Ohio Speeding Ticket Ruling

[lovehamr]

Originally Posted by dcdoug

It may be the law, but it seems to be pretty flawed, not to mention possibly unconstitutional IMHO. Be nice to see it get challenged further.

Doug, I can see the "flawed" thing and being an ex-K9 and firearms guy who hardly ever worked traffic I can understand the sentement. But "unconstitutional"? I'm lost on that one.

Steve

[dcdoug]

Originally Posted by lovehamr

Doug, I can see the "flawed" thing and being an ex-K9 and firearms guy who hardly ever worked traffic I can understand the sentement. But "unconstitutional"? I'm lost on that one.

Steve

It seems to be that our police departments these days spend an inordinate amount of resources focused on generating revenue, which I believe should not be their primary focus (and doesn't seem like it used to be 20 years ago). Most departments have a mission statement that is something like "Protect and Serve", not "Generate Cash to Cover Budget Shortfalls and Protect and Serve As Time Allows". My guess is that traffic officer headcount is 2x-3x relative to other departments from what it was 20 years ago. I'd love to know that the real answer is if you have it.

As for the Supreme Court case - WDZ had it in his post. Given the variance of this officer's ability to discern speed despite the training, I don't see how the average citizen is protected by a presumption of innocence until proven guilty. Where's the proof? The officer's "proof" in this case was actually shown to be unreliable through his own testimony, yet the citizen still gets the ticket. And what about reasonable doubt? That also seems to be in abundance here.

All the more concerning when you consider the revenue pressure that a lot of these officers are probably under. That is not a healthy structure designed to serve and protect citizens. It is a structure that encourages the exploitation of citizens. Might not happen very often as I do believe that most officers out there are fair and honest. But that's why the burden of proof lies with the government, not the citizen. Except apparently with traffic tickets because that might affect government cash flow.

[Great Asp]

Of topic slightly, I hope Ron gives me a variance

"Ticket or Click it"

Safety program, or revenue generator?

E

My voter is annoying revenue generator, I am tired of hearing the gas.

[lovehamr]

I agree that a police department should not be a cash cow for the government, I believe that it makes for a conflict of interest. That being said and with very few exceptions, most officers do NOT like normal traffic duty and are not out there because they just like writing tickets. Are there some who do? Of course there are but there are also people who like cleaning porta-potties, so go figure. If a dept's focus is changed to reflect more revenue generation you can bet that it didn't come from their own command structure. It came from the civil leadership over them. You don't like the police policies? Vote out the sh*t-bird officials controlling them. Before I sign off, I do have to point out that when I say normal traffic I'm not talking about DUI sweeps, dope check points, school zone enforcement and things of that nature. I consider those as necessary evil fighting tactics, not revenue generation. Heck, most officers could care less about your 5mph over violation, but if they make the stop and smell dope burning……..well now, that’s a whole nother ball-O-yarn ain’t it? LOL

Asp, stats on this one don't lie, belts save an awful lot of lives. Annoying rhetoric? Yes. Useful info? Also yes.

[Great Asp]

Originally Posted by lovehamr

Asp, stats on this one don't lie, belts save an awful lot of lives. Annoying rhetoric? Yes. Useful info? Also yes.

I'd rather they write the tickets and stop spending money on bugging me.

But then again, when it is "Ticket or Click it" month, the LEOs focus on writing seatbelt tics, so while they are looking to meet quota on seat belts, ????

E

[Ibr8k4vetts]

I call B.S. on all you "pro" on judging speed from standing on the side of the road...and I will beat you EVERY time in court!
I had a C.H.P. pull me over and said I was doing 70mph in a simi truck that was only able of 60mph! He was and D!ck and I knew him...He would swear I was doing 70 in court and was TOTALLY WRONG! The car's I was passing all slowed down to 45 mph or less and it looked like I was speeding.

[joyridin']

It will be like the movie Minority Report where some group will think you can commit a crime, so you'll get punished for it.

[Ibr8k4vetts]

I would like to make it clear I am NOT ante law enforcement...I have friends in C.H.P., P.D. and Sheriff Dept.
But some let it go to there head!

[lovehamr]

Originally Posted by Ibr8k4vetts

I call B.S. on all you "pro" on judging speed from standing on the side of the road...and I will beat you EVERY time in court!

Mike, if you're not anti-LE then why lump us all in? I mean, dayum! What did I do to you?

Steve

[Ralphy]

Not surprised, in Ohio if you speed it's only a question of, when will you get a ticket. People are posting comments about the burden of proof. However if you crash a stop sign and get ticketed. More then likely there is no proof, so I think that angle is not warranted.

[dcdoug]

Originally Posted by Ralphy

People are posting comments about the burden of proof. However if you crash a stop sign and get ticketed. More then likely there is no proof, so I think that angle is not warranted.

The difference is that determining if someone came to a complete stop or not is binary. You did or you didn't. Not much gray area. Determining speed has lots of gray area unless you have it on laser or radar (IMHO).

[Stoney FFR]

EDIT: I missed the link to the court case the first time. Looks like this case involved BOTH visual estimation and verification by electronic means. The case is somewhat messed up though. The officer estimated 70 MPH, but the radar said 82 MPH?? I probably wouldn't have stopped the vehicle since the radar was telling me something considerably different from my visual estimation.


Just because the court said that visual estimation was viable, it doesn't mean that officers are going to spend all day writing citations based solely on visual estimation. This issue is old news since officers receive extensive training and are suppose to make visual estimations even when using radar, laser, lidar...

[bobcowan]

Originally Posted by SPF2245

Just for the non-cops, most radar schools are ~40 hours of math and in my class the final certification was 20 controlled speed verifications with a +/- 5mph (ie the suspect vehicle was moving at 50mph and you had to be within 45-55. Then you had to also have a distance you make the estimate. We had to get 18 out of 20 correct to pass the class. Along with that, we had 100 practice runs during the week...by the end we'd be making estimates +/- 2mph with near 100% accuracy.

The reason this exsists is due to the radar can not tell you which car is traveling at the speed indicated so you use the radar to verify your visual estimate. It's really not hard to do this accurately.

What you just said is that your margin for error is 10%. And, you're 90% accurate nearly 100% of the time.

Now think about that. What if you went to the bank to cash your pay check, and they had an acceptable margin for error of 10%. And then not all the time. Would you accept that? What about your plumber? Auto mechanic? Stock broker?

Heck, what if the timing lights at the local drag strip had a margin for error of 10%? Would you accept that?

So now we're talking about an event that significantly affects peoples wallets (fines, court costs, lost work, insurance rates), and we're supposed to be OK with that?

Don't worry. Next time you're in my office, you'll get the correct prescription. Within 10%. Most of the time. But you're OK with that, right?

[bobcowan]

Originally Posted by Stoney FFR

Don't forget guys, I don't think anyone has posted the details on the case that was ruled on by the high court. For all we know the officer saw a kid on a crotch rocket going 130+ MPH. Something like that would be very easy to visually determine that he was substantially exceeding the speed limit. ...

Again, flawed reasoning. To estimate a speed of 130mph, you have to practice at it, even to get within 10% most of the time. How often do you see a MC traveling past you at 130mph? How often does the average motor cop practice estimating that? Probably never. So, clearly, he has no training or experiance in performing that function/duty/task. I am probably more qualified to testify, since I drive that fast on a regular basis, and watch other vehicles do the same. (on the track only).

So now the officer has to testify about something has no training, knowledge, or experiance. And the court just says, "OK"? You find that acceptable? Really?

What does the officer say? "I saw him riding really really fast". And out of what orifice does the officer pull the actual speed from? That's important, because the fine/punishment is based on the speed.

If you want to convict and punish some one for comitting a crime, you have to specify what that crime is. You can't just say that they did one of many possible crimes, and only on the say-so of one guy. That IS unconstitutional.

[dcdoug]

Actually, patrickt posted a link to the summary findings and testimony in the case.

[patrickt]

Originally Posted by dcdoug

Actually, patrickt posted a link to the summary findings and testimony in the case.

It's generally more fun to opine about a case without actually having read it first.

[ERA Chas]

I respect the info the law guys have posted about their training and experiences-bottom line is they always use electrons as backup for their observation.

But I'd like to understand-is speed judgment based in a target's speed relative to other moving traffic around it? Or are officers trained to gauge a single moving object's speed? If traffic is moving at a steady 80 mph and I'm going 86 is that detectable, and to what end since all traffic is already 25 over posted limit?

Further, who (if either) is more likely to get a citation-a red C6 going 72 or a gray Hyundai going 78? Are these subjective evaluations or is the faster car always correctly stopped regardless of a vehicle's perceived speed capability?

[Stoney FFR]

Originally Posted by bobcowan

Again, flawed reasoning. To estimate a speed of 130mph, you have to practice at it, even to get within 10% most of the time. How often do you see a MC traveling past you at 130mph? How often does the average motor cop practice estimating that? Probably never. So, clearly, he has no training or experiance in performing that function/duty/task. I am probably more qualified to testify, since I drive that fast on a regular basis, and watch other vehicles do the same. (on the track only).

So now the officer has to testify about something has no training, knowledge, or experiance. And the court just says, "OK"? You find that acceptable? Really?

What does the officer say? "I saw him riding really really fast". And out of what orifice does the officer pull the actual speed from? That's important, because the fine/punishment is based on the speed.

If you want to convict and punish some one for comitting a crime, you have to specify what that crime is. You can't just say that they did one of many possible crimes, and only on the say-so of one guy. That IS unconstitutional.

How often do you see a MC traveling past you at 130mph?

Not that it really makes a whole lot of difference, but around here you can see it daily on IH-20, State Hwy. 287, SH 360 or IH-30. It's a huge problem that I'm not exaggerating about!

Bob, the exact wording of the laws are different from state to state. I was using the 130 MPH motorcycle just as an example. Here are a few more of my thoughts.

In my state an officer can pull over a speeding vehicle based on visual estimation too. The point isn't to go out and do speed enforcement without a radar or laser. Sometimes an officer isn't able to get a reading on a vehicle that is clearly going significantly faster than the speed limit, all because of the excessive speed of the vehicle. A vehicle traveling in excess of 100 MPH can be very difficult to shoot with laser/radar, depending on where the officer is set up. The other possibility is that the officer may not even have an electronic speed measuring device in his car.

With that said, it's very easy to tell the difference between a vehicle going 100+ MPH compared to a vehicle traveling 55 MPH..

By having the law allow for visual estimation, the officer is still legally allowed to stop the vehicle, even though no radar/laser verification was used. Please tell me that you would want an officer to be allowed to stop the speeding vehicle! Not allowing for visual estimation would make the stop illegal! I used to made visual estimation type of stops from time to time. I don't remember the break down because it's been many years since I have done speed enforcement, but at some point the fine is the same beyond a certain speed. Something like 30 or 40 MPH over the speed limit. So it really doesn't matter from a fine standpoint if the speed is written at 130 MPH or possibly 90 MPH.

So back to my original statement about the 130 MPH motorcycle. An officer could write the citation for 110 MPH. Who cares if the motorcycle was going 130 MPH, the fine is the same and he clearly had to come back down through 110 MPH as he slowed down.

When it comes to speeds like that on public highways trust me, we want officers to be able to get those people off of the roads before they kill someone and don't want some stupid law from preventing officers from doing their jobs.

Is there a possibility that officers could abuse the visual estimation law? OF COURSE. But then again, if an officer is going to lie, he could just lie and say that he clocked the vehicle with laser/radar too.. All bets are off if the officer is corrupt.

Courts have always recognized an officer's visual estimation as being valid and required for laser/radar citations for the past 28 years that I have been in law enforcement. Requiring officers to visually estimate speeds has always been very important, especially back in the radar days. Based on the way radar works it was always really easy to point the radar at one vehicle going the speed limit and get the reading from another vehicle that was exceeding the speed limit. Visual estimation was the only thing that kept innocent people from getting citations. Do you really want a law that says visual estimation is not allowed and the officer should rely solely on what a radar or laser displays? I hope not!

I guess to make a long story short, I feel there are a couple of reasons why courts give the authority and requirement to make visual estimations.

#1 - It's a important part of speed enforcment even when using an electronic device.
#2 - Officers need to have some legal authority to stop a person driving at excessive unsafe speeds, even if the excessive speed hasn't been confirmed with laser/radar/lidar.

Now, with all of that said, I have now read the above court case. The officer said he estimated the vehicle was travelling at 70 MPH. The radar said 82 MPH. The officer gave the defendant a break and only wrote the defendant for going 79 MPH, to keep it under the 20 MPH over fine. The court found the defendant guilty of 70 MPH since that was the officer's visual estimation. And you guys want to get upset over the court's decision?? lol...

[Fordzilla]

Wow Joe! That's alot of typing. Anyway, I second what Joe just posted. Saves me from typing..

[ERA Chas]

Originally Posted by Fordzilla

Wow Joe! That's alot of typing. Anyway, I second what Joe just posted. Saves me from typing..

Ford,
Would appreciate your experiences on my questions in post #37.