[Baltimore Citizen’s Academy] — Traffic Enforcement Part 1
This is part of the series on the Baltimore Citizen’s Academy, being posted every Monday and Thursday. Today’s entry is based on a presentation from Officer Livesay in the patrol division.
You are in your car, on your way to an appointment, or meeting someone for lunch. The radio is on and you are jamming out to some good music, or listening to an interesting podcast. This drive is a drive that you have made before, and is the kind of drive where you kind of go into auto pilot.
All of a sudden, you see police lights right behind you. Your foot comes off the gas instinctively. You know they are pulling you over because they are right behind you, and not just driving down the road to get somewhere. “Crap, crap, crap”. What did you do? You don’t know because you were on autopilot. And you have already slowed down because your foot is off the gas.
Your mind races. What do people do when they get pulled over? Stories flash into your mind where people get ripped out of their car and tased. You don’t want to get tased! Crap… you still haven’t even started pulling over yet. You start moving over.
Maybe you have something in your car that you aren’t supposed to have. Maybe there is that gun in your trunk from hunting last month. Or maybe there is that bottle of liquor that you threw in your backseat after that party from last weekend. Or maybe there is a little pot somewhere in your car. Think of an alibi. No. Don’t say anything. Just act natural. Act like you normally do. How do relaxed humans act? I DON’T KNOW!!!
You pull over. Ok… it will be fine. Wait… is my insurance card up to date? They are going to throw me in jail and tow my car and give me a ticket and my insurance is going to go up. Or I might get tased and arrested if I do the wrong thing.
Sigh.
Getting pulled over is the most common interaction most people have with the police, and its a very stressful experience. At best, it can make you late, and the worst case can be much worse. So lets go through some of what goes into a stop.
Note: I am not a lawyer. This information is from Officer Livesay’s presentation on Traffic Enforcement. There probably are other arguments for some of these things, but that's why lawyers get paid lots of money to argue these things in court. If you disagree with them, its best to go along with the stop and then get evidence thrown out in court.
What should I expect?
The officer will stop behind you and pull slightly to the left, into traffic. Outside of the Citizen’s Academy, I have been told that it would cause the patrol car to swing away from the officer if it were hit from behind. However, Officer Livesay said that it forces passing cars to move over a bit more, which gives the officer a bit more of a safety bubble to stand in while doing the stop. Sgt Corso, the coordinator of the class and former patrol officer, told us that he had been hit by a passing sideview mirror in the past.
If you look at the video at the top of this post, you will see what the BPD patrol cars look like with their light bar activated. If its dark out, the officer will probably also turn on a spot light and point it in your car, which helps them determine what is going on in the car before they approach it.
Traffic stops can go many different ways, and of course officers are shown the worst of the worst situations. For instance, this traffic stop that turned deadly quickly.
Every patrol officer probably has a horror story, but Sgt Coroso had one where he nearly shot the individual he stopped for having two tail lights out. Sgt Coroso approached the driver’s side door and asked the driver for his license. The driver, who was a security guard, had an odd looking box on his passenger side seat that had a handgun he used for work. He did not have permission to take the gun home, and did not have a concealed carry permit. When Sgt Coroso asked him what was in the box, he grabbed the gun out of the box and cocked the gun.
Let me repeat. Instead of telling him what was in the box, he grabbed the gun… and cocked it. Sgt Coroso said that he pulled his gun and probably had taken all of the slack out of the trigger before the man put his hands up. That is how close that situation was to being a police involved shooting.
They had us go through our own simulated traffic stop. After the child in me played with the lights for a few seconds, we got out and approached the car. Officers are trained to approach slowly, and keep their eyes on the cabin of the vehicle. They are trained to touch the trunk as they pass it to see if it is open, and to put their prints on the car incase it drives off.
As I approached the driver’s window, the driver was reaching to the passenger side for something. It could have been a drivers license or insurance card, but it was impossible to tell and is the reason that officers can be on edge during stops.
Officers don’t need a search warrant, or probable cause to search what is in plain view. The officer we were talking to said that if the trunk is open, then that counts as something being in plain view. Officers are looking at all occupants, looking for any contraband, and looking for any weapons.
Officer Livesay said that the officer might shine their flashlight in your eyes, which is to check if you might be under the influence and to verify your face against your drivers license picture. If they suspect it is, they might ask you to verify some of the information on the license.
They also stand sightly behind the driver, just behind the door for a few reasons:
- It provides a clearer view into the front cabin, and what the driver is doing with their hands
- The door would not hit the officer if swung open
- The occupant would need to turn more than 90 degrees to fire at the officer. It also makes it more obvious if you are about to do something, which gives the officer a bit more time. Of course, there is still a risk if there are people in the back seat, but the risk profile is reduced.
One thing that you can do when you are getting pulled over to put the officer at ease is to turn on your dome light, pull over, and put your hands on the steering wheel. As they are walking up, don’t be searching for your driver’s license, insurance card, and registration. Just wait. Those blaring lights might make you nervous, but the officer is probably a bit nervous as well. Just… wait. Especially on night stops.
In part 2 on Traffic Enforcement, we will talk more about how the BPD has used traffic stops in a way that has violated citizen’s civil rights, and how it has been used as a tool for many of the unconstitutional stops and searches that underpin the Justice Department report.
To wrap up this post, I leave you with a few roadside stop videos including a trooper dealing with an eccentric person getting a speeding ticket, a person who beats a cop that stops him, a person that refuses to give the officer his driver’s license and proof of insurance, and a Michigan teenager who was shot during a traffic stop.
