It is no surprise to anyone who has received a speeding ticket in Florida that this is big business for the state. Millions of dollars a year fill the pockets of cities and fill the coffers of state and local government offices. Take a look at any municipality’s books and, assuming they’re accurate, you’ll see where traffic ticket revenue helps cover budget shortfalls. When you think about it, it begs the question of whether or not local governments should rely on people who break the law to meet their tax obligations. Of course, reflecting on government actions can often open up a can of worms regarding questions of right, wrong, just, and unjust. Such is the case with speeding tickets.
There is no denying that the funds accruing from speeding tickets are large, but one segment of speeding offenders that is not quantifiable is that of speeding police officers. It is not quantifiable because a police officer rarely gets pulled over for committing the same speeding violations that other drivers are ticketed for, at least not when he is driving a police car. Even when stopped in a personal vehicle, a police officer is highly unlikely to receive a speeding ticket once the arresting police officer realizes they are dealing with one of their fellow “guys in blue.” “.
Surely, all of us have experienced the frustration of driving in heavy traffic while trying to obey traffic laws (not always an easy task) when suddenly a police officer zooms past us. He’s not running around with lights and/or siren, and it’s time for a shift change, so he knows he’s just headed home. Watching cops get away with murder for no good reason and suffer little to no ramifications can be infuriating. This is especially true if he’s gotten a speeding ticket…or two.
It’s no wonder most of us feel a small spark of joy in our hearts when we hear that a police officer has been arrested for committing the very infractions they seem to enjoy fining the rest of us for. Unfortunately, this seems to happen rarely and only when they commit major or repeated violations. Occasionally, however, police-to-police violations are so egregious or systemic in a given area that they attract the attention of those willing to do something about it. YouTube is littered with videos of people filming police officers speeding or abusing the power entrusted to them.
Fortunately, we can often still count on news sources to conduct research on such behavior. The Sun-Sentinel conducted an investigation in 2012 that resulted in the censorship of 44 Miami-Dade police officers. The investigation revealed that these officers were constantly driving county vehicles at speeds in excess of 90 miles per hour. Fifty percent of the time, these officers were off duty when they committed these violations. I don’t know which is more outrageous, the fact that half the time they were breaking this particular law it was while we taxpayers were paying them, or the other half the time they were breaking the law and putting others at risk in their time. staff.
The investigation also revealed that while on duty, many of these officers exceed the limits that even their department policy allows during critical conditions. These seem like pretty serious infractions to me, but the only penalties most of these officers suffered were briefly losing the privilege of driving county vehicles home after their shift and/or taking an 8-year driver safety training course. hours.
In addition to those findings, the year-long investigation also found that nearly 800 police officers from a multitude of agencies drove between 90 and 130 miles per hour according to SunPass records. Unfortunately, it took the involvement of the media to bring these serious issues to light, which in turn led the various law enforcement agencies to conduct individual investigations. The result of these investigations was that 138 officers were sanctioned not only by their respective agencies, but also by the counties in which they operated. Unfortunately, the discipline they received was severely lacking, as, with only two exceptions, the sanctions issued were nothing more than reprimands.
There are incidents where police officers who break traffic laws face harsher penalties including dismissal or imprisonment, but these actions are generally reserved for “rogue” police officers who commit more serious crimes. Such was the case for a Miami police officer who was arrested for running from a Florida state trooper for more than 18 miles at speeds in excess of 100 mph. Why was he in such a hurry? Apparently, he was on his way to his second job while driving his Miami City Police cruiser.
The way police officers like the ones I’ve mentioned here abuse their power is outrageous. Any additional driver training they receive does not necessarily make it safer for them to speed up and justify taking the welfare of others into their own hands. The fact that they are entrusted with the power to determine whether or not the average citizen is acting within the confines of Florida traffic laws makes it even more critical that they hold themselves to a higher standard of care. Combine that responsibility with the fact that these speeding violations often occur in police vehicles that are paid for with our tax dollars, as well as the gas that fuels them and the insurance that covers them, and it’s easy to get upset when knowing that these police officers rarely see the same consequences as we do for committing the same crimes.
Most of us are taught at a very young age to respect police officers, comply with their demands, and operate within the bounds of the law. That is a bitter pill to continually try to swallow when we feel that the standards by which law enforcement operates are different from those the rest of us are expected to meet. If you receive a speeding ticket or any other type of traffic ticket, call us at 954-967-9888 for a free consultation. We believe that protecting your rights is as important, if not more so, than the rights given to police officers who give you traffic tickets.
