Stupid motorcycle cop! I was behind a school bus, and after it made a right turn I gave the MINI some gas and sped off. I was driving briskly, but not insanely. Next thing I know there's a motorcycle cop in my mirror.

He says to me "Give my one reason why I shouldn't take you to the county jail right now."

What? He claimed he could barely keep up with me, and that I was going 90 mph. I was definitely NOT going 90! That's ridiculous! He didn't have radar, so he gave me a ticket for "excessive speed."

And then, as he walks away, he says "It handles pretty well in the curves, doesn't it?"

Ha ha ha. Very funny, jerk. :evil:

And, ironically, his motorcycle was a BMW. Freaking traitor.

Now I have to go to traffic school to avoid getting points on my license. (Gotta love Florida.) At least I won't get an insurance increase.

 

FIGHT IT FIGHT IT FIGHT IT!!!! He didn't have radar. He estimated your speed. I've fought a ticket for this in Kansas and won. There was no actual figure that could be determined. That's absolute BS!!! Don't settlefor traffic school!

 

If you got a freakin' ticket, you should be freakin' in the privacy
of your own home.

Sorry to hear the bad news. Cops need to feel like they are actually
doing a job I guess.

 

>>He says to me "Give my one reason why I shouldn't take you to the county jail right now." <<

How about "I don't want to climb on the back of your bike and wrap my arms around you"?

Sorry to hear that! I agree, absolutely fight it. Without radar he should have given you a warning, if anything.
_________________
"In all matters of opinion, our adversaries are insane." -Oscar Wilde[img]null[/img]

 

That sucks dude! Fight it! I was pulled over once and the cop said he was going to give me a ticket for a moving violation, I asked what did I do wrong. He didn't say but he did give me a ticket for my euro plate instead!

 

I agree... take them for all they're worth.

Chances are that if you show up in court to contest it, the cop won't. If that happens (in Georgia at least) it becomes almost impossible for them to issue you a ticket in all but DUI and/or reckless driving cases.

At the very least, if he can't prove your speed, they should reduce it to a warning.

 

Mine......as the statie walked away he noticed my radar detector on the passenger seat floor where I had tossed it"so, did that go off?" No, I said.........."HAVE A NICE DAY(big smile) " !@#$%^&* :evil:

 

When my wife lived in FL. she used some company, I think they were called "Ticket busters" and they went to court to fight the violation. Fight it!

 

In the name of all that is good and just... Don't DARE pay that ticket!!! At least, not without a hefty and well-executed fight.

If you don't do it for yourself, do it for all the other poor schmucks that that hyperactive hunk of bacon will pull over! He probably assumes that you'll just shut up and pay---NEVER GIVE IN TO THE MAN!!!

 

:smile:

Chow!

Donna

 

Well, I'll ask the question since no one else has.

Do you think you were speeding?
Yes you can probably fight this ticket and either pay a reduced amount or cause this officer to have to come back to court more then once, therefore removing him from his primary job.

It's a cause and effect relationship, and although you haven't complained about the outcome or the penalty, some of the replies seem to be blaming the cop!

 

Absolutely and completely LMAO!

That beats my previous best answer: "I was trying to kill a bee"

 

Smokey's right. About 5 months after I purchased my Mini a cop pulled me over. I live in a small town and I can ASSURE you they where waiting to pull me over. A cop pulled me over. I was honestly doing 45 in a 40. He approaches my car, while whistling (I knew I was doomed) and stated that I was doing almost 60. I reacted and said "What, NO WAY!" wrong thing to say. In the end, I ended up in court, pleaded my side to the prosecutor and only paid court costs.

All in all, cops are just bullies and football players that never made it in life and want to pick on every person they come across as prey. A cool car is just one of ‘em.

 

Have you ever noticed most cops are extremly short? They have gone through
life carrying a major inferiority complex and now they figure its payback time.
I know no less than 15 cops. I grew up in a neighborhood with about 7 cops.
They all have these common traits.
1) short
2) corrupt
3) would take a life preserver from a baby in a sinking boat.
4) all got their asses kicked in elementary school.
5) when they were kids, they were the ones who ran home to tell on you.

Many years ago, when I was preparing to enter military service, I took aptitude
tests to see what jobs I would be suited for in the military. The first two I took said I should be an M.P. I requested a 3rd test and got the same result. Totally pissed, I asked the sargeant what other jobs would I be suited for? He replied, "Your tests say you would
be great in law enforcement, why won't you pusue it." I replied, " because I know plenty of cops and I know I'm WAY TO HONEST to ever be one!"
I only knew one good cop in my whole life. And his wife was banging the whole town while he was working nights

 

Yep, fight it. Without radar they'll have to reduce the fine (if you maintain that you weren't going 90, and instead something lower)...likely to the "minimum" fine for speeding. And that may either reduce your points or eliminate them altogether. On the other hand, don't expect the ticket to be thrown out entirely. Unless it was this cop's first day on the job, he isn't in the business of handing out actual fines for situations that he knows will be thrown out. It's a compromise and a business deal, like barganing over price...they've laid out the first challenge. Not it's up to you to respond by going to court. That's almost always good for a 50% discount. As they say, only the lazy and stupid pay retail...the same goes for speeding tickets IMO. (and I guess maybe MINIs, unless I want to put myself in the stupid category )

I've been pulled over twice in the MINI by cops who said that I "looked like" I was going way too fast. Neither had radar. Neither issued a ticket....just written warnings (no fine, no points). I guess this is just part of MINI ownership for some of us.

 

Reading the posts, it sounds like you could be money
ahead by fighting it... but I know guys that ended up
paying MORE because they took it to court. (Perhaps
I haven't the brightest friends in the world...)

Godspeed.

 

don't do the crime
if you can't pay the fine

 

Thanks for the copious replies, folks.

I've decided I'm going to do the online traffic school and pay a reduced fine.

The way it works in FL, they cut your fine by 18% and don't give you any points if you go through an approved school. And you can do the school online, and from what I've heard from other people it's painless.

Since he gave me a ticket for "unlawful speed" without an actual number attached to it, the fine is only about $90. With the reduced fine, I'll only end up paying a little over $70. According to him, if he'd written me up for going 80 it would have been a $350 fine, in which case I'd defintely fight it. I'm thinking he didn't do that because he knew 80 was total BS. Maybe he went 80 on his bike in an effort to catch up with me, but there's no way I could have been going 80 in that spot.

If I went to court and lost I could end up with the points and a $500 fine. I'd also have to go through the hassle of taking time off of work, the bureacracy of the court system, etc. It's not worth the risk or the hassle, since I'm already able to avoid the points and the accompanying insurance hike.

And for the record, yes, I was speeding. I wasn't looking at the speedo, but I'd guess I was going between 50 and 60 in a 30 mph zone. Mind you, that's a 30 mph zone on a gently curving empty road with open fields on both sides leading to an office park, not a 30 mph zone in a residential area with kids and bunnies in the road. I like to drive over there on my lunch hour sometimes because it's out of the way and there are lots of twisties.

I don't blame the cop for pulling me over. I do blame him for the county jail threat, the BS claim about me going "80 or 90," and the wisecrack about my car handling well though. He was just busting my ***** for his own entertainment.

 

It's amazing how much some of you guys hate the cops. Personally I'm glad to have them around. Not a lot of folks are willing to risk their lives for low pay and no appreciation.

You broke the law and you got a ticket. I think that's the way it's suppose to work.

 

I would fight it. A few years back while driving my 2002tii I was pulled over by a motorcycle cop. He had been going in the opposite direction and "felt" that I had gone through a nice little S-curve in the road to fast. Now, he had no radar proof of this, was going in the opposite direction, in traffic himself and made a U-turn to "catch" me and pull me over.

When he did pull me over he asked the typical cop question, "Do you know why I pulled you over?" Of course my answer was, "No idea." Then he told me he felt I had been speeding and asked me how fast I had been going. I told him the speed limit to which he asked what the speed limit was. I turned it around and asked him the speed limit, you know, "Don't you know it officer?" He failed to see the humor in that of course.

He knew however that without me admitting to any speeding, he could not write me for speeding since he didn't know himself how fast I was going. He proceeded to write me for not having a front license plate and for a non-functioning turn signal. The weird thing is the turn signal worked and I proved it to him prior to him leaving and he didn't ask to see it function before writing the ticket. Basically bully behavior, but the best he could do was a fix-it ticket and it cost me nothing.

Certainly fight it, he is trying to increase the cash flow for the local authority and playing the averages of you just giving in and paying the fine.

 

Yellowcooper:

Just a quick rebuttal; I'm a short guy and yes, elementary school was a relentless horror show of sadistic bullies. Yet, somehow, I survived, prospered and I didn't become a cop. In my experience, most police are the size of your standard moose. These guys are not 'embittered' because of their size. They are failed jocks - the guys who didn't get to the pros and need something [and someone] to take out their steroid rage on. Usually, it's the public.

 

They make a living off the intimidation factor. I admit, it has worked on me and I have been too chicken to fight tickets and that's what they're counting on!

Never did I received a ticket before I got a MINI (and that doesn't mean I used to obey traffic laws and I don't now). The MINI draws attention, good and bad, for sure and it does become a game for cops to write up a MINI I think. I've had the worst luck since the MINI arrived... 3 tickets within a year. 2 for speeding (one on Valentine's Day!). The most recent is what really pi$$ed me off- pulled over exclusively for lack of solid rally light covers, front plate was a euro plate, and window tint on front side windows. I talked my way out of the light covers and tint ($100 fine- no fix allowed) and took the front plate fix-it ticket ($10 fine). Needless to say, I postponned going to a police station to get the front plate approved because I was worried I'd get nailed for something else- so I rolled my windows down in the cold, took all the decals off my car, taped up/covered my rally lights, and parked far away from the front entrance. He used a parking lot camera to see I had added the legal front plate and that was it. I did find it funny that the officer who wrote the ticket didn't even spell "MINI Cooper" correctly! You gotta learn to constantly watch all mirrors for black and whites. I pity those living in states where un-marked cars are allowed!

_________________
Silver and Black Cooper with a Silver Union Jack and an awesome MCS on the way! Thank you Julie @ Classic MINI!
scmm.org

 

Slow down around school buses and school zones. Respect the posted speed limit whether you like it or not. The cop was a total jerk, but you also did your part to call attention upon yourself by driving like, well an *idiot*.

So now that you have to go thru the aggravation of traffic school and pay a fine, let this be a learning experience for you to be careful and keep your speed under watch on public roads.

 

Following the posted limit is all fine and good when safety is involved (as is the case with a school bus)...

But if traffic is light, road is dry, and conditions are good 25-30mph in anything but the densest residential zone is an unreasonable limit. Just as 55mph on the left lane of a 5 lane interstate highway (as is the case in much of Metro Atlanta) is an unreasonably low limit. For a large SUV w/ poor manuverability this might be sane; in a Mini where you are in complete control even @ 70mph this is NOT.

I speed on a daily basis. I violate social contract and rocket down the interstate at 80mph when appropriate. I don't (and will not) feel the least bit bad about this because I'm "breaking the law". I NEVER drive unsafely (ok, so I took a few twisties out in the country over the weekend at INSANE speed, but it was deserted and dry), and find that most speed limits must be written for "lesser" vehicles that don't cope w/ the speed so well.

 

>>It's amazing how much some of you guys hate the cops. Personally I'm glad to have them around. Not a lot of folks are willing to risk their lives for low pay and no appreciation.
>>
>>You broke the law and you got a ticket. I think that's the way it's suppose to work.

I just want to say that if it were as you describe there's not a problem. He broke the law and he's dealing with it; it's the extra BS that pisses people off. If the cop is professional, that's life, he did his job. If he needs to make extra comments just to make you feel bad, then people get angry. The cop wanted him to get upset and you're acting like the cop was just doing his job -- really, he went beyond the call of duty here and it's reasonable to be pissed about it.

If people want respect they have to be respectful -- cops included.