The right to refuse service in a retail store.

Are the speed traps targeted at town residents?
Have they stolen from your store? If they do, and you can catch them on video, you will be in good shape to complain.
Is everyone else mad at them? If so, you might think about running for office. A motivated collection of voters could cause a lot more trouble for the police than you excluding them from your store.

You can refuse to serve Joe, the nasty, bigoted, rude, mean-spirited priest, but you have to be careful to make it very clear exactly why.

I agree. Most “speedtraps” are for people just passing through, who don’t know about sudden change in the speed limit. If the police are merely arresting folks who break traffic laws–tough.

Yes, catch any shoplifters on video.

Get together with other folks who object to police misbehavior. You might accomplish something. An Independent Anti-Cop Crusade sounds dangerous.

This was a prime example of a speed trap: New Rome, Ohio

Get creative. Something that other businesses have received publicity over, but probably not for this specific reason. Post a sign, “no weapons permitted”. They could come in for official business (where you called them) but not to shop on their own.

To the OP, I have to ask: Where do you live?

Our restaurant had a sign saying “We reserve the right to serve refuse to anyone.” Now read that again s l o w l y word by word. We got a lot of laughs out of it over the years.

There are many “cities” in the US that consist of nothing but “speed traps” with Municipal/Mayor’s courts and are just big money grabs and ways to harass (mostly poor and minority) people. They have judges and court clerks who make an extra 20-30 grand for working a few hours a month and poor people have arrest warrants (often with no proof or record keeping at all) in multiple cities for the same minor traffic offense. It has absolutely nothing to do with safety. It’s revenue and their only funding and reason for existence of many towns. One interesting article that came out of the Ferguson situation examined the relationship with police/courts in a part of Missouri that has something like 16 different cities within 10 miles, all averaging several tickets and outstanding warrants per resident. One of the guys in the article is a small business owner who runs a car repair shop and is constantly harassed by police who wait around looking for dubious reasons to ticket him. Plus, if the police want to pull you over and find something to ticket you for they will- since EVERYONE breaks multiple laws often unintentionally. It’s very rare that any given individual never breaks any laws in the course of his average day. If you’ve never experienced this or had friends or family who have, consider yourself fortunate due to your environment and/or class. Many people do have to experience needing to drive an old car with minor “safety” issues, struggling to pay outrageous fines, or not looking the “right” way in the wrong place, etc.

My dad was caught in a speed trap 60 or 70 years ago: the road went through a cutting, and the speed sign was up on the top of the cutting.

A year or so after, they made the mistake of catching a big-city-lawyer, who took them up to the state court to have them stopped. Probably wouldn’t get away with anything so obvious now. …Got to hate those big-city-lawyers.

This strikes me as counter-productive. IANAL, but aren’t police officers exempt from following “No Firearms” signs since they are required to carry a weapon in the performance of their duties? And in many jurisdictions, police officers are considered to be “on duty” 24/7 whether on or off the clock and whether in or out of uniform, and are required to carry a weapon even off duty. And what if the cop refused to leave his weapon outside, who would you call? Another cop? The sheriff? The state police? It seems you’d be opening yourself up to even more harassment. Perhaps one of our legal Dopers like Oakminster or one of our LEOs like Loach could weigh in. I couldn’t find anything on a Google search.

As a business owner who has refused service to people (mostly due to bad debts), I’ll point out that telling someone you want nothing to do with them isn’t the easiest thing to do. I fire maybe one client a year, and it’s not something I enjoy.

A few years ago two employees approached me about a potential new client they did not want to interact with. His name was known locally due to his arrest and conviction on molestation charges. He served too little time (locals believed) due to a plea bargain and was back out.

My staff was adamant and they seldom ask for anything, so I spoke with the guy face to face. I apologized, then was brutally honest about the situation. He was cool about it. I got the feeling he had similar things going on elsewhere. It seemed more difficult for me than him.

If you don’t want local cops in your business you’re going to have to tell them the details face to face at some point. Can you?

I can see refusing too allow kids or teens into your store with the issues of shoplifting.

I’ve heard the VERY expensive stores like in NYC are by appointment only and the rest of us are barely allowed to look into the windows.

We had a pub/hotel/bar here that tried to ban police officers for a while. On the grounds, more or less, that they were a form of organised crime, and that the local plod was not welcomed by the owner or his clients. Publicans explicitly have the right and the responsibility to ban people.

The courts sided with the police force, which sided with the police officers, who thought, more or less, that they are allowed to go anywhere they want, and particularly into bars where people don’t want them.

I find this anti-police stuff to be odd because I know of no better security than a police car sitting in front of your business.

In fact in our area many convenience stores offer police, especially at night, free coffee and soft drinks. This also extends to uniformed security officers since their cars often resemble police cars and they are often armed.

Hence, even in high crime areas those stores dont have to have employees hiding behind glass and almost never a robbery or even shoplifitng. Why? Their is almost always 1 or 2 police cars or security guard cars parked out front.

I can’t say how it is in every state. Around here (I will include both NY and NJ) for the purposes of this issue you are not considered on duty all the time. A private business can prohibit guns from being on the premises. They would not be able to keep you out if it was your jurisdiction and you are there on official business. But many places do not allow any weapons. This usually comes up at large venues like sports arenas. On a LEO page I frequent one of the most frequently asked (and repeated) questions is “Can I carry at ___ ?” Sometimes yes, sometimes no.

I used to work at a convenience store when I was a teenager, and there were a whole lot of times uniformed cops none of us knew from Adam would just walk in, pour themselves a cup of coffee, and walk back out without ever saying a word to anyone. And that was totally fine. The store owner had specifically told us and the local force that any and all on-duty police officers were welcome to free coffee/fountain drinks/donuts/cookies. If things were pretty dead, they’d usually stop and chat a minute, maybe get a pastry. If we had a line at the registers, they’d just hoist their cup at us on the way out the door, usually getting a smile and small wave in return. Nobody ever came behind the counter to get their own pastry during any of my shifts, but I’m not saying it never happened.

I can see how that might look pretty entitled/corrupt if you’re not familiar with the idea of businesses giving cops small freebies, and I did have a few customers ask me if I had noticed that guy just walking out without paying for his coffee. One or two seemed a little taken aback when I said “Oh yeah, and I would have grabbed him a free donut if he wanted one. We like having them around, especially on the late shifts.”

Don’t some police forces have anti-corruption rules that prohibit even so much as a free cup of coffee?

Hope the police enjoy their drinks with extra spit. :rolleyes:

Some do. Some allow for gifts of small amounts like a $2 cup of coffee. Around here DD will give us drinks for free. I always thank them and leave at least a dollar in the tip cup. They are happy to have us show up, especially the midnight guys.