The business of law enforcement

Started by peternap, November 28, 2011, 07:38:48 PM

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peternap

Public Safety my butt. Write those tickets, tax revenues are light.

http://www.nbc12.com/story/16138323/state-wants-more-speeding-ticket-money

RICHMOND, VA (WWBT) - There's a fight brewing at the State Capitol about who should get all the money collected from speeding tickets and other traffic violations across the Commonwealth.

Communities like Chesterfield could lose nearly $3 million. State legislators feel that money belongs to them, but local governments are fighting to keep it.

Nobody likes getting a traffic ticket, but that money goes a long way for many communities trying to pay for teachers and police officers. State Senator John Watkins of Midlothian says writing tickets isn't the right way to raise revenues.

"Times are tough for all of us," Watkins said. "That doesn't justify going out and using this as a means of raising money. It's supposed to be law enforcement."

He's drafting a bill that would divert money from traffic tickets away from local governments and give that money to the state. He says too many local governments depend on traffic tickets to pay the bills.

"This is a quota when they do this," he said. "When they get up and testify they're going to pay for their cars and police officers with tickets, that's a quota and that is unethical and inappropriate."

Virginia drivers paid $95 million last year in traffic fines. That's a lot of money potentially leaving local government coffers.

Sterling Rives is the Hanover County Attorney. He says Hanover could lose more than half a million dollars in traffic fines.

He says the reason the state is not getting as much money from traffic tickets is simple - state troopers don't write as many tickets as local police.

"Funds from writing traffic tickets, when those traffic tickets are written by Hanover County Sheriff's deputies logically would go to Hanover County," Rives said.

Henrico could lose up to $4 million in traffic fines as well. Right now Senator Watkins is still drafting this bill.

These here is God's finest scupturings! And there ain't no laws for the brave ones! And there ain't no asylums for the crazy ones! And there ain't no churches, except for this right here!

Redoverfarm

There should be no incinitive to do what they took an oath to do (If they even took an oath).  Here it goes to the court and school system and nothing is funneled to the law enforcement agency. 


Rob_O

I lived in Midlothian for about 6 months. It was a great place to leave
"Hey Y'all, watch this..."

peternap

Quote from: Redoverfarm on November 28, 2011, 07:46:32 PM
There should be no incinitive to do what they took an oath to do (If they even took an oath).  Here it goes to the court and school system and nothing is funneled to the law enforcement agency.

That's the way the State Police allocate the fine money John.
Localities get to keep it if written on the local code. What they do is just copy the Va Code into the County Code to get around the Dillon rule, then keep the money.

Ron made a good example. Chesterfield County has a huge Police force that does absolutely nothing but write tickets.

The place is a perverts dream. Child porn, prostitution, you name it, they have it, but it gets ignored because the PD is too busy tagging speeders.
These here is God's finest scupturings! And there ain't no laws for the brave ones! And there ain't no asylums for the crazy ones! And there ain't no churches, except for this right here!

Woodsrule

Peter, I couldn't agree with you more. I'm a retired cop and our PD and the others in our state used to receive a percentage of speeding fines in order to fund more details to catch speeders. It was a classic case of chasing your tail. That is no longer done, thank God. This type of quota system inevitably leads to dishonest or unethical behavior on the part of cops, municipal courts, clerks, etc... Right down the line, if any type of enforcement is done to cash in, then hold on to your rights as they will take second place to the profits. I'm similarly opposed to dragnets couched in cute terms like "sobriety checkpoints", "TSA Security", etc....


Native_NM


Kind of interesting, I have not been pulled over in a while, until today in front of Cottonwood (large mall).  I couldn't think of what I could have done; my first thought was he was responding to another call.  As soon as I realized it was me, I pulled off the road.  It seems my registration sticker had expired 4 days ago.  I had completely forgotten about it.  I suddenly had a vague memory of something I was supposed to do before Thanksgiving.    In this case, I was at fault, but the guy was very professional and polite.  No complaints today.  For every bad cop ( and I know there are plenty), there are even more who are just doing a job. 
New Mexico.  Better than regular Mexico.

peternap

Quote from: Native_NM on December 04, 2011, 07:01:01 PM
Kind of interesting, I have not been pulled over in a while, until today in front of Cottonwood (large mall).  I couldn't think of what I could have done; my first thought was he was responding to another call.  As soon as I realized it was me, I pulled off the road.  It seems my registration sticker had expired 4 days ago.  I had completely forgotten about it.  I suddenly had a vague memory of something I was supposed to do before Thanksgiving.    In this case, I was at fault, but the guy was very professional and polite.  No complaints today.  For every bad cop ( and I know there are plenty), there are even more who are just doing a job.

This gets very difficult to explain sometimes.

We all read posts on one site or the other from keyboard commandos that hate cops. Hate the individual, kill them if they can...you know how it goes.

Well, there are bad cops, always have been and always will be, but most are just doing their job.  Now this is where it starts getting sticky. The Administration is the one to blame for using the PD as a cash cow and the individual cops are just doing what they're told, like it or not.

As time passes and this becomes a standard, new cops are brought in that consider it the norm. That combined with the new breed of cop that are hired for their GPA instead of their ability, this becomes a nightmare for us to decide who the good guys are.
These here is God's finest scupturings! And there ain't no laws for the brave ones! And there ain't no asylums for the crazy ones! And there ain't no churches, except for this right here!

CjAl

in the last year i have been let off two speeding tickets and.instead was given seat belt tickets. the officers both told me it was because the speeding ticket money goes to the state and the seat belt ticket money stays in the community. unfortunatly the seta belt tickets were not much cheaper. in Wi they were $10. the ones i got were almost $200 in garland tx and $150 in some small AR town.

Redoverfarm

Quote from: CjAl on December 11, 2011, 06:41:36 AM
in the last year i have been let off two speeding tickets and.instead was given seat belt tickets. the officers both told me it was because the speeding ticket money goes to the state and the seat belt ticket money stays in the community. unfortunatly the seta belt tickets were not much cheaper. in Wi they were $10. the ones i got were almost $200 in garland tx and $150 in some small AR town.

Here the dispersment of monies collected is the same regardless of the violation.  In fact that might have a been a blessing in disguise as they are not moving violations therefore no points associated or reflection on your insurance.  The fine is relatively low but the court cost associated makes them less appealing.  I have been fortuneate to have never received a citation  ;)  but if you consider the times that everyone has violated the various laws and escaped being caught, the law of averages are in your favor.  We b*#$ch and complain but could your imagine what this world would be like without some enforcement.   ;D


peternap

Quote from: Redoverfarm on December 11, 2011, 11:28:29 AM
  We b*#$ch and complain but could your imagine what this world would be like without some enforcement.   ;D

Lots of road rage :-\
These here is God's finest scupturings! And there ain't no laws for the brave ones! And there ain't no asylums for the crazy ones! And there ain't no churches, except for this right here!

MountainDon

One of the cops from a small village along the route to the cabin caught me doing 45 in a 35 zone this summer. I was lucky, he told me he gives a freebie, a warning to one person a day and I was it. he said it helkped that the "system" came up clean on me.

Then later in the fall I got stopped by the forest service. I had a trailer load of wood and no tags showing. He asked me if I had forgotten to place the tag on a log in the load. I told him I didn't have any tags. He told me everyone needed a permit and had to place a tag on the load. "No exceptions" he said. I was waiting for him to ask where I got the wood or something like that. Heck I'm not the only private land owner in the area. The wood was from my own trees of course. So he gave me a lecture and finished by saying he had to write a ticket. I was thinking well, this has been fun but I really don't feel like wasting anymore time so I asked him "what if the trees were my own?"  At that he got all excited and asked if the trees were from my land why didn't I say so already. He replied I was waiting for him to ask and didn't want to butt into his lecture.


We also had a short discussion on whether or not I could prove the wood was mine. How did he know I wasn't l making that up? That ended when I said I didn't know I had to show proof of ownership. He didn't like that at all but told me I could go and have a safe trip.

Just because something has been done and has not failed, doesn't mean it is good design.

Bob S.

I read an article in the newspaper about a group of people in California that sued their city over the red light camera program. They were able to prove that the system was rigged. The lights changed to red on one side about one second after it turned to yellow on the other side. I could not fathom why a public servant would think up somthing like that. Later I saw a article that explained that the system was administrated by a independent contractor. They got a cut!! The more tickets the more $$$. I'll bet all the city council members were on the take also.

Don_P

I'll bet none of the council members knew the lights were rigged. They were probably happy that the new technology was so efficient at catching runners. It increased the county income and they never thought about why. We are quick to assume malice where ignorance is usually the culprit.

Suction cup darts  ;D.

peternap

Quote from: Don_P on December 13, 2011, 07:35:29 AM
I'll bet none of the council members knew the lights were rigged. They were probably happy that the new technology was so efficient at catching runners. It increased the county income and they never thought about why. We are quick to assume malice where ignorance is usually the culprit.

Suction cup darts  ;D.

Yep, pretty much!

These here is God's finest scupturings! And there ain't no laws for the brave ones! And there ain't no asylums for the crazy ones! And there ain't no churches, except for this right here!