years. Fortunately, I was not offered the option of http://www.charlotteobserver.com/topstories/story/1162195.html
I was running late to work. It was an early Saturday morning, and it was overtime, but I didn’t really have to be in at a specific time; I’d just said I’d probably be in by eight, and it was about eight-fifteen. I pull off the tollway, and I’m in spitting distance of my building. All I have to do is turn right, drive about 100 feet, and turn right into the complex.
Of course, I just barely miss the light, even though I’ve got plenty of time to turn. The signs said no right turn on red, but there was only one car, it was in the far lane, and he hadn’t started moving yet. So I turned.
And the cop–who was that only other car–follows me into the complex. I get pulled over. I’m polite, give him my license, registration, and insurance card. He mentions the sign. I deny having seen it. The address on my license is for a town 50 miles away, so I guess he believed me. I only got a warning.
I’m not proud of having lied, but. . .okay. When I was 18, I used to speed. Got pulled over for it. Missed a stop sign, got a ticket for that. Had a suspended license (this is statuatory when you’re under 18 and have two tickets). I was paying out the ass for insurance, and didn’t want another ticket on my record. Since then, I’ve not been pulled over. . .but I’m also a really careful driver. This was about five years ago.
I got ticketed for going 65 in a 45 on Halloween on a stretch of highway near my home, and it cost about $200.00. There were other things I could have been ticketed for, but wasn’t, so I got off lightly.
The time I got pulled over before the Mustang incident was funnier. This was maybe 5 years ago. I was driving a Kia. It was uninspected. I knew it was uninspected. I can’t remember exactly what was wrong with it but I hadn’t gotten it fixed or replaced or whatever.
I’m pulling into a plaza parking lot heading toward a Wendy’s. The cop follows me into the lot and follows right behind me the whole way across the thing until I park at the place. He stops behind my parked car and watches me cross to the door. I even looked at him and shrugged and gave him a “is it me? What did I do?” gesture, and he didn’t do anything. So I went inside and grabbed a baked potato or whatever the hell it was and when I went back to my car … cop gone. Odd. Strange even.
I snake my way back across the parking lot and just as I’m about to pull out into the street, he flips the blues on and pulls me over in the lot. Gives me the ol’, “Any reason why you don’t have a valid inspection sticker?” deal. To which I replied, “Not really. Sorry.”
It was a fair cop. What was I gonna do? So he takes my license and registration and proof of insurance back to the cruiser. And sits there. And sits there. And sits there some more. I’m thinking, what am I Dillinger, here? What the fuck is taking so long for.
He comes striding back to the window, hands my shit and says simply, “Computer’s down. Have a nice day;” goes back to his cruiser and drives away.
I was last pulled over for expired tabs. While I didn’t get ticketed, the pig was still an asshole. My tabs had been expired for all of nine hours (first of the month) and I was on my way to pay them up - the Dept. of Licensing letter and check for tabs was on the passenger seat. The officer asked me why I had allowed my tabs to expire, made me wait around while he ran my license, then proceeded to lecture me about how I needed to pay more attention and how he could have written me a citation for whatever the fine for expired tabs was at the time :rolleyes:
I was pulled over for my first and only time in 17 years of driving this July first. I was driving down a street that I knew to be a bit of a speed trap. The limit is 30mph, but it is one of those roads that just feels like you ought to be able to go faster, so a lot of people do so, and end up getting ticketed. Anyway, a car was following me very closely, almost to the point of tailgating, but not quite. Knowing that cops hang out there a lot, I resisted the urge to speed up and kept to the limit, or at least not more than two mph above it.
After a stoplight, I turn the corner, and the lights go on in the closely following vehicle, which is, of course, an unmarked police car. I pull over, and eventually the officer comes over. After asking for and receiving my license and insurance card, he asks accusingly if my stepson in the front passenger seat just put on his seat belt when we stopped. The cop said that it looked to him as if my stepson hadn’t been wearing it while he (the cop) was following me. My stepson answered, truthfully, that he had put the seat belt on before we had left our own driveway.
The cop didn’t press the issue, and let us go. I’m still wondering what that was all about. I’m thinking he was hoping to get me for an expired sticker fine, (my town issues yearly vehicle permits every July 1) and since my sticker was up-to-date he was looking for something else to harass me over. Since I wasn’t speeding, he tried the seat belt thing.
I had forgotten to put my headlights on in the dark. On balance I’d say I didn’t deserve it because I was driving through places with bright lights so everyone could see each other and it was hard to notice your lights were off, but I could see it going either way. Cop talked to me enough to make sure I didn’t seem drunk and let me go.
But even more recently I was driving through New Mexico and went through a checkpoint where everyone had to pull over, which I understand are looking for both DUIs and illegals. Asked me where I was going, and I hesitated for a second because I was driving to visit my brother in Albuquerque but was not going to get there that night but rather stop in a motel somewhere. So I hesitated for a second and said “ummm…Albuquerque.” And I was free to go despite the thought he might use his hesitation to talk to me further to make sure I wasn’t drunk.
It was a minute or so later that I realized that the American pronunciation of “Albuquerque” is literally a good shibboleth, because nearly every syllable has a sound that is pronounced slightly different in American English (not that I don’t look American or anything but if there were doubts…)
I decided to gun it to make a yellow light, and didn’t notice the cop - oops! I made the light, but exceeded the speed limit to do so. Luckily, he didn’t have time to actually check my speed with any official device, so I got off with a warning. I think I was like 19. Very careful driver since then.
OTOH - my husband fully deserved the ticket he got. Similar situation - hubby gunned it to make a light, and didn’t beat the red. Of course the cop was just waiting to turn onto the street we were on, so hubby pulled over before the cop was even behind him. “Do you know why I pulled you over tonight?”
“Yep - absolutely! Ran that red light just back there. Here’s my license and registration, and I’ll wait right here for my ticket. Thanks and have a good night.”
About 6 years ago, driving home on Christmas eve I was pulled over for a random breath test - I’d had one drink just a few minutes previously (and said so) - the officer made me wait 15 minutes in the car so the test would work properly. I blew in the tube and the light stayed green - he wished me a merry Christmas and sent me on my way.
