Question regarding police stops

[matt819]

When a police office conducts a routine traffice stop - speeding, headlight out, dull night - are they required to run your name through the system?

And if they give you a warning for something - light out, for example - and tell you that they've entered the warning into "the system," do they really do that? (And is that like you school permanent record? I'm 40 years out of high school and still wonder about that.)

[libguard]

1. Just be glad he gave you a warning.

If you get stopped again, they will cite you for now and then. And be nasty about it. Get it fixed.

[TOC]

3. state

what state?

I think they can all run your plates without any evidence of broken law or infraction

whenever stopped its legally practiced you must turn over your ID

[Shagbark Hickory]

4. "I don't think so" to either question...

This may vary from place to place obviously but in the places I've lived (I'm a scanner/radio enthusiast), when a tag/ and or and drivers license get run, it returns with whether the registration and insurance are valid or invalid and whether the driver has any warrants. It can also indicate other things about them such as if they have convictions but seeing as how a warning citation is not a conviction, I would be very surprised if the officers had that information. But again, it depends on how sophisticated your agency is. The highway patrol may have something like that for instance but not the local pd. On the other hand, if you end up in traffic court and try to plead for mercy with the judge over a ticket, don't be surprised if the judge had that information.

As for the first question, I highly doubt it. But you know.. they gotta look and act busy so count on it happening.

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[matt819]

5. Funny thing

So, this trooper stopped me and warned me about a tail light being out. I had no idea and got the warning. So I go to to the auto parts store and pick up a tail light, figuring, how difficult can it be? It was like the Rubik's cube of car part replacement. I give up after an hour and drive over to my mechanic and tore him away from what he was doing to change the damn tail light. He opened the "Rubik's cube," which, even if I had done it, I didn't have the right tool to undo the screw to get to the light itself. Then, while he's doing that, he points out that the tail light compartment is full of water due to a hairline crack, which might eventually have shorted out all the lights.

So, while the stop was irritating, it turns out to have saved me a larger problem, though that probably wasn't part of the trooper's intent.

Oh, and another observation. Some years ago, when I first moved to the state, I was stopped because I didn't have a state, or even a current out of state inspection. I told the cop (town, not state) that I had an appointment the next day to take care of just those items. He asked me where, and actually called to confirm. I wasn't ticketed.

To be fair (don't you just hate that?), when you think about it the cops are just doing their jobs and, as irritating as it is to us, every stop is a potential threat to them.