Citation for stopping to "take pictures"

[bvstaples]

Please list the places where it is common practice, so I can avoid going there. It is NOT common practice anywhere I have lived, or anywhere near where I have lived, and that includes at least a third of U.S. states.

Baja, Mexico...though the Federales have taken a back seat to the drug cartel, so you're more likely to get shot than to get ripped off.

[rdenney]

Baja, Mexico...though the Federales have taken a back seat to the drug cartel, so you're more likely to get shot than to get ripped off.

Got it!

Rick "avoiding Baja" Denney

[AFSmithphoto]

My wife and I got up early one morning to drive to Rust in Austria. On the way there we drove to the top of a hill, just outside Rust, to visit a Roman marble quarry. After we saw all that was to be seen we got back in our car and started to drive to the bottom of the hill (small mountain?) and my wife, in the passanger seat, was bust assembling the maps and negleted to put on her seat belt. Halfway down the slope we passed a policeman standing on the edge of the road with a radar gun and a radio. A little further down the hill another office stepped out of the woods and flagged me down. Since his English was not very good he told us to wait and went back into the woods and came out with his Lieutenant - whose English was much better then my German. He explained that we were stopped because my wife was not wearing her seat belt. An offense in Austria that was then punishable by an immediate payment of quite a few Austrian Schillings - on the spot.
However he wanted us to enjoy our stay in Austria and after a nice chat about seat belt lawas in the USA and the lack of it being an offense that you could be stopped for in NJ he wished us a nice visit, recommended where some of the better sites were in Rust, warned my wife to Buckle Up and let us go on with no fine.

Next time maybe you want to visit Austria rather then Wisconsin.

I can think of a number of reasons Austria would be preferable.

[Drew Wiley]

I got pulled over once in the middle of Nevada for running a stoplight in a county which
doesn't even have a stoplight. And I was over fifty miles from an intersection. Court
was open two days a month. You would have drive out, make a plea, and then return
six month later for the actual hearing. The worst place I have ever gone through is
Panguitch Utah. The Highway Patrolman stop all cars with out of state plates coming down from Bryce and tickets them. So I would always pause around the corner until he caught someone else first before proceeding. And once I tried slipping through town late at night when I knew he was off duty, but the sheriff and his buddy pulled me over, made it clear that no one from Calif was welcome, and searched through all my stuff. I figure my crime was that I only have one wife and not four.

[Allen in Montreal]

My wife and I got up early one morning to drive to Rust in Austria. .......we were stopped because my wife was not wearing her seat belt. An offense in Austria that was then punishable by an immediate payment of quite a few Austrian Schillings - on the spot.
However he wanted us to enjoy our stay in Austria ...... he wished us a nice visit, recommended where some of the better sites were in Rust, warned my wife to Buckle Up and let us go on with no fine.......

Sounds like Montreal cops 10 years ago.
Sounds nothing like the Montreal cops of today!

[Allen in Montreal]

......

He told me I was weaving, I told him I was not, he told me again I was weaving, and I knew better to argue anymore about it. He asked to see my license (but not car registration -- which told me he knew he was BS'ing). Then he sent me on my way.

Granted, he was just looking for any reason to pull people over to check for drunk drivers.........

Vaughn

I now roll video out my front window at all times.

So far it has saved me 200.00 and 3 demerit pts. It is sad that there is a need to film yourself as you drive as a self defense move against the police, but it has come to that. Police in Montreal have quotas and their interpretation of a moving offense varies depending on how close they are to their quota.

God I miss the old police chief who was more concerned with crime than ticket revenue. The current chief has set 3 consecutive record years of ticket revenue for the city hall. When my daughter was attacked by a loose German Shepherd, the cops could only come the next day to take a report, but when I drove in to town, I found 9 cars from the station near my home working a speed trap at the entrance to the highway.

[Michael_4514]

Traffic citations of this kind are ordinarily summary offenses, infractions which do not rise to the level of a misdemeanor crime. People are not typically arrested or sent to jail for infractions. The circumstances of the stop make abundantly clear that this was not a serious offense ("I'm guilty, here's my $277.78"/"Off you go then; have a nice day!")

It's an abuse of the American jurisprudence system and abhorrent to this citizen's sense of fairness and decency that the threat of jail is used to strong-arm people into pleading guilty on the spot so that they remain free, versus the choice of going to jail to exercise the fundamental right to the presumption of innocence. Particularly when we're discussing what's essentially a parking ticket.

It bothers me more that while some have not only accepted this extra-constitution rights grab with nary a whimper, others seek to blame the victim.

(And, no, "extra-Constitutional" does not mean "more" constitutional.)

Ivan, I will see your outrage and up you one. Just a couple of years ago, the Supreme Court, our supposed protector of constitutional rights, ruled that the police had the right to arrest and hold a woman for not wearing a seat belt, even though the maximum penalty for the offense, if proven guilty, was a small fine. In other words, the police, in the act of enforcing the law, could punish the woman more than she could be punished by the courts for breaking the law.

This is not the place for a long rant about the constitution, the Supreme Court, politics or the media, and it suffices it to say that we have a real crisis on our hands. Just look at what is going on in Arizona.

[Peter De Smidt]

Point 1: The law exists to protect citizens and promote their welfare, and we take on some duties in exchange for this. When laws don't protect or promote welfare, then there is no moral imperative to obey them, and in some cases there's a moral imperative to violate them. The OP cited a number of ridiculous and/or immoral laws.

Point 2: It's not true that we should never endanger other people or ourselves. After all, we do this every time we drive a car, or shoot a gun, or build a bridge, or climb a mountain, or open a fast food restaurant....

Point 3: Law enforcement officers should enforce the law in a way that protects people and promotes welfare, and they should curtail individual liberty only in the service of those ends. So if stopping and taking pictures put someone in unacceptable danger, then the person doing so should be warned against doing it, or if the danger is great enough, then they should be fined or incarcerated. In this case, the danger presented was extremely small, and so at the worst the officer should have issued a warning.

Point 4: Corruption is the number one danger with law enforcement. Making people pay on the spot is a very bad idea, and threatening them with incarceration if they don't pay immediately certainly violates the spirit of due process.

[8x10 user]

I very much agree with Peters points.

I have never heard about a law enforcement officer requiring payment to be on the spot. Did the OP receive a written ticket as well? If not I think the officer might be running a scam.

From what I hear, in my small Wisconsin town the police officers make up most of their quotas by harassing high schoolers for small things like having too many people in the car.

[AFSmithphoto]

Point 1: The law exists to protect citizens and promote their welfare, and we take on some duties in exchange for this. When laws don't protect or promote welfare, then there is no moral imperative to obey them, and in some cases there's a moral imperative to violate them. The OP cited a number of ridiculous and/or immoral laws.

Point 2: It's not true that we should never endanger other people or ourselves. After all, we do this every time we drive a car, or shoot a gun, or build a bridge, or climb a mountain, or open a fast food restaurant....

Point 3: Law enforcement officers should enforce the law in a way that protects people and promotes welfare, and they should curtail individual liberty only in the service of those ends. So if stopping and taking pictures put someone in unacceptable danger, then the person doing so should be warned against doing it, or if the danger is great enough, then they should be fined or incarcerated. In this case, the danger presented was extremely small, and so at the worst the officer should have issued a warning.

Point 4: Corruption is the number one danger with law enforcement. Making people pay on the spot is a very bad idea, and threatening them with incarceration if they don't pay immediately certainly violates the spirit of due process.

Well said Peter. I find it intresting that so many people have claimed I've endagered others by stopping on the side of the interstate as if driving down an interstate includes ZERO risks. I drove through TWELVE states (Three of them twice) for no good reason other than I wanted to. That put quite a few more people at risk than stopping where I did. (A few miles from an exit where I couldn't find a place to eat breakfast that was open before 10)

And yes, I did recieve a paper ticket and checked with my bank to insure that my payment went to the court district listed.