Answer:


A patient once said to a doctor " It hurts if I do this"

The doctor said, "well... then don't do that."

 

Most of the time going to court is a waste of time, lose more money missing work than the ticket or insurance is going to cost. I would still go.

 

Howie, about a month ago, a city police officer stopped me for flashing my high beams in his rear vieew mirror. I wasn't, but he thought I was.

He came up to my car and told me that he stopped me for flashing the high beams. "Don't do that." he said.

I said, "Officer, I wasn't flashing the high beams. These are HID lights with a sharp cut off. I can't change that."

He said, "I know what HID lights are. Don't you ever do that again or I will ticket you."

When I got home and told my teenage son what had happened, he said, "Dad, you gave him the wrong answer, even if it was true. You should have said, 'I won't flash my high beams in your rear view mirror any more, officer.'"

Even if you gave the right answer, you gave the wrong answer, Howie.

Barry

 

I got pulled over once in my Prelude as a "routine traffic stop", what a load of BS.

What was happening was (keep in mind at NO point throughout this did I break the speed limit) I was zig zagging to get out of the slow moving (less than the speed limit) traffic, I knew the cop was there, but I wasn't breaking the limit or driving recklessly, so I didn't care. Anyhow a couple minutes later while we're stopped at a light, he turns on his lights. I pull over and he proceeds to ask me a series of insulting questions. It started off with the usual inconsiderate "Can I see your license and registration". How about you "$%^$@%@$ TELL MY WHY YOU PULLED ME OVER ARSEHOLE".. so he says things like "Have you been stopped before? Have you ever been to jail?" I'm pissed and I'm sure quite snarky in my responses to him. He looks all over the car, I know he's looking for something. Eventually he finds something, I didn't sign my registration (what happened is there's a fold on the registration where the signature line is, I had to fold it to get it to fit in those plastic holders in the those dealer folders you keep you car manual in. So I never saw the signature line.

Besides, I have to show my license and insurance to get my registration. Why doesn't the clerk who handles your registration renewal require you to sign it before you walk off with it? I have my signature and name on my license, and my name is on the registration, what's the big deal? Anyhow.. he fines me something like $120... for not signing my registration. Unbelieveable.

I wondered if I was more polite (for being pushed around like that) that I might not have gotten the ticket. But he DID pull me over, so I'm sure he would have look for something anyhow. I was so going to fight it and I told him that... but the fact was.. I didn't sign the registration, so other than providing a wonderful inconvience for the cop and the court (sucking up some more tax dollars) just to loose didn't seem worth it once I calmed down.

I won't recommend one action above the other. If you're wrongfully pulled over, I think you should be allowed to spit in their face for wasting your time. High beams, and moving quickly and safely through traffic (instead of driving like one of the cattle) are really NOT valid reasons to waste my time or my tax dollars.

You can't tell me that cop could tell from his beaded seat inside his car 10 feet away that my registration wasn't signed and he had better pull me over to handle that.

Then again, you get some cops like a woman who pulled me over 18 months ago for doing 68 in a 50 zone (km/h). It's such a joke too because the road is 4 lanes wide and on a sunday morning empty as all hell. I wasn't endangering anything, anyhow.. she had probable cause. After looking through my papers she points out my insurance card isn't recent. "oops". So I say I will deliver proof to the station within the required time, but I DO have valid insurance. However the law changed here and it's a $60 or something fine as you have to keep it on you at all times. She asked me about what I was paying for insurance and my record. And she waived it... and she knocked my fine down to 15km over the limit so I was spared any points on my record. Here I did two things wrong, and I got a considerate police officer who understood there was nothing malicious about either charge and gave me a break.

'Tis life I guess.

 

I once got a ticket right in front of my own aprtment for 1) failure to stop at a stop sign, 2) failure to yield t pedestrians, and 3) unnecessazry use of the horn. What had happened was that as I came up to the stop sign, I saw some friends crossing in the crosswalk. I stopped early (behind the first line), honked at my friends and waved, and proceeded through the intersection only to stop suddenly b/c a car was speeding towards the intersection! It turned out to be a cop who waved me into th eintersection. As soon as I turned into the intersection, he pulled me over!

I took this one to court and despite witnesses and such, my attitude in court (utterly disrespectful to the officer) and my approach (make the officer look like a total jack ass since he had th ecolor of my car wrong AND my race wrong too) probably caused the judge to find me guilty of one count, the stop sign. I must admit though that while that was the WRONG approach, I did feel better afterwards The entire courtroom laughed as I presented all the stupid things the officer did. In sort of a weird way, it was worth it.

 

Last Winter (I live in Edmonton, Alberta, Can.) on my way to work in my truck (after 6 inches of snow fell that night)
I was pulled over and given a $70. ticket for having a partially obscured licence plate. The cops even took a picture of it. When I ask why 'I' was pulled over and not the 85% of the other cars on the road, he says 'I guess it's just your lucky day'
For the rest of the trip to work I counted 135 cars/trucks/buses with snow on their plates.
The next day I brought my camera and after stopping a 3 Donut shops (really) I found 2 cop cars with snow covering their plates. Took some pictures - went to court - was very polite to the judge - and got off. The judge even told the officer to not waste the courts time in the future.

 

Warren
Good man.

Damn cops trying to reach their quotas. I bet in Bedford,NS where there are bylaws against fragrances and smoking in public they'd probably cite you at the end of the month

 

way to MOCK JUSTICE ed...

i got a CHP to bring down a 100mph speeding/reckless (weaving, heavy traffic go ahead and b!tch at me) to following too closely. i didn't even have registration or photo ID when i got pulled over either!!!

 

I think for the most part if you take it to court you have a good chance of winning. I guess it's reasonable to think that unless one is really being wrongly accussed one wouldn't spend the time to go to court to argue against the ticket.

Here in Canada, students or jobless people can go to court and argue that they don't have enough money to pay for the ticket. You do get a few bucks off. A lot of people don't show up to court though. The real waste of money is tax paper's money. Like everything the more rights you have the more abuse of rights there is whether it's the police or the average individual.

Anyhow, my friend's dad got a ticket for running the red light too (turning left) and he went to court to argue that the policeman was too far away to tell and he won.

So my thinking is that perhaps the policeman being an eyewitness isn't enough. Unless he has something recorded, it's your word against his and since there is reasonable doubt you should win.