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Guess My Speed and Give Me a Ticket, In Ohio
quall writes "The Ohio Supreme Court has ruled that police may estimate your car's speed and issue a ticket if they believe you were speeding. The hearing threw out a radar gun as evidence because the officer was not qualified to use it, but apparently his guess was good enough. If you make your way into Ohio, I suggest driving 5mph under the speed limit because this leaves little room to dispute your ticket in court. The only chance you have is if the issuing officer decides to skip your hearing."
I wonder whether the court would also accept a driver's own GPS log as exculpatory evidence.
that most of the judge's wages are paid from speeding fines?
Wherever You Go, There You Are
Look, just because there are no missing people, no unaccounted for deaths, or any evidence of any shape or form doesn't mean you didn't commit murder. I mean, you LOOK like a murderer. A trained police officer can't be wrong...
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It's doubtful that you could show an appropriate chain of evidence with the GPS. It's easily argued that you tampered with any such evidence.
Ticketing for illegal speeds is pretty easy, most people confess to it.
"Do you know why I pulled you over?"
"I was speeding."
"I saw you doing 80mph"
"Yes sir, that's about right. I'm sorry."
Voila, instant ticket for 80mph, and a confession to back it up.
I did the opposite. You never *KNOW* why the officer stops you. You may have been speeding. He may be pulling you over for a burned out taillight, or your vehicle may match a description of one seen at a crime scene, or it may even match the description of a vehicle from a missing persons case. Don't guess.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
Yeah, but back then speeding tickets were a) not very common (according to people who were driving then) b) rarely paid because hearings degenerated into a lot of "did not" - "did too" ing. (educated guess plus anecdotes) c) not very high (matter of public record)
I do not have a sig. You are hallucinating.
I'm from Ohio. I once got pulled over, and though I was speeding (and quite excessively), the officer didn't radar me. He wasn't legally allowed to write me a ticket for speeding so he just gave me a ticket for reckless operation. The speeding ticket would actually have been cheaper and put less points on my license. Bottom line: this doesn't change much.
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."
In the UK, it used to involve two police officers.
One would drop their arm, raise a flag or some other indicator as a fast-looking vehicle passes...
The other would time how long it takes from the time that the first officer indicates to the time that the vehicle passes him. Since the two of them are a known distance apart, say 100 yards or so, it would be trivial to calculate the speed.
So if the driver was speeding or does something (braking like crazy to slow down) to raise reasonable suspicion, he'd be ticketed accordingly.
No sig. Move along - nothing to see here.
Any conversation with a police officer should start with you saying "Evening officer, what seems to be the trouble?"
Unless it happens to be morning. Or early afternoon.
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."
So much for a fair trial.
So by now, who hasnt wiped their ass off with the bill of rights?
In Ohio the officers might not be trained to operate the Bill of Rights...
How do you think police issued tickets before radar guns were invented?
Well if I didn't know any better, and thought there was no way to measure velocity prior to the invention of radar, I might do as you have invited me to do and imagine that they just guessed and that this was good enough.
But since I do know better, I don't have to imagine. What they actually did was to time how long it took you to go between two points of known separation. Amazing, eh?
Even as late as the 90s some officers preferred this method, and sometimes near speed traps in the city you could see the markings on the curb that they drew. When it was explained to me by an officer, I believe he said the preference stemmed from when radar guns were new and tickets based on radar guns were being challenged successfully, while the stopwatch measurement of a trained officer was more likely to be believed by the judge.
In any event, "guess" was never the proper method.
The enemies of Democracy are
There's a law against waiting till the cop is walking to your car, then put it in reverse, crank the wheel, floor it and flatten the crooked bastard, as well. The same sort of problem cropped up in Louisiana. Cops were targeting out of state tags and towing cars to impound for further inspection, even if you were speeding. Then you pay inflated rates for impound and your belongings were probably stolen and there would never be an investigation. So don't defend yourself against tyranny and injustice from crooked law enforcement by killing as many of the cockroaches as you can.
That would be illegal. But then so is jaywalking.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
So since you use a powerful, bold disclaimer, if you accidentally omit it sometime, does your previous use of the disclaimer then imply that you are giving legal advice when you omit it?
Or is it so much puffery?
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Meow also works.
I was written a ticket by a detective one morning. It was for 4mph over the limit. There was no traffic on the 5 lane road and I was in a business suit. After he left, I realized he had written the ticket to me, but was for a Ford Mustang. I drive a Dodge Charger.
So the court date rolled around and I showed up in court. The DA comes over and asks if I want to plead it down to an equipment violation. I tell him that wouldn't be legal as I didn't have any equipment violations and the detective wrote the ticket to the wrong type of vehicle.
The DA walks over to the detective and proceeds to have him write me a new ticket, making the change to the type of vehicle to reflect what I was driving. This was after the DA looked up my DMV records to find the correct type of vehicle.
We go in front of the judge and I have to question the detective. I ask him if he used a radar gun to clock me, which he didn't. I asked him if he was qualified to write tickets based on "pacing". He wasn't. I asked him if he knew how far down the road in either direction the speed limits changed. He didn't. This was relevant because I had just entered a 45 mph area from a 55 mph area.
The judge got tired of me reaming the detective and says "I really don't care what evidence you have, you're paying for the ticket. Dismissed." That was the end of that. Traffic court is a joke.
I'm starting to think that forcing the accused (in either civil or criminal proceedings) (and later found blameless) to pay for their defense and/or court appearance is a terrible injustice within our society.
Oh, no, don't worry - vehicular law has a get-out-of-jail-free card (pun soundly intended) in that, because automobile operation and licencing are a regulated activity, your rights don't extend to cover it. Hence why RIDE programs are legal, hence why so-called 'routine' traffic stops are legal. It's a nice grey area that your local cops live to bask in.
Which, of course, requires visually estimating that your speed is approximately equal to that of the target vehicle.
Telling whether or not an object is getting closer to you is not very difficult. It's an ability that evolved in animals several million years ago.
Exact same discussions? They were measuring speeds with a radar gun, not confronting the alleged speeder, but then mailing them a civil citation, fining them with no opportunity to prove their innoce-- oops I mean -- have the proof of their guilt be examined by a court?
The main issue with radar guns was technology and how much people trust equipment. The main issue with red light cams is basic due process.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
This is a great intro to why you should never talk to police. You have to show ID but you do not have to answer any questions /. story awhile back and bookmarked it because it is valid and useful.
Got this link off another
Never talk to Police
In a nut shell, the police will take what ever you say and use it against you.
-- I ignore anonymous replies to my comments and postings.
There's no such thing as instantaneous speed. Velocity is always distance over time. If time is zero, that's a divide by zero.
You didn't do well in calculus, did you?
In my case (in Ohio) it was low flying aircraft measuring the distance and an officer at the side of the road waving me to pull over based on the results (along with several other drivers and a patrol car at the side for those who chose not to stop...).
I was pretty bothered by what I saw as a cheap stunt for money, so I went to court on the principal of it, after reading up on speeding ticket defense and the city's speed ordinance at the local University Library. Present at the hearing was the officer at the side of the road and the assistant city prosecutor. Here's a nut-shell of how it went:
Prosecutor to police officer: How fast was the defendant going?
Officer: The defendant was clocked at --
Me: Objection, your honor.
Judge: Yes, young man?
Me: The officer doesn't know how fast I was going. Based on the complaint issued to me in writing here, he was relying on an aircraft pilot's measurements. The pilot is not here; that makes the officer's testimony hearsay.
(Prosecutor approaches Judge after talking with officer)
Judge: Young man, would you agree to an extension 10 days from now until the pilot can be summoned?
Me: Respectfully, no, your honor. That date would put the hearing beyond the 30 day time-line for disposal of this case, which is the end of this week.
Judge: young man, would you like your case dismissed?
Me: yes, your honor.
Judge: case dismissed.
Know the basics of the law in your case. Sometimes it can end up being on your side, as long as your willing and able to take the time to research it and appear in court.
uR iGn0ranc3, Their Power
It isn't a valid question, judges in Ohio get a salary that is paid no matter how many tickets are issued or not. They do not get commissions or anything of the sort. It may be that the fund the actual salary comes from is supplied or supplemented by citations, but it wouldn't effect their salary or benefits if no citations or twice as many was ever processed.