How do they prevent the two investigators from lying about what I said?
Reminder: Oh, Won't You Please Shut Up? (2011)
211–216 of 216 posts
Re: Reminder: Oh, Won't You Please Shut Up? (2011)
#212I'm not American and I have a question. Everybody in this thread repeats to "never talk to law enforcement without your lawyer present". I don't have a lawyer. I don't know a lawyer. I've hardly ever even talked to a lawyer. If I were in the USA and I'd get picked up for questioning, I wouldn't know who to call. Does every American "have a lawyer"? Do you know their phone number by heart? Is having a lawyer like havi…
The "don't talk to the police without a lawyer" thing is a meme that is pretty overblown. It doesn't hold for stuff like getting a minor speeding ticket, being a witness to a crime that clearly you aren't involved in, the cop just talking to see whats up (when you aren't otherwise committing crimes).
You really need a lawyer:
When the cops are interrogating you
When you are a suspect or it looks like you may be one. If your wife winds up dead, you are a suspect. If money at work goes missing and you had access, you are a suspect. But if you just happen to see a random kid get hit my a car, you can talk to the police without a lawyer.
When you actually committed a crime.
Or if you are were involved in some accident, dispute, whatever and there might be a lawsuit.
But, IMO, if you try to lawyer up at a traffic stop (when you aren't committing real crimes), when a cop asks how you are doing in a park, or when you are clearly a third party witness; then you'll probably just cause yourself more grief by asking for the lawyer.
Lawyers are expensive, you make yourself suspicious, and you might cause the cops to detain you longer.
Re: Reminder: Oh, Won't You Please Shut Up? (2011)
#213Re: Reminder: Oh, Won't You Please Shut Up? (2011)
#214Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you answer directly, it should be to say "I only know what my speedometer displays." And then politely decline to mention the number it had been displaying. If you say a number, in the cops eyes, you are either lying or confessing. If you just say "yes", you cut off certain affirmative defenses you could otherwise raise. If you say "no", the cop may charge you with reckless or inattentive driving rather than speed…
> So record every police encounter, always. Unless you are in a jurisdiction where such actions are illegal...
There is no such jurisdiction in the US. Those laws are struck down on constitutional grounds when they are challenged in court.
It cannot be illegal to record a public official, in public, while performing his or her public duties, or there is no future for democracy. Individual jurisdictions may specify whether such recordings can be made secretly or not, but if you are openly and obviously recording, you shouldn't have a problem anywhere.
(I am not a lawyer.)
Re: Reminder: Oh, Won't You Please Shut Up? (2011)
#215Earlier quoted context omitted.
Crazy stat : city of Ferguson has outstanding arrest warrants on more than half of its citizens. This is an insane police state! http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nathan-robinson/the-shocking-f...
This is the result of the crazy patchwork quilt of small municipalities in St Louis County. All of these municipalities need money and property taxes are usually not enough to fund the police etc. So they use ticketing as a revenue generator and that has really screwed up the relationship between the officials and the people who live in those towns. There's a tiny tiny town called St. John. It has a tiny tiny city li…
The other thing you need to factor into the equation is that low-income Americans, especially black Americans, don't vote in large numbers.
There is a sense that we get the government we deserve.
Re: Reminder: Oh, Won't You Please Shut Up? (2011)
#216Earlier quoted context omitted.
No indicates recklessness. Yes indicates intent. You're screwed either way.
Am I reading all these comments correctly ? You guys were caught in the act and don't even admit it ? "Do you know how fast you were driving?" "Yes sir, I'm sorry I was speeding, it's been a stressful day. I have no excuse for this behavior. I won't do it again." Should be the reasonable answer. Now swallow your pride and pay the fine, and try not to do that again. My kids will thank you.
I'm not in the US. Our police officers aren't desperate to meet quotas and don't have any reason to assume a driver is armed and/or dangerous. I don't have any reason to believe a conversation with a police officer in my country will lead to anything other than improving my chance to be let go with a warning instead of a fine.
That said, I'm still in my probation period (only started driving a little more than a year ago) and haven't violated any traffic laws yet at all. Most speeding checks are done with unmanned cameras anyway, so your first contact with the orderlies will be a flash followed by a stern letter a few weeks later.