Caporegime
Not all of them, I've had mixed experiences with traffic Police. Some are very nice and very reasonable. Others are absolute gits on a power trip.
Dad pulled out on traffic cop on M6
- Thread starter mattyg
- Start date
Soldato
please cite all these cases, must be thousands if all the time as you state
as you seem to know the traffic laws so well please link to where this applies. Ta
Last edited:
As others have said, it's hard for anyone to judge without seeing the footage. For him to pull your dad over must have meant it was significantly closer than it was. "professional driver" or not, it's easy to have a momentary lapse of judgement.
It does put it into perspective. Given a 5-7 second window to perform an overtake, the copper would have been 0.25-0.33km back, enough to have slowed down.
I think we're all interested to see the outcome of this if he contests it at court. At least your dad will be able to see the footage from the police car and realise whether he had a lapse in judgement.
It does put it into perspective. Given a 5-7 second window to perform an overtake, the copper would have been 0.25-0.33km back, enough to have slowed down.
I think we're all interested to see the outcome of this if he contests it at court. At least your dad will be able to see the footage from the police car and realise whether he had a lapse in judgement.
Keyboard warrior found!
Caporegime
A little strongly worded and exaggerated but there is some truth in there.
Soldato
I wasn’t being particularly serious, but unless the OP’s version of events is totally biased, it would seem excessive for police to issue a ticket for that “offence”. I drive over 100MPH regularly and it’s pretty easy to spot when someone might pull out on you, and back off a bit. On the occasions I have to brake, I just think “fair enough, they weren’t expecting me to be going that quick” and move on with my life. Equally, in situations where there’s heavy traffic I don’t drive that fast because I know it’s highly likely that someone will pull out. I’d expect police officers driving without blue lights to have a similar philosophy.
The skill of the driver at 120mph is less relevant than the skill of other drivers. To put that another way there is a 50mph difference between the people using the motorway normally and the copper flying past. And that 50mph braking difference is on the police driver to be aware of. Especially at night.
Most drivers wouldn't be expected to have someone come up that quick behind them when they are already at the national speed limit.
Soldato
Dashcam footage for the win.
If you genuinely feel hard done by, then fight it. If there's circumstances we're not being told, then take it on the chin.
If it was mirror, signal, manoeuvre, no cop, then cop, that's not ticket-worthy.
If e.g. your dad was trying to show integrity by slowing traffic back down to the motorway speed limit of 70 MPH, then there's more of an issue.
If you genuinely feel hard done by, then fight it. If there's circumstances we're not being told, then take it on the chin.
If it was mirror, signal, manoeuvre, no cop, then cop, that's not ticket-worthy.
If e.g. your dad was trying to show integrity by slowing traffic back down to the motorway speed limit of 70 MPH, then there's more of an issue.
Soldato
I was going through a tunnel on a dual carriageway 2 weekends ago I think it was, doing about 75 coming up behind a truck. Checked mirrors and saw blues quite a way behind but didn't pull out. Police car passed me like I was barely moving, wouldn't be surprised if they were doing 120. Surprised me how quick they caught up, so quick that I hardly needed to slow down as they were gone by the time I caught up with the truck infront.
Seen a lot of them absolutely bombing it while we're in lockdown and the roads are quiet. One crashed in the same tunnel recently . They closed off the entrance for abut 20 mins while they cleared it up which I was unlucky enough to get caught in. Funnily enough they didn't mention that incident on social media...
Seen a lot of them absolutely bombing it while we're in lockdown and the roads are quiet. One crashed in the same tunnel recently . They closed off the entrance for abut 20 mins while they cleared it up which I was unlucky enough to get caught in. Funnily enough they didn't mention that incident on social media...
I swear the majority of you ignorantly act like shills for Authority
Tell your old man to challenge them in court.
1) Thats what court is for
2) It will not be a long, drawn put process it will be one or two letters to respond to and one day in court in front of justice leaning magistrates.
3) If he loses it's the same net result as if he doesn't contest
4) Your old man's history of professional driving will be held with great weight by the court
5) The conditions are in your favour (dark, no blues)
Yes there are bad Traffic cops, yes there are good ones. Regardless of that fact if you think you're being done over by authorities then challenge the cnuts.
If their footage proves your father pulled out dangerously then I'd bet he would have been able to smell the officers brakes when he was taken into their car (unless your old man is white, then I don't know if you get taken into their car or not
), ask him if he recalls a smell? As I would have thought for the officer to stop pursuit it must have been an extremely close call missing the back of your dad's car. Most likely just a younger officer with anger issues.
Tell your old man to challenge them in court.
1) Thats what court is for
2) It will not be a long, drawn put process it will be one or two letters to respond to and one day in court in front of justice leaning magistrates.
3) If he loses it's the same net result as if he doesn't contest
4) Your old man's history of professional driving will be held with great weight by the court
5) The conditions are in your favour (dark, no blues)
Yes there are bad Traffic cops, yes there are good ones. Regardless of that fact if you think you're being done over by authorities then challenge the cnuts.
If their footage proves your father pulled out dangerously then I'd bet he would have been able to smell the officers brakes when he was taken into their car (unless your old man is white, then I don't know if you get taken into their car or not
), ask him if he recalls a smell? As I would have thought for the officer to stop pursuit it must have been an extremely close call missing the back of your dad's car. Most likely just a younger officer with anger issues.You'd be surprised the speeds needed for that (unless it's a really short tunnel, I know Wales does have some tiny ones), generally it's about 150+ (double their motorway speed and above) you start to fly past and vanish into the distance, 120 they'll just be passing you like a car on a main road to a pedestrian.
120mph = a mile every 30 seconds
there no way I anticipate every cars headlights half a mile in the distance doing 120mph, would be different if they had blues on.
If you had to assume every car on the motorway could be doing 120mph when you see them in a mirror you’d never get off the slip road!
I’m sure the dashcam footage makes it look bad at first watch but I think if we all think of our last lane change and suddenly increase the car in the mirrors speed to 120mph half of us would be dead.
I would contest it
there no way I anticipate every cars headlights half a mile in the distance doing 120mph, would be different if they had blues on.
If you had to assume every car on the motorway could be doing 120mph when you see them in a mirror you’d never get off the slip road!
I’m sure the dashcam footage makes it look bad at first watch but I think if we all think of our last lane change and suddenly increase the car in the mirrors speed to 120mph half of us would be dead.
I would contest it
Not so much aimed at OP's dad but the number of times I see people:
(a) Just pulling out when someone is coming up in the outside lane and would have to significantly modify their speed either through inattention or being inconsiderate and/or doing so because they object to someone's speed rightly or wrongly
(b) Manoeuvring badly around emergency vehicles which are going with lights and siren
leaves me sceptical.
When there was roadworks on a dual carriageway near me which closed the left hand lane the number of times I saw people just wandering down to the end and then pulling across into the right hand lane following the cones without a care for what was behind them was insane.
So many times see people pulling out of junctions into the path of clearly approaching lit up emergency vehicles - often then panic braking in the path of the emergency vehicle when the emergency vehicle hits the horn or changes/sounds siren in response to it.
@Skillmister oh yes even though they’re trained etc at the end of the day still human and do make mistakes including crashing
personally I’ve had A couple encounters with police, overtaking them at 70mph
personally I’ve had A couple encounters with police, overtaking them at 70mph
I swear the majority of you ignorantly act like shills for Authority
It's not so much that as the obvious bias inherent when you only get the 'victims' story.
Prime recent example the guy asking about dangerous driving laws because someone brake checked his driver, followed later by a video of a lorry tailgating, flashing headlights and trying to half arse an overtake at a junction, all in crap visibility - the brake check he received was probably the least bad bit of driving in the video.
This happens routinely on forums, it's hardly surprising that people think it's more likely this is a case of someone blindly changing lanes right in front of someone else rather than a copper being so annoyed at a perfectly reasonable mistake that he gives up on a pursuit just to dish out a FPN.
Everyone will have their biases that affect which scenario they think is more likely to have occurred. Most people on here have never had an issue with the traffic police, so are unlikely to default to the assumption they're out to stitch up a totally innocent motorist just to be an ********.
Soldato
Slightly misleading.
Yes the police would have been doing 53m/s, but OP's dad would have been doing 30m/s (assuming 70mph), so not quite such a significant difference in speed.
That being said, if your dad is sure he was in the right (e.g. he looked properly and the police car was a speck in the distance at the point he pulled out) then absolutely fight it.
Edit: also the part about not having blues on to avoid spooking the target, but the other car did have them on? Hmm...
Yeah funnily enough people manage to cope just fine with people coming up behind doing well over 120MPH there granted it is more of a normal but still.
as commented when you join motorway/duel you have a big speed differential too, and you usually make sure upcoming vehicles have an escape into offside lanes too.
worst i know junction on a47/swaffhamwest has a near blind, 100m visibility as you join.
for op he was in middle lane, so there was traffic, so could have held off in case of any uncertainty.
had forgotten the groundhog day response to being pulled over Too early for flapjacks?
worst i know junction on a47/swaffhamwest has a near blind, 100m visibility as you join.
for op he was in middle lane, so there was traffic, so could have held off in case of any uncertainty.
ergh first you acuse people of being favourable to victim, anti police
then you say people have a more pragmatic approach - confused.com.
had forgotten the groundhog day response to being pulled over Too early for flapjacks?
Soldato
Look at this way, if your dad had been doing 150mph this would never have happened. Therefore the lesson here is to drive faster.