I've been to court enough times, as well as more than my fair share of defensive driving courses to give my opinion. I have asked judges, police officers, and driving instructors the same question, can a police officer, fireman, ambulance drivers speed without lights and siren? I get the same answer everytime, no. They are not above the law and must follow the same laws we do. One answer I will always remember was no, but if you or a loved one are injured wouldn't you want them to get there as soon as possible? True, but with a light and siren.

I once was heading home on the beeline when some a hole was tail gating me. I kept speeding up to get the car off my ***. Well just so happens it was a DOT officer. I asked why was he tailgating me and his reply was to see how fast I would go. Completely unfair and I lost the case pretty much. I didn't get points, I had to attend school for 8 hours, no court costs, and I owed the original fine.

Fought a ticket this month I got in December, same outcome. Paid the lawyer $150. the only real benefit is court ordered driving school doesn't count against my lifetime maximum of 5. There is a limit of one driving course per year, but with a lawyer i've been 3 times in one year

 

They're not called attorney's if they're doing that.

 

Always blame someone else. Taking responsibility would be nice for a change. If it happened to me I would feel like a fool, pay the fine and try not to embarrass myself anymore.

 

I find comments like this very troubling. I was never a big ticket writer either, but I stopped a lot of cars during my patrol days and gave hundreds, if not thousands, of verbal or written warnings. Was I not doing my job? Part of traffic enforcement is also education. I served on a department that put a tremendous emphasis on DUI enforcement, and we consistently ranked in the top 10 departments for DUI arrests state-wide for many years.

You also have to take into consideration that officers from larger towns and cities spend most of their time going from call-to-call. I have friends who were on the Chicago PD that probably didn't write 10 tickets during their whole career.

I could be wrong, but if you were 1 of the 10 people he did write a ticket to, you'd probably be be claiming you didn't deserve it.

 

You are wrong. I deserved every ticket I have gotten and like everyone else, should have gotten many more. I didn't whine about it or blame someone else. I took responsibility, paid the fine and moved on.
A cop handing out a couple tickets a year is not doing his job.

 

A defense of "I shouldn't be charged with speeding because someone if front of me was speeding" is a waste of time, whether the car in front was a cop or not. If a cop robbed a bank, would it be ok for you to rob one, too? He broke the law, so I should be able to. Won't fly in court.

 

That depends. Many departments do not have the manpower to act as traffic control and also work to solve or prevent more serious crimes, so they focus on the greater evil. How many times have you heard people complain, "Why don't they go after the real criminals?"

 

Patrol cops don't usually solve or prevent crimes. They answer calls and traffic control is a big part of their job.
A patrol cop could easily write one ticket a day for serious traffic violations without even trying. A cop that pulls over hundreds of people a year and only writes one or two tickets is in the wrong line of work.

 

You're missing the point. Many departments do not have individual departments or designations for their officers. They just have one department with too few police to go around so they concentrate on the more serious crimes. They go from one call to the next and don't have time to deal with traffic violations.

 

I don't know where you live, but there are plenty of cops here in the Midwest. If crime is so bad the cops go from one call to the next, you might want to move to a safer city. I believe cops that don't write tickets are just lazy and avoiding the paperwork. I do not believe they don't have the time because of other crimes.

 

I think it's pretty normal for cops to go from one call to the next in any major city.

 

Maybe at certain times of the day and days of the week, but it gets pretty slow in the mornings and not much going on Mondays. I live next to a major city and the cops are not all that busy. They do their share of cruising and donut eating.

 

Believe what you want. I'd prefer to have the police working on crime rather than writing the occasional speeding ticket. Crime where I live isn't bad at all, but then that's because the priority for the police is solving and preventing crime instead of writing traffic tickets. For example, some of those police are guarding the schools to protect the children, including my daughter.

 

Writing tickets is a way to protect your children from speeding cars that might run them over. There is a better chance of a child getting killed by a speeding car than in school. Thousands of people are killed every year because of speed. I would consider that pretty important.

So you think your kid is safer to have a cop in school babysitting than out on the road stopping dangerous drivers?

 

As my daughter is in school and not out on the roads, yes, she's safer with the officer right there in the same place she is.

 

AFAIK, police vehicles can travel faster than posted speed limits if responding to a call without sirens or lights. However, they must engage their lights when crossing traffic signals that are not in favor of their flow of traffic.

The reason they are allowed to do so above other emergency vehicles is to prevent a suspect from noticing their arrival. However, once the suspect is in visual, their lights and sirens must be activated. If they try to escape and other police vehicles are on their way that were not yet at the scene with lights/sirens off must then activate them. This is what I was told by state police. The lights/sirens are their signal of 'engagement'.

In your case, its not entrapment at all.

However, if all cars are maintaining a speed above the speed limit and you were going along with them you can argue that you were going with the flow of traffic. If you were to obey the speed limit you may have posed a risk to the safety of yourself and others. That is the only way you can easily get out of a speed ticket - other than a cop not showing up.

 

Thousands of kids are killed every year by speeding or drunk drivers. A few dozen are killed in schools. Do the math. Just another example of media sensationalism misdirecting priorities. We would all be safer if more tickets were written and more dangerous drivers taken off the roads.

 

There aren't any drivers in her school when she is there and under guard by a police officer. That WAS the question.

As far as drunk drivers go, that would be one of the more serious crimes I was talking about.

 

Yeah, speeding isn't all that serious. Only 30 percent of
all fatal crashes, and 13,192 lives were lost in speeding-related crashes in 2004. How many kids were killed in school that year? 10?

Speeding is just as serious as drunk driving.

I know several people that died in speed related accidents. Don't know anyone that died in school.

 

I forgot my advice. I think I would plead not guilty and go to court. My defense that might work would be, my speedometer was not working. So I paced myself with what I assumed was a law abiding member of law enforcement. Since he was doing the same speed as there rest of the traffic I felt my speed was legal. His lights weren't on, so again he should be driving the legal limit. How was I to know your honor that the law enforcement officer I was basing my speed on was breaking the law himself?