VoKuS said:
I hope you wore a good police officer that valued human life...
If I may, I would like your input on an encounter i had not to long ago with a police officer...
Why do police get personally offended?
Hey VoKuS, I felt I was a good officer, and even when I was in the Marines in different conflicts our country was in, I still valued human life even though at those times in my life it was my job to take it.
This story you shared is all too familiar, and I'll share with you what I think. This is all from my experience I cannot speak for anyone else but myself. What is usually in a cops mind, at least it was and still is in mine,
typically there are only a few type of people on the road driving in the wee hours of the morning, like the time you were driving, 3AM. Cops, drunks, and dopers. Cops, well that is the time they are working, drunks, usually the 'newer drinkers' and ones that went to 'after-parties' after the clubs closed down, and dopers since they are heading from a club to a house to get re-doped up, they are doped up and need another fix, or they are hungry or thirsty because of the dope in their system and they did no pre-planning! Grant it, in today's day and age there are a lot of people that are working multiple shifts, actually working a swing or midnight shift, traveling etc, but the ones I mentioned are who cops run into I'd say about 95% of the time at those times of the morning. In any type of stressful and, let's face it, life threatening job, and especially the things that you see and have to deal with at times, there is quite a lot of pressure on an officer. On one hand, they are an 'extension of the law' and are not to have any personal feelings or thoughts when dealing with the things they deal with and follow the 'letter of the law', yet on the other hand, they are required to be personable, think of others and follow the 'spirit of the law'. Cops are people, people have lives outside of work, those lives are not always the little white picket fence with the 2.5 kids, etc, etc, and sometimes those things affect how a person reacts and performs at work, be it becoming ill, family issues and other day to day personal life stuff not to mention the sometimes horrific hings officers have to deal with at work. This in no way is to give excuses for the officer, but to try and show their world and what a cop deals with every day. I can tell you right now, if you have never been a law enforcement officer especially in a metropolitan city, it is very difficult to understand and see from a cops point of view. It is more than just reading about it, watching COPS, talking about it or going on a ride-a-long or two, it is a life experience that many do not have the opportunity to experience. Here is an example and personal experience of when I went from nice cop to kinda pissed off cop and my ride-a-long was appalled. My ex-father-in-law was my ride-a-long, I was working downtown San Jose, car stop, probable cause: one brake light was brighter than the other, time about 2:45AM. The gentleman was in his mid 50's, drunk, and failed all the FST's (Field Sobriety Tests), multiple offender for DUI, this time was a felony, went to handcuff him, he said he was having a heart attack, needed his pills, the prescription on the pill bottle was not his nor one of his relatives I refused to let him take the pills in the bottle, had him sit down on the curb, called EMS, EMS said he was fine, he refused to stand up and said the EMS were wrong, forcefully got him to stand-up and he got to go spend some time at the Grey Bar Hilton. My ride-a-long was appalled that I was so 'mean' to the gentleman for not giving him 'his' pills and how I 'got him to stand' after the EMS were finished with him. Was I upset at the gentleman? Yes. Did I take it personally? Yes. Why? He was trying to get out of going to jail and wasting my time when the inevitable was going to happen no matter what. Did I feel compassion? Yes, I felt bad for him being a chronic alcoholic, but not for him trying to play me for a fool by using someone else's prescription and saying he was having a heart attack. Was the car stop a weak probable cause? No, it was a valid vehicle code violation and the results were that a drunk driver was removed from the streets that night. Ride-a-long wanted to go home after 'that display' of injustice, so home he went. Was I annoyed with him? Yes, even with him being there seeing it all, all he thought of was the poor guy is having a heart attack and you want to take him to jail. Was I annoyed for the rest of my shift? Yes, trying to be taken advantage of and someone lying to me and trying to play me as a fool annoys me. What can I say, I'm human!
So who knows what events happen in a cops life that trickle into their next encounter with the public, that is the hard thing about being a police officer, completely forgetting about what happened a minute ago and move forward to the next thing to deal with. I think it is difficult for anyone to actually do that, and if they can, then they may just not be human!
That being said, you mentioned that you felt as if he took it personal, and that was your perception, without knowing what was going on in his mind, it is difficult to actually say if he took it personally that you were speeding. I do not think he took it personal, his mind may have been somewhere else before his radar started to 'beep' and show your speed. He may have been writing a report and was looking forward to the end of his shift to go home (just as you were excited and wanting to go home!) and he had to do his job and stop you in case you were DUI, which would mean extra paperwork and overtime, he may have recently dealt with an accident on that stretch of road where someone was driving at an excessive speed and someone was injured and you and your speed were a trigger object, who knows?! Those could just be one of the reasons his demeanor was the way it was, but it does not mean that it was the right demeanor to have or to express!
The basic speed law in California is, not to drive faster than the prevailing conditions allow if there is no posted speed limit, so let's take a look at your driving situation that you shared!
VoKuS said:
As far as I am concerned, I have done this trip 100's of times...
My car is designed to be stable at high speed and has great stopping power...
I am willing to pay for speeding and fun...
I did not endanger any one...
Most accidents occur with routes that people drive continuously and are comfortable with. Their sense of danger goes out the window since it is familiar and in the past has been uneventful and non-threatening. Your car is designed for those speeds and has great stopping capabilities......but does the driver have the motor control and reaction time necessary to ensure that the vehicle can accomplish what it is capable of? If so, how does the cop know? You also mentioned that nobody else was on the road, well the cop was! You may be willing to pay for speeding and fun, but all it takes is one time for the speeding to not be fun! You did not perceive that you endangered anyone, and in this situation you may not have been, but the bottom line is, is that you were breaking the law and you knew it since you tried to slow down only when you believed that you were caught! :wink:
Sorry for sounding like a 'dad', but you asked for my input on the encounter, not just a part of it!
I am still waiting, 3 years later, for the second sticker. This puts me in violation of the soon to be scrapped Federal Gun Laws. :lol: :lol: :lol: The authorities have run amuck.
