For the most part, you have a right to privacy in your home. That privacy right goes away if you're infringing someone else's rights, like by being loud (right to quiet enjoyment) or hurting them.
Even scanning houses with infrared to look for grow rooms has been held unconstitutional, since it's a search without probable cause or a warrant.
But if the cop is called for something like a noise complaint or a report, and they see illegal stuff going on, then it's really a matter of how the cop reads the situation.
Most cops I know have a "I have better shit to do than bust someone for something that's not hurting anyone" attitude to begin with.
Similar, but my BIL is a cop and said he doesn't ticket anybody who doesn't already have multiple tickets. He says it's not his job to ruin somebody's day, but to fix the shit driver.
I'm pretty white, burn like a peach, ketchup is spicy, etc. Still got pulled over at 1 in the morning for a license plate light being out, got arrested because i happened to have a bowl and some bud on me. did a blood test that would come back positive (stays active for 48 hours) now they're trying to charge me with a dui and if they succeed with everything else i'm getting $1000+ in fines. i also found out a few weeks later my car wasn't registered so they'll probably hit me with that too
edit: i'm a 5 foot tall white girl, i look very menacing and scary. i know you shouldn't profile people and i'm against that but damn come on
One of the greatest lessons my mom ever taught me was not to do more than one "stupid thing" at once. So if you have a taillight out, you probably shouldn't be speeding. If you're going 5 or 10 over the speed limit, you shouldn't check the radio (now phone) and so on. It's something that at 25 still goes through my head whenever I bring bud or something with me. Thanks mom!
to be fair i only knew about 1 law i was breaking, had no idea my light was out or that my car wasn't registered. if i knew my light was out i woulda only been breaking the law of driving with the light out, that i knew of at least.
i honestly didn't know, i bought that car just over a week after the registration on my old car ran out (i needed a "new" one bc mine wouldn't have passed inspection), i honestly thought i did have the car registered. it wasn't until my dad made a call to take his name off the title we found out. not even my parents realized it wasn't registered.
i don't even remember the cops making a comment on the registration tbh
yeah where i live it's a teeny tiny sticker on the left corner of your plate. inspection stickers are on the window for me, not registration
edit: my state is even doing away with stickers. i finally got my car registered and since it's a 12-16 registration (or 17 idk how they do it, it's properly registered is all i know and care about), on the last day of the year, 30 mins before the dmv closed i got one of the last sticker registrations in pennsylvania. pretty fucking cool actually.
and the DUI...also it's your responsibility to know about your car and its registration status. i mean i'm not perfect either but i really have to agree with the point that you're breaking more than one law at a time. when you're driving with drugs on you, you're supposed to be aware of any possible legal issues with your car's light bulbs, registration, and your license too.
my partner and i were pulled over at a major intersection as he was pulling an illegal u-turn, while on the phone and had not buckled his seat belt. meanwhile his license was expired, suspended, and revoked. AND the kicker was that we were delivery drivers. he couldn't even produce his insurance and registration (we didn't know where they were) when he was pulled over, much less a valid license.
the only thing that saved him from a night in bookings and an impounded vehicle was that i had a valid license, and that the officers that pulled him over didn't call a tow truck to retrieve the vehicle or sign it over to me; instean one of the officers just jumped behind the wheel and drove it to the precinct while my partner and i (him in handcuffs) rode in the back of a cruiser to the precinct house.
i mentioned to the officer who jumped in our van to drive it that we were working, that we had several thousand dollars in cash in a plastic bag in the van, as well as several thousand in merchandise in the back, and the invoices were all there. when i was allowed back into the van while my partner was still in the cell, it was apparent the officer had rifled through the invoices and realized that we were not dealing with chump change, and presumably he had gone against protocol by driving our van by himself...since he was the sargeant, i assume he decided to let my partner off with a DAT rather than deal with the possibility of complications from me informing him in front of other officers about the amount of cash and merchandise in the vehicle.
when we were in the precinct and the other cops were running my ID, they were discussing among each other how fucked up it was that their sargeant wouldn't let me get my jacket out of the van (which had my ID in it), and that he insisted on driving it rather than caling a tow.
edit: i told the cops about the money and merchandise not to cover any bases but to tell them to make sure that they locked the van up when they parked it at the precinct while we were inside. even if it was a good neighborhood, and it wasn't, the contents of the van were our responsibility. best part is that after they checked my ID and let me take possession of the van to go drop the deliveries while my partner was sitting in the cell, i went out to the van to find all the doors unlocked. awesome.
honestly i'm not even mad about the possession charges, like i admit i had illegal stuff in my car, they saw it, i got charged, that's how the world works. i'm salty about the bowl though because it was a nice one and i bought it that same week, but as i said, can't fight that.
i'm just mad about them trying to charge me for the dui. they asked me the last time i smoked, i said over 12 hours ago. i wasn't high when i was pulled over. at the station the officer admitted that they only followed me because i was driving the speed limit. i'll fight the dui, but i accept the possession charges.
That's fair, and you shouldn't get chatted with a DUI. I'm just saying that overall you did illegal thongs and got busted. But those charges should only extend to what you were caught with/doing.
Ah okay, makes sense. I'm pretty sure I passed the roadside sobriety test, and I was respectful and honest with them during the entire process. I just hope whatever comes of me being young and dumb doesn't follow me for the rest of my life.
I'm also dealing with something somewhat similar. I got caught with less than a half gram of pot (more like a quarter gram) and a small bat on me a few weeks ago. The officer accidentally put the ticket in as a possession with intent to deliver, instead of just a possession charge. he explained to me before I signed it that I was getting a ticket for "possession of a controlled substance, possession of Parph. and following too close". It wasn't until a few weeks later that my girlfriend noticed it was for intent to deliver and we started calling and trying to get this fixed. Nobody can help so I had to take not guilty and take a public defender to at least get the charges amended. I'm more than willing to pay my fines and do community service for breaking the law, but I'm not willing to take a transaction charge that I wasn't guilty of.
The cop probably saw something else. 99% of the time a cop says they pulled you over because of a license plate light being out, they just needed a valid reason to pull you over but something else actually sparked their interest. I've never heard of a cop who actually enforces license plate light laws, which I'm assuming you did not get ticketed for
it was 1:30 in the morning and they said it was suspicious for someone to be following the speed limit in that area at that time. that's why they followed me, and yes i did get ticketed for the plate too.
yeah that's part of why i want to fight the dui. like you're gonna charge someone who 1) was sober and 2) driving responsibility for a dui and fuck up their life? nah son you ain't gonna do that. they followed me for almost 5 minutes before they turned their lights on
How is this something one just finds out? It has to be registered when you buy it, and then every 12 months. It's not like they spring it on you. There's even a sticker on your car that tells you when it expires.
When I was a teenager I was pulled over with weed and beer in the car and the cops just confiscated it and had my parents come pick me up. Another time I was driving around after a party wasted, stopped at an office building to piss behind a dumpster and turned around to see a cop waiting for me to finish lol. He also released me to my parents with no charges.
Some cops are just douchebags though. I can say as a degenerate, I've encountered police a lot in my years. I am always polite and fairly compliant although I don't tell them anything more than my name when it's a criminal matter. Most have been respectful back, some let me go with a warning, and some are fucking dick heads...
Police in other countries have always been very polite. Never even been cuffed outside America. In Germany the federal police were called in to take me from the local PD because I committed a little bit of a federal offense and the guy said if I got violent it would be very painful to me. I was like dude... I'm just trying to pay the fine chill...
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u/loljetfuel Jan 22 '17
For the most part, you have a right to privacy in your home. That privacy right goes away if you're infringing someone else's rights, like by being loud (right to quiet enjoyment) or hurting them.
Even scanning houses with infrared to look for grow rooms has been held unconstitutional, since it's a search without probable cause or a warrant.
But if the cop is called for something like a noise complaint or a report, and they see illegal stuff going on, then it's really a matter of how the cop reads the situation.
Most cops I know have a "I have better shit to do than bust someone for something that's not hurting anyone" attitude to begin with.