Hello guys, I am new to this forum cause i jsut bought a g35. but also like 3 weeks ago i was driving my moms 2001 lexus ES with my mom in the car. I approached a 4 way stop sign intersection and I stopped a little bit over the limit line. A cop was hiding on the cross street in his little motorcycle and as I go he pulls me over. He acknowledges the fact that I stopped at the stop sign legally, but he said I crossed the limit line when i stopped. I asked for a warning for such a minor offense but he says i have to go to court to get the fee. I was pretty mad considering the cop was lying about everythign and said that i was a whole car over the limit line. If i was a whole car over the limit line i would be on the other side! I also told him that the DMV had told me that crossing the limit line to observe other cars is legal and he kept saying, well u broke the law and i have to ticket you for it. I got this ticket and it doesn't say any fee but a court apperance in February. My mom was pretty furious too about this cause she knew the cop was lying. I believe that I have couple of options to fight it and like take pictures of the intersection and fight it. Also people have been telling me that if i cancel and re schedule the date for later on (because i have to do stuff during the time of the court appearance) the cop would probably not show up for such a small offense. I am giong off everythign i have heard and just wondering your opinion. If you feel that i committed the offense and should accept the punishment, please feel free to say so. However, I do believe that i have a case against this or something. Thank you!

 

Well, I hope you can fight it. I was in a similar situation at a 4 way stop at 1:00 a.m. in the morning and I did a 5MPH rolling stop and a cop was hiding about 50 yards away. Well, to make a long story short, he gave me a ticket. I was trying to explain to him that I was a good driver that I had a clean record for 8 straight years now and also that my rolling stop was the closest stop that anyone can do, especially when no one is around at 1 in the morning. The cop actually agree and said that I did one of the closest rolling stop he has seen, but he still gave me a ticket. Well, that was 1 year ago, 8 hours of traffic school and $260 later.


Peace and happy motoring.

 

man! what an [censored]...

gluck fighting it!

 

This is exactly why I, like so many other people, am developing a bad taste for police officers recently. That is such a BS ticket! Its amazing that it doesn't seemed to bother their conscience, intentionally making life hard for others, for such petty useless offenses. I also cannot believe how ANY police officers these days, can have it in themselves to write tickets like that (and half of every other moving violation that exists), when themselve turn around and do the same exact thing everytime they drive. I just want to tell them whenever I get pulled over for 5-10mph over the limit, "that unless you yourself have never gone over the limit by 5-10mph, get the hell back in your car and leave me the hell alone!!". Something tells me that wouldn't get me far with any officer, but damn I get so aggravated!!

Sorry if I seem a little on edge, but I am venting as it just so happens I am fighting a wrongful DUI charge that a local officer here gave me b/c I aggravated him. Now this is costing me a ton of money and my license for 1 year (which I am also fighting). My advice is fight this ticket!! If everyone who received citations fought back, and every case went to court, these local governments wouldn't make a quarter of the money they make off of them. This is why they make it such a PITA to get them taken care of. It is wrong, and in immediate need of REFORM!!!

 

Try to fight that ticket. Cops see us in the G35 and give out tickets like candy falling out of a pinata. I was ticket for allegedly going 64 in a 35. It was the POS Ford Taurus between me and the cop that was speeding. He just picked out a shiny new car to get his quota. For those that say there are no quotas are lying. It's called revenue for the cities. Safety is just a secondary concern. He was suck a *****. Irving, TX cops suck. I took deferred adjudication and paid $225 to get if off my record.

 

here bro I don't know if your in CA, but check this out even if your not.

http://www.ticketassassin.com/

read it!

 

This is exactly why if ever I get a *legitimate* ticket I will fight the hell outta it until I get it off my record. Too many BS tickets others (and I) have had to deal with.

And yeah, there is some law saying you can cross the line if you need to in order to see other traffic. Check it out...

2004 Twilight Blue Coupe
6 spd
Premium Package
Aero Package

 

I dunno what law you are talking about cynical. check the law it says you have to stop at the limit line. not past it. You guys all kids or what? Immature.. quit your whining and slow down.. 1am or 5pm who cares you broke the law so deal with it.

You know every one of you speeds on a daily basis and yet you don't get a ticket on a daily basis. Oh well.. As for fighting your faulty DUI.. gimme a break. you weren't arrested for DUI cause the officer was mad it was because you were drunk. Its nice to hear you lost your license for a year and have to pay tons of money.. maybe next time before you have anything to drink you will think about it before you get behind the wheel and put everyone's lives in danger because you are better than every other driver out there and you can hold your liquor..

 

I'm not going to bother looking it up because I'm not going to waste my time.

But at least in California, yes you have to STOP before the line. But, if you need to proceed past it after you have stopped due to obstruction, etc. etc. (or the line just being painted too damn far back) theres a possibility you can get out of it.

And after driving a non-riced Civic in Irvine (if you live around here you know what I mean) and getting harrassed by cops (such as the cop that BLEW a red light and came racing up behind me....just to pull me over so he could give me a ticket for my tint) traffic cops can bite me.

2004 Twilight Blue Coupe
6 spd
Premium Package
Aero Package

 

Fight the ticket.

FWIW, I believe you do have to stop BEHIND the limit line and then you can edge out past the line for better visibility.

The city/state coffers are definitely being augmented by ticket writing. What annoys me is when they write tickets for petty instances. I would bet that if the officer had let you go and waited 5 more minutes there would have been some idiot that would blow right through the stop sign without even slowing down - THAT'S the guy that should be ticketed.

I don't care what anybody else say's; the law is different shades of gray. You can interpret the laws strictly according to code or you can use some common sense when enforcing them...

 

Hey Steve, unless you know what the hell you are talkng about, keep your comments to yourself. For one, I was arrested for refusing the 2nd field test (might I add that passing the 1st one was pretty easy, considering I'd only had two beers all day). If a cop say, had a bad day because he just found out his wife was sleeping with some other guy named Steve and were to pull you over and say you are too drunk to drive, reguardless if you even had one drink, guess what. You too just lost your liscense, and will also have to spend a lot of money to clear your name, even though you were innocent in the first place. All because one police officer's word. I'm not saying that this exact situation would happen, but IT CAN happen, and I now know this first hand. I don't know what my cop's deal was that night. Perhaps he has money problems, and can't stand the fact that a 25 year old drives a nicer car then he does (He did seem very angry and was making a lot of comments about my car). Who knows. So much for innocent until proven guilty huh. Everyone who knows me, know that I am not irrespondsible enough to go out and party, and get all drunk and try to drive home. First of all, my Coupe is my baby, and I would never risk that. So like I said, unless you know me personally, and know the situation, keep it to yourself, and quit being so nieve. Also, try loosing the "Greater then thou" attitude while you're at it!!

 

cry me a river.

I do happen to know that a cop has to get approval from the traffic detectives as well as their watch commander to get approval for an arrest. the probable cause has to be there or the arrest will not be approved, and the city attorney will not file the arrest.

Im quite sure that while they were doing the SFST-Standardized Field Sobriety Test and you decided to refuse = guilty they informed you that failure to take the tests would be basically an admission of guilt. There is no reason if you were "sober" that you would not just take the test..

lets see.. i get pulled over.. im perfectly sober.. cop says walk the line.. touch your nose.. yada yada.. you say no.. he says ok either do it or go to jail, lose license, pay big fees.. what sane, sober person on earth would go through that? face it you basically admitted guilt by refusing. Im pretty sure I know what I'm talking about

 

It seems recently we've been on a anti-cop theme. I have two close friends who are cops and from many conversations I really think:
1. They hate doing the traffic stuff, but have no choice. The traffic duty is mandated by their superiors which in turn comes from city politics. So don't hate the cop, it's like hating the person working the counter at a store. He didn't make the policy. Although I will agree some of the cops are jerks, but less than you'd think.
2. Most cops are good people and will let you out of a ticket or give you a break when possible. Sometimes they have a trainee or ride along with them and it's harder for them to waive the ticket. And let's face it when you are going 15-20 miles over or blowing thru a stop sign there really isn't a good excuse.
3. Traffic stops are inherently dangerous. Every cop needs to be very wary when approaching your car. Every year too many officiers are shot on traffic stops. So when they get to your car they have adrenaline flowing and are waiting for trouble or in most cases serious attitude.

Hey I know we all hate getting pulled over, but that same cop you are calling an a-hole would put his life on the line for your or your family. Just my .02 cents.

 

First off Steve, refusing a FST, is not an admission of guilt. Matter of fact, if you refuse a take the test, the officer doesn't even have to arrest you. He can, in theory, take your license, and make you find a ride home. So your entire second paragraph holds no credit. On a side note, I completely agree with you about probable cause, and that is exactly what the officer was lacking in my case. This is what my lawyer is planning on using to get the case dropped. In my case, the officer stated he smelled alcohol, and saw me swerve once. Neither of these are probable cause to justify a traffic stop. He smelled alcohol b/c I had 2 beers. He saw me swerve b/c I was pulling my ringing cell phone out of my pocket.

So before you even get to the FST, he didn't even have probable cause to initiate a DUI investigation, plain and simple. That's the law. It was a BS traffic stop.

Generally I have grown up respecting police officers, and other forms of authority. Personally though, I think they hold too much power, and too many times abuse their power. There are good cops, and there are bad cops. I would bet there are way more good cops then bad cops, but it only takes one bad one to mess up someone's day. It's a fact that less then 1% of tickets are taken to court. If all tickets were taken to court, most would be thrown out; b/c a lot of what officers do is unconstitutional. The system without a doubt is set up to take advantage of the everyday citizen's ignorance of the judicial system. They also make is so damn difficult, aggravating and stressful to clear these matters up, just to deter people from fighting tickets. This all goes back to money!! Why give a ticket to someone going 5mph over the limit, but not to someone going 10mph under the limit? Fact of the matter is, the person going 5 over, is probably more in line with surrounding traffic, thus a hell of a lot safe then the 10 under guy. But lets see, there is no money for the county in the 10 under driver, so we'll leave him alone and go for the moneymaker. Police mottos are usually along the lines of "serve and protect". Well they seem to do less and less serving and protecting, and more and more "bill and collecting". Steve, you are correct, more times then none, it is not the officer, but the system, and like I saw before, the system is in desperate need of an overhaul!

If you go back to my original post, and the original post to this thread, you'll see I was focusing my post on the hypocrisy ALL police officers, good or bad, exhibit EVERYTIME they write a ticket. You cannot tell me that the officer, who gave this G35 owner at the top of this thread, stops before every stop line, every time he is out on the roads. Personally I refrain from being hypocritical to others as much as I can, and could not find it in myself to write a speeding ticket to an otherwise law-abiding, hard working citizen, especially when I'd be guilty of this myself. Don't throw stones if you live in a glass house.

 

Swerving is not probable cause??? Tell me what is? Almost anything can be probable cause...and it usually sticks...and I think here in Nevada if you refuse to submit to a BAC test they do look at it as being guilty...
Pingo

<P ID="edit"><FONT class="small"><EM>Edited by pingo on 01/09/04 08:53 PM.</EM></FONT></P>