The following is an email (with a few minor updates) I sent to Eric Peters that was subsequently posted on his website on September 3, 2013. See here for the original post on ericpetersautos.com
I have such contempt for police that I sometimes find myself rooting for actual criminals to win
against them, and not just unwitting law-abiding citizens caught up in
an unfortunate police encounter. On April 2 of this year, I was
accosted by the Milwaukee County Sheriffs Department Thug by the name of
Steven Paull. His claim was that I was driving in an unsafe manner and
issued me a citation for Unsafe Cutting In When Passing (and referenced
Wis Stats 346.07(2)). The law had nothing to do with what the thug
accused me of (see the list of exceptions listed at the end of the first paragraph of the law he cited). Even so, I did nothing to harm anyone on the road or
even cause anyone on the road to swerve, brake or in any way have to
compensate for my driving. I went to the initial appearance, the
pretrial hearing and the actual trial (three separate appearances in
all) and eventually prevailed. The Judge (Carolina Maria Stark) found
that Milwaukee County did not have sufficient evidence to suggest that
my driving was unsafe and further, that what the Thug kept repeating,
namely that I switched lanes without signaling constituted unsafe
driving, could have been charged under failure to signal or unsafe lane
deviation. I write this to encourage anyone that receives any traffic
citation to fight it in court and tie up as many resources as possible.
Ask for a jury trial. If more people would fight these bogus citations
which amount to little more than road use taxes or speed taxes, the
police would lose the incentive to write them if they know they will
most likely lose the case. The police departments would have little
incentive to direct their officers to write the tickets if they know
they will have to pay loads of money for OT for the officers answering a
court subpoena. Beat them at their own game and make them collapse
under the weight of their own requirements.
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