Off Duty Police officer, tries to race me then gives me a ticket

[KrazyBones]

iv had "off duty" cops flash their badge at me before, just calmly ignore them and drive away. A cop can't pull you over by just flashing a badge. I didn't see it, i didn't believe he was a cop etc.

[mike.from.canmore]

Firstly, as you know, the charge laid is the one which must be proven in court. Not proving a different charge, and that the lesser and different charge therefore is satisfactory. It would be like arresting for manslaughter, but charging for armed robbery because it seems easier to obtain a quilty plea without trial.

No, the OP did not say anything about estimating top speed. BUT, we do know that the ticket was for 49 over the limit, which would require a form of speed measurement, and since none was present, estimation would be the only method of said measurement. Logic is a cool thing.

Actually... the charge was for SPEEDING.
The charge wasn''t for 49 over.

The 49 over is merely used to determine how many demerit points are associated, and how much the fine will be.

Q: I don’t think I was going as fast as the officer gave me the speeding ticket for. Can I use this as a defence?
A: Stating that you don’t think you were going as fast as the officer clocked you at is not a valid defence for your case. Actually, on the contrary, this sort of statement would help convict you of the speeding ticket. If you feel that you were only speeding 10km over the limit but the officer gave you a ticket for 20 over the limit and you disclose this in court, you are still admitting to speeding. No matter what speed you were traveling at, the charge always remains the same...Speeding. The rate at which you were travelling at is purely used to determine the fine amount attached to the ticket. A speed of 1 km over the limit is the same charge as 45 over the limit, only the fine would change, but the charge is still speeding. When you go to trial, the prosecutor will ask, “were you speeding?” If the answer is, “yes, but not as fast as the officer says”, you will still be charged for speeding. The only way to fight and beat a speeding ticket such as this is to have a professional from Traffic Ticket Solutions review your case to see what legal errors or technicalities are available to help eliminate the speeding ticket from your record.

Source - http://speedingontario.com/questions.php



Why all the fuss - this is merely a single MINOR moving violation. (1-49 over is minor).
The OP got a break, he actually was racing, but fortunately got a minor speeding ticket instead.

[Ijaz]

Couple of interesting points:

1. What's to say that the cops weren't just revving their engines waiting for the lights and then sped off for their own purpose other than racing the OP. OP then mistook this action as the Focus wanting to race and accelerated to beat them.

2. I am not supporting blindly what Turbo is saying, but I see what point he is trying to make. The OP was given a speeding ticket for going 49 KM/H over the limit. This is a valid ticket and has been given out to many people, instead of an HTA172 charge. It's within an officers discretion to do so. The OP's car could have been impounded simply based on the fact that he was trying to race regardless of what speeds were reached.

3. He was given a 49 KM/H over speeding ticket. This could indicate that officers paced the OP to an indicated speed on their speedometer. Whether they stopped giving chase or did reach higher speeds is irrelevant as their car would have indicated the speed OP was traveling at, at one point or another. Pacing is a valid charge in the court of law as has occurred with many tickets given out by OPP officers on the highway. It does not need to happen over a distance either. As long as the officer had to reach that speed to keep up with you, you can be charged at what the speedometer indicated. It was simply the officers discretion to give the OP a break and not impound the car. Remember, you do not need to be going 50 over to get your car impounded.

4. Off duty officers are never really off duty. Maybe they called for backup because they didn't have the ability to write a ticket at the time and needed an on duty officer to do so.

*This is all just speculation as to the charge itself. No one here, including myself knows exactly what happened. For all we know, OP can be altering the details a bit to suit his needs. We all do it. I am not assigning blame here, or siding with the officers either, so don't bite my head off.

[toysareforboys]

Cool cop race story:

I just purchased my 2004 Grand Prix GTP compG and installed a Zex wet 75hp nitrous kit and put headers on it and upped the boost by a ton, etc... Got off work around 6pm, heading south from brooklin. In the right hand lane stopped at a red light. My lane ends/merges a few hundred meters ahead. I notice in my rearview a car driving around other cars very aggressively. He pulls up beside me at the red light. It's a tinted out brand new dodge charger. He revs his engine, etc. I do a couple nitrous sprays and whine the supercharger. Usually makes people back off. He revs again. I'm like, alright, lets rock.

Get on the brakes, rev er up to 3,100 (high stall converter) and get ready for the green light. BOOM, he eats me like I'm standing still (damn rwd ). As I get into second I light the nitrous and begin to catch up to him. We get up to some traffic and... police lights illuminate in his back window, and from under the rear bumper!! I'm like WTF!! The car in front of him pulls off the road and he goes speeding off into the distance... I slow down and hang back. 2 mins down the road it splits into two lanes again. I get in the right lane because it's empty and guess who I come up beside at the red light!! He honks, I look over, he's motioning for me to put down my window so I do...

He says "Goes pretty fast eh?"...
"I guess so..."
"I just got it!"
"Yeah I can tell..."
"GREEN LIGHT. VROOOOM"

Off he goes in a big smoke show =)

Bought a lottery ticket that night

-Jamie M.

[ZX3_2NV]

All I have to say is unless the Focus looked like this you shouldn't of been racing him lol.