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Originally Posted by The_wall
What would be a ligitimate reason to get to the head of traffic and then slow down to about the speed of traffic? The legitimate reason would be to catch the big bad criminal who was going 40 in a 25, on a road in which everyone goes at least 30, many go as fast as 45 on it.
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As many of you know, I am a cop... or a pig, "the man", corrupt... whatever else you want to call me. I have resisted posting in this thread because I take all this shit personally, but I feel the need to respond.
First,
The_wall, in reference to your question: Many times when there is a "hot call", a call that requires lights and sirens, dispatch will send several cars to the scene. Once the first car gets there and determines that whatever is going on does not need an emergency response, he or she will advise the other cars to slow their response, or to disregard responding completely. In those times, I'll be running with lights and sirens to a call, and when I'm told to disregard, I'll shut off my emergency equipment and return to regular patrol.
Now, in reference to those who say that I write tickets for revenue reasons, I say "Kiss my ass." I have no quotas, no expectations, and nothing happens to me if I write one ticket or if I write one hundred tickets. I don't see any extra cash in the paycheck if I write you a ticket, if I write you a warning, or if I cut you lose with a verbal warning. So now the question is: why do you write tickets. I write tickets because I honestly believe that speed limits are there for a reason. An accident at 25mph and an accident at 40mph are entirely different. I've studied the physics behind vehicle accidents and the speeds at which they occur. Whether or not you agree is trivial. The government has set the speed limit, and they've told me that part of my duty is to enforce it.
For every person that complains that we have better things to do than to set up "speed traps", there is a person who is complaining about the cars that are racing up and down their streets. For every person that complains that we speed as we drive down the street, there are people who complain that it took us 20 minutes to respond when they called us. For every person who complains about us doing whatever, there are people who complain that we aren't doing enough of it. There would be no way to do my job effectively and please everyone who thinks they know how to do my job better than I do. Everyone has their view of how law enforcement should behave, and quite often it is the people who get caught doing what they shouldn't be doing that have the loudest voice of all.
To those who support us, I thank you.