More LEOs?

[wantahertzdonut]

So out of curiosity, where does the rest of the money go?

[Tpoppa]

http://blog.motorists.org/where-does-the-money-from-a-speeding-ticket-go/

example from Indiana:

In this land where reality and fiction are indistinguishable there is a dead legal principle that says judges and courts should not personally benefit from the results of their rulings. Obviously, there is a conflict of interest anytime a judge’s well being would be affected by his or her decision. On occasion, a judge is found guilty of taking bribes for deciding in favor of his benefactors.

But, when the conflict of interest is systemic, universal, and worth billions of dollars it is also invisible!

I’m talking about the adjudication of traffic tickets. Traffic tickets are the mother’s milk of the court system. Thousands of judges rule on traffic cases knowing full well that guilty verdicts pay their salary, fund their retirement systems, and build their courthouses.

But nobody seems to see a conflict of interest in this system? The noble judges are apparently above the temptations the rest of humanity experiences?

Here’s how a typical speeding ticket (in this case a ticket from Indiana that we paid though our Traffic Justice Program) is divvied up:

State Courts: $49.00

County Courts: $18.90

City Courts: $2.10

Law Enforcement Fee: $4.00

Jury Fee: $2.00

Highway Work Zone: $0.50 (??)

Auto Record Keeping Fee: $7.00

Document Storage Fee: $2.00

Infractional Judgments: $99.50 The fine!

Public Defense Administration Fee: $3.00

Judicial Insurance Adjustment: $1.00

Judicial Salaries Fee: $18.00: Do you think murderers and rapists pay this fee too?

DNA Sample Processing Fee: $2.00 Very common service for traffic tickets.

Court Administration Fee: $5.00

Total Cost Of Ticket: $214.00

This should help explain why average traffic ticket recipients start out with two strikes against them when they enter traffic court. The court system just can’t afford to offer real justice. If it did it would drown in its own workload and go broke in the process.

[buildit]

Patrol the highways and skip the byways. They can give out a second ticket if you for get to click it.

[IN_NO_OH]

There have been a number of articles in Ohio papers over the last year touting OSP's drug seizures. I don't have anything else to go on, but the news suggests OSP is deemphasizing run-of-the-mill speeding tickets in favor of trying to get busts. That's not a question of their total presence, per se, but it might speak to priorities.

That said, I don't know that I've noticed more presence than normal on the turnpike. That highway and 70 are always well-patrolled in comparison to more local routes like 480, but it seems about what it always is.

[MeefZah]

So' date=' what you're saying is LEOs are a tremendous burden on the taxpayer, with no real benefit?

[/quote']

Yes, you have done a stellar job of gleaning the fucking point. Kudos to you.

[speedytriple]

I have much respect for my local LEO every experience I have had with them has been good. The osp on the other hand is a money grubbing monger.

[Rod38um]

Here in southern ohio, we are swamped with osp. I run a radar/laser detector in the truck. I have a 20 minute drive to work. Its rare that I dont get lit up by an osp. I have been hit 5 times on that 20 minute drive before. This week, I've started seeing something new. I saw a car pulled over by an unmarked black chevy truck and one pulled over by an unmarked black dodge challenger. I dont see much benefit in employing ticket writers that require high tech equipment to determine if someone may be slightly over some blanket policy speed limit.

[Tpoppa]

So' date=' what you're saying is LEOs are a tremendous burden on the taxpayer, with no real benefit?

[/quote']

That increased burden that results from stepping up enforcement purely to generate additional municipal revenue was never approved by voting taxpayers.

[MeefZah]

This week, I've started seeing something new. I saw a car pulled over by an unmarked black chevy truck and one pulled over by an unmarked black dodge challenger.

You are either mistaken, an embellisher of the truth, or you are a witness to police impersonators. In Ohio, to make a traffic stop and issue a traffic citation, an officer has to be in a marked police car equipped with a permanently mounted roof light and siren.

Some agencies, like those in the Cleveland area, stretch this with barely marked cars and the tiniest light possible on their roof, but they are still in compliance.

What you describe would not be in compliance and there is no agency in this state that would do that.

[ohiomike]

Part of the issue is the amount of other stuff us real cops deal with (state patrol excluded since their job entails mostly just traffic).

I might be en route to one of the 20 calls I handle in an 8 hour shift when I fall in behind your light malfunctioning / tailgating / texting driver. I can't delay a more urgent call to make a traffic stop on some minor bullshit.

The stops I do make are either out of dispatched calls or they are made when I am not currently on or en route to another call... and as I have said in numerous other posts on this topic, I generally don't write for minor stuff unless there is an extenuating circumstance or it leads to a bigger violation.

I concur, but it's the principle of the thing, coupled with the fact that if they didn't prosecute, everyone who got a MM citation would then contest it knowing it would be dismissed, thus "contributing to the chaos". It would basically be free reign to drive like an asshole, if you get caught, oh well - ticket will be dismissed anyway.

Edited for this side note - you want to discuss wasted spending, if the OSP plane gets you and you fight the ticket, the pilot FLIES to the airport, parks the plane, and gets a ride from a trooper to the courthouse. He and the issuing trooper then wait for court... so the state is paying 2 guys OT, plus the cost of flying a plane to wherever, which can't be cheap... all that for a MM ticket on which the state will collect about $26 after court fees and such.

Then raise ticket fees to cover costs, a two fold winner. It covers all the overhead of enforcing the laws and seeing it through to prosecution while sending a real message to violators, hitting them in maybe the one place that will make them sit up and take notice as well as adhere to the law.

Personally I feel for Leos. Its a damned hard and mostly thankless job. Increasing traffic numbers, increased crime stats do not mesh well with shrinking budgets. Col increases make Leo's wages seem to shrink too. But if we are going to get only partial enforcement what's the point of even wasting the money on any traffic enforcement? Used to be a broken license plate light would elicit being pulled over. Now a person can drive without any taillights working and unless they are involved in a collision they never get pulled over. A neighbor has been doing that for about 6 months now, (works in Columbus) and laughed everytime we talked about it. He did just get them back working, but said he never got pulled over. Municipalities need to realize these small violations quite often lead to serious consequences down the road. More traffic and increased crime needs more officers with more severe consequences for violators imho.

[Tpoppa]

Then raise ticket fees to cover costs, a two fold winner. It covers all the overhead of enforcing the laws and seeing it through to prosecution while sending a real message to violators, hitting them in maybe the one place that will make them sit up and take notice as well as adhere to the law.

Personally I feel for Leos. Its a damned hard and mostly thankless job. Increasing traffic numbers, increased crime stats do not mesh well with shrinking budgets. Col increases make Leo's wages seem to shrink too. But if we are going to get only partial enforcement what's the point of even wasting the money on any traffic enforcement? Used to be a broken license plate light would elicit being pulled over. Now a person can drive without any taillights working and unless they are involved in a collision they never get pulled over. A neighbor has been doing that for about 6 months now, (works in Columbus) and laughed everytime we talked about it. He did just get them back working, but said he never got pulled over. Municipalities need to realize these small violations quite often lead to serious consequences down the road. More traffic and increased crime needs more officers with more severe consequences for violators imho.

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[Loch Rob]

I am in the Dayton area and am seeing the same thing. All the friggin' time.