$200 for 12 over?
 

I was driving back from vacation along 59 North in a rural county in Texas. A was coming down a hill so my car accelerated about 5 MPH. At the bottom was a trooper clocking and he clocked me at 82 in a 70. How much is the ticket? $200 - that is insane.

He also searched my car and asked me if I had an bomb making materials. Quite an ass.

Most states have "escalators" now, like $50 for the first five MPH over the limit, and then an additional $5-$10 per MPH over that.

The fees are 10 MPH and under is $150
11-18 MPH is $200
19-25 is $250
25 and over you have to call

What if the cop pulled somebody over who had bomb making material in his car and the cop paid no attention. Only to have the guy kill 200 people, would the cop still be an ass...

Don't break the law and you won't have anything to bitch about...

don't forget the lame "fees" that are tacked in addition to the fine

A couple months ago I was pulled over in the lovely town of San Angelo (avoid it like the plague, Jeeber will probably agree) at around 12am. I was crossing a bridge where the speed limit was 40, but when you get to the end of the bridge the speed limit becomes 35. I wasn't paying much attention to my speed and I noticed the cop sitting about 40 yards past the bridge. I checked my speed and I was at 44. I really didn't think I would get pulled over for 4mph over the speed limit at 12am. I was wrong. I had to turn at the end of the bridge, so I slowed down as I came off the bridge and turned on my blinker to turn. As I passed the cop she put her lights on and pulled me over. She goes on to tell me I was going 46 in a 35. I had to pay something like $165.

So, either I was clocked earlier on the bridge and she was bored and decided she wanted to pull someone over. Or I sped up as I came off the bridge so I could make the right turn I had to make at the light faster.

Ok Mr. Saint. I am sure you have never sped before. I showed no suspension of bomb making materials the cop was just bored. We do not like asses around here so dont show yours.

I am not bitchin about the ticket. Sure. I was speeding but am bitching about the insane price.

or she just decided to cite you for 46 instead of 44 because it means more money for the police force. She was obviously sitting in a speed trap (the famous at the bottom of a hill where the speed limit lowers) so I wouldn't doubt she put you 1 MPH into the higher fine category.

Did he ask permission to search your car? Did you grant that permission?

He asked I granted. I did not have anything to hide.

http://www.startribune.com/stories/1557/4915799.html

Last update: August 7, 2004 at 12:06 AM
114 mph plus cell phone equals ticket

David Chanen, Star Tribune August 7, 2004 SPEED0807

Not even the speediest fastball in the major leagues could have kept up with a 20-year-old woman from Clearwater, Minn., who was running late for work.

A radar gun clocked Yelena Koop's red Acura at 114 miles per hour on Interstate Hwy. 94 near Monticello about 8 a.m. Tuesday.

The speed limit on that often busy commuting stretch of freeway northwest of the Twin Cities is 70 mph, and Koop was going 44 mph over the speed limit, according to authorities.

Koop, who was talking on a cell phone, apparently didn't immediately notice the state trooper's flashing lights in her rearview mirror, said Nathan Bowie, spokesman for the Department of Public Safety.

Koop was cited for speeding and driving with a revoked license.

The trooper who caught her said he's never given anybody a ticket for such a high speed in his 14 years on the job, Bowie said. But several troopers told him it's not unusual to nab speeders who are going 90 to 100 mph, he said.

Bowie said the fine for going that fast is $220. Koop has a mandatory court date, when she could also be fined $1,000 for the invalid license. She has had two other speeding tickets in the past three years.

She couldn't be reached for comment Friday.

A three-week effort by state law enforcement agencies last month that focused on speeding netted more than 21,000 tickets, which would average nearly 1,200 a day.

Out of 172 agencies that reported tickets, Minneapolis issued the most, 2,132. The Safe & Sober initiative was coordinated by the Public Safety Department's Office of Traffic Safety.

"Motorists sometimes don't see the speed limit as the law and a public safety guide," Bowie said.

He cautioned that driving itself is multitasking, but throw in speeding and talking on a cell phone and there is serious potential for tragedy.

In 2002, inattention was cited as a contributor in 28,413 crashes, which caused 137 deaths and nearly 15,000 injuries in Minnesota.

That same year, illegal or unsafe speeds led to nearly 13,000 crashes, causing 184 deaths and nearly 7,000 injuries.

David Chanen is at [email protected].

You gotta love the bomb-making materials question. What do they expect you to say? "Sure, what do you need?"

Then you can't complain about that.

Sure you can. The question was pointless. Did the cop ask "Do you have any biological weapons in the car?" There's no basis for asking either question as I doubt GE was giving off WMD vibes. Besides, if he had some would he say yes? The question has no purpose at all but to potentially offend the driver.

Besides, if he says no to searching the car then it gets impounded and ripped apart when they get a warrant.

I am just surprised he came out and asked if I had bomb making materials.

There's a second pedal (right next to the gas pedal) that can help with this sort of situation.

Well it's a good thing you hadn't stopped by Home Depot and picked up some fertilizer.

When ever I've been stopped they always ask me if I have any firearms or weapons in the car...not a stretch to ask about bomb materials. It just escalates from personal safety for the officer to public safety. . .not a leap in this day & age.

As far as to the search, forget that. I used to say sure (note: extremely small sample group here), but since I took a law class at school, I feel it's important to not grant permission even if I have nothing to hide. It's a matter of my rights, and protecting them.

Sorry GE, but this one is on you, not the cop.

You chose to break the law.
And then chose to bitch about it the penalty.

Can't do the time? Then don't do the crime.

I keep my car full of trash and empty bottles. No cops want to search my car. :D

I keep a dead body in the trunk. They hate the smell.

He called the cop an ass for asking him if he had bomb making materials in his car, not because he pulled him over for speeding.

The cop WAS an ass for asking him that for reasons I've already pointed out.

the insane price is to stop speeding, isn't it? Now people would think twice.

http://dynamic2.gamespy.com/~fof/for...343#post431343

At least there's a little justice


HAHA!

SI

I dont see how he was being an ass by asking about bomb making materials, its probably required right now. I just came back from a casino in Canada with a large group of friends. Four out of our five cars we took were stopped and searched. That is by far the most trouble I have ever had getting there and back.

Going over the border is far different than being stopped for speeding.

In summary of my previous posts...

It was lame for the cop to ask if he had bomb making materials (is he going to say yes?). Why not ask if he had WMDs in his car? I don't think GE was calling the cop an ass for giving him the speeding ticket, just the bomb question which doesn't do any good but potentially aggrevate the person pulled over.

But, if you decline the search, they might just get pissed and write you the ticket instead of the warning, etc....which some people don't want, especially if they have nothing to hide.

I cannot believe that it is only a 220 dollar fine for going 114 freaking miles an hour. The fine for going that fast should be like 1000 bucks or more, and liscense suspension. That is just unreasonable driving, and there is no reason for ever going that fast, unless someone needs to go to the hospitol(baby born, bleeding, shot....etc)

That was my goal, if I let him do the search, then maybe I would get out of the ticket.

Chubby is right, the guy just seemed like a general ass. My best guess he was bored. I was speeding but was it really neccesary to waste an hour of my time searching my vehicle?

correct, they also might impound your car and rip it to shreds since they now have probable cause. If I was hiding anything then I wouldn't let them search it, but since there's nothing I'm worried about in my car it's worth it to me in the long run to just let them search it. You are then cooperating and they may be more lenient on the speeding ticket (happened a couple of times to me)

keep in mind you also get a boatload of points which hikes up your insurance. The $220 doesn't include mandatory "fees" you have to pay as well.

Wow.....it took him an hour to search your vehicle?
Id have let a cop search my vehicle too, but thats just bullshit. Perhaps you fit a certain profile?

Yeah...All of those fees have got to be insane...


Which is more likely to cause a fatal accident, a bitch driving 114 miles an hour talking on her cellphone, or a guy with a BAC of .09 driving home from the bar? Both are lethal, but one is punished 10-20 fold(at least) of the other.

The actual serach took about 15 minutes. He looked through everything. We had a ton of luggae since we had been n vacation and my girlfriend was moving alot of her stuff to MS. He also ran the tags which took another good 10 minutes and made me get out of the vechicle and talk to him for 10-15 minutes. It was a good 45 minutes to an hour.

I am your usual middle class white guy and the same for my girlfriend except, well, she is a girl.

I liked my altercation with the Oklahoma Highway Patrol last weekend, who clocked me at 74 in a 65, said he motioned for me to slow down, but I didn't, so he said "you must have wanted to have a little visit with me." He proceeded to write me a warning so I wouldn't have to pay, advised me the limit was 65, to which I replied "I guess I'll go that fast then" and he said "...or somewhere around there." And then I was on my way. Also I wasn't put on red terror alert either.

I honestly thought this thread was going to be about golf!

:o

Ya, police are funny guys, you never know what youare going to get. I only have 2 tickets while driving a truck,one in Houston where the cop was an ass. I was going through north of downtown on I-10 when i came up over a hill and there was some large debris in my lane, i punched it so i could get over into the next lane without having to cut a car off, and the cop got me. I was only 5 MPH over the speed limit and he didn't care about anything sitting in the road, pissed me off.

The second was a bigger fine, but i considered myself lucky. It was in San Antonio last year when i was in the middle of buying my house. Left home and got up to SA about 2-3am. The speed limit drops from 60 to 50 as you get near downtown, i was doing 65 but starting to slow when i passed the speed trap, anyways one of the cops got me. As usual he asked for the normal paperwork and license, oh shit, didn't have my license! I had taken in out of my wallet for the mortgage company to make a copy and never put it back in. Thankfully I know my license number by memory, and gave him that, He gave me the ticket for speeding and no license, but it could have been worse, he could have called the state troopers to come give me the third degree and possibly shut me down.

Anyways, only 2 tickets driving a truck. Not bad considering i drive in states like the anit-trucker state of Ohio a lot......

Obviously. Im just making the point that they seem to have stepped up security. Two months ago I doubt even one car would have been searched.

Sorry to hear that, GE. Can you take defensive driving?

In my early years, I sped EVERYWHERE. I ended up paying about $1000 in traffic fines over the years. Finally, I just stopped speeding. Well, I do, but I generally never go more than 5-8 mph over the limit. My friends call me "grandpa", and it drives my wife crazy, but I've saved a lot of money.

It's based on #'s. Every x amount of cars are searched, the lines are no worse now than 7 years ago (going across the Rainbow)

Eighty-two mph seems excessive to me no matter the speed limit. Considering you were also driving in a hilly area with limited visbility (you obviously didn't see the cop car at the bottom of the hill) its not only excessive but stupid IMO. If the $220 makes you more careful in the future you should consider it money well spent.

A friend of mine is a police officer, and the purpose of a question like this is to rattle the driver and observe his reaction. The reaction can often give them an indication of the likelihood of criminal activity.

I got pulled over in Decatur coming back from Everybody's pizza (had some pesto pasta in the car). It was about midnight, no drinks, there are 3 stop signs in a row. I was pretty sure I stopped at all 3. I get through the third one, the cop pulls me over, says I stopped at the first, but kind of rolled through the second. Takes my license. Comes back 10-15 minutes later and asks me what I'm on probation for. I say nothing. He says, well your license is coming up with you on probation. I asked if it was my number, my address, all my info...he says yes. He then tells us to hold on while he goes back to his car. About a minute later, without warning, he sticks his head into the passenger window (my g/f was sitting there) and starts sniffing and looking around saying he smelled something funny. We assured him it was the pesto. Gave it to him to see. He gave us the stink eye.

Comes back 10 minutes later with a ticket for failure to observe a signal and tells me to go get my info checked out so I can "clear" my record. The next day, I go to the Dekalb county police office and ask about my "probation" record (they wouldn't do it on the phone). They tell me they have no idea what I'm talking about. To top it off, I go to court to fight it, and they say they can't possibly handle all the cases, so if anyone has a low points offense, they can plead guilty to some lesser charge (they don't say what it is, but it magically carries the same fine), otherwise I may sit there all day, not get my case heard and have to come back.

Cops suck and so does Dekalb County Courthouse.

A friend of mine who gets a few too many tickets always tries to plead it down to a non-moving violation because you don't get any strikes against your insurance or license but the fine is still the same. Probably better in the long run for your pocketbook.

SI

This is always the best way to go. And always ask for a supporting depsoition if there's the option on the ticket when you send it in pleading not guilty. If they don't send it to you then it gets dropped on a technicality which is even better :)

I got stopped in a National Park for doing 54 in a 50. I didn't even realize I was driving in the park. It was a two lane road and at some point I entered the Park area and looked behind to find a patrolman behind me. He asks me if I knew how fast I was driving and I answered sure...it was going 55. His response was no sir it was 54 and your in a 50 mph zone. I actually thought he was joking at first. But after the fine, "federal court" I might add, I knew he wasn't joking anymore.

I never claimed to be a Saint, I just told you to grow a pair and take the ticket like a man.

If cops could tell the diffrence between people who do and who don't have bomb materials on them, they'd be able to arrest them before they completed the bomb.

I may be an ass, but your a bitch...

Well that's constructive.



Ragesmith - ouch, 4 MPH over the speed limit? Surely that got thrown out of court when you fought it, at least I hope so.

Real mature. :rolleyes: