I did that once.....unloaded..ammo was out of reach..the pistol was in plain sight to "me" and my buddy between the seats but i figured i'd better put it where he can see it as he pulled me over.(i kinda but not really ran a red light and was swerving trying to light a cigarette at 2am) i said officer i have a pistol on the dash, it's not loaded. All hell broke loose, squad cars came out of no where,at least 5 or six, me and my buddy were cuffed and on our knees, unfortunatley it was our cowboy hat stage, it's actually very humorous. It took the cop a while to figure out how to get us both to the back of the Bronco. One cop gave me a hard time about having my 12 gauge facing the rear of the Bronco. It was in a gun rack? a cop had gotten shot the week before so the force was a tad bit uptight and on edge. We went from cuffed at the back of the truck getting yelled at for an hour to O we're really sorry have a nice day. needless to say they didn't search my truck to good...