I say your best bet is to show up to court in a speedo and pasties and try to seduce the Judge, they usually go for that sorta thing
Enjoy the benefits of a premium membership!
Upgrade Account
-
TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
Join free Log in
Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.
Problems with the law.
- Thread starter The modifier
- Start date
I agree. But one point: in this case, I think it was the law-protector who was wrong, not the law (the latter, invariably, never is). The problem is, in most practical cases, the two become interchangeable, which engenders such situations.
The OP has my sympathies to a good extent. He was only telling the cop what he was doing, and the cop exercised (rather abused) his absolute power in an unfair manner by giving the ticket. What has gone against the OP is that instead of saying something to the effect of :"No sir, I was merely warming down, good sir", what he said might've been something like, "Hey man, I'm just cooling my fingers down", obviously not the best way to deal with an already POd cop. The lesson to learn is never open your mouth in front of a cop unless asked to.
Really hope you get out of this mess
Even if the cop's 'proved' right in the end, take this as a life lesson and move on.
You know only one side of the story. The OP said stuff that didn't need to be said while the cop was talking to someone else. There's not much doubt in my mind that the OP's response wasn't particularly cordial. It's never a good idea to be anything but compliant when a cop is trying to do his job. I know if I were the cop, I wouldn't need any backtalk from someone uninvolved in my conversation.
Actually, according to the OP, the police officer made a comment to the OP and the OP responded to the comment.
To the OP, arrive at court dressed appropriately, respond to the judge's questions (and only his questions). Saying less generally is best. If you believe the citation is incorrect (you were not in violation of the noise ordinance), just say so when asked (again short and sweet, no long stories) Point out any discrepencies on the citation (you are not a female, etc.)
The judges I've known in the past did not pick sides up front. Their job is to be neutral and, they generally are. They do expect and insist on all people in their courtroom to respect the court, being disrespectful to the court (loud, abusive or argumentative results in a nearly automatic loss and maximum fines.)
Good Luck.
Was this still in Wales? Had he been dressed as a sheep, there could have been a whole world of problems!
That old chestnut started in Scotland apparently
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
I simply stated my actions to the cop? in my opinion and those of the people who witnessed it, my response was neutral. He however chose to interpret the neutrality as smart assing 
Like I said before I was not even a part of the conversation or addressed in any way when this man first walked into the garage, it was not until he caught sight of me when the whole issue began. I had not been informed that it's against the law in this city to be holding your instrument in the presence of a lowly cop :scowl:
Like I said before I was not even a part of the conversation or addressed in any way when this man first walked into the garage, it was not until he caught sight of me when the whole issue began. I had not been informed that it's against the law in this city to be holding your instrument in the presence of a lowly cop :scowl:
What a sad story.
Hey, I've watched a fair biut of TV. The ordinance seems very contestable with a lawyer to steer things along:
Prosecutor: "Mr Cop, what happened"
Cop: We responded to noise complaint at XYZ address, found loud rock music emanating from garage. Knocked on door, defendant was present and playing a guitar. I issued him with a ticket for nuisance noise"
Your lawyer doesn't need to cross examine the cop unless he's a better lawyer than me. Cop probably won't even mention the "fact" that you continued to play. If he does it's probably in your favour as you weren't making any noise and weren't involved in the conversation. Your lawyer could have a field day with that.
Then you get your turn
Lawyer: what happened?
You: "We were practicing our band. We had no idea it was too loud outside, anybody could have come and told us but officer invited himself in ( -ve brownie points from judge) and wrote me a ticket. If anyone had complained to us or the officer had just informed us we would have packed it up for the night straight away"
Prosecutor gets to cross examine your testimony then. He has to stick to examining the facts and the facts speak for themselves. So long as you stick to the bare facts and don't embellish or get ansty he can't pin anything on you that you didn't already admit.
Then the you get to see what kind of judge you got. The ordinance is written to favour the complainants but a $300 fine it isn't very fair if you don't get any warning that your noise is unacceptable in the community. If I was the judge I'd throw it out on that basis.
Hey, I've watched a fair biut of TV. The ordinance seems very contestable with a lawyer to steer things along:
Prosecutor: "Mr Cop, what happened"
Cop: We responded to noise complaint at XYZ address, found loud rock music emanating from garage. Knocked on door, defendant was present and playing a guitar. I issued him with a ticket for nuisance noise"
Your lawyer doesn't need to cross examine the cop unless he's a better lawyer than me. Cop probably won't even mention the "fact" that you continued to play. If he does it's probably in your favour as you weren't making any noise and weren't involved in the conversation. Your lawyer could have a field day with that.
Then you get your turn
Lawyer: what happened?
You: "We were practicing our band. We had no idea it was too loud outside, anybody could have come and told us but officer invited himself in ( -ve brownie points from judge) and wrote me a ticket. If anyone had complained to us or the officer had just informed us we would have packed it up for the night straight away"
Prosecutor gets to cross examine your testimony then. He has to stick to examining the facts and the facts speak for themselves. So long as you stick to the bare facts and don't embellish or get ansty he can't pin anything on you that you didn't already admit.
Then the you get to see what kind of judge you got. The ordinance is written to favour the complainants but a $300 fine it isn't very fair if you don't get any warning that your noise is unacceptable in the community. If I was the judge I'd throw it out on that basis.
Come on dude. Seriously. 'Cooling down your fingers?'. 
LMAO. 
That's a line of BS and the cop saw right through it. Now, granted the whole putting you in the car and then giving you a ticket was simply a ploy to scare you, but you pissed him off by being defiant and then trying to excuse yourself with a line of BS that shows you were trying to be the expert explaining to him a lowly non-musician layman. How do you know he didn't play an instrument too, and knew you were full of it with your 'cooling down your fingers line'? Personally, I think the ticket was a little overboard, but when a cop asks you to stop (even if you're unplugged) you should stop so you can hear him out and you guys and the cop can work out some kind of agreement. He was called there because he serves the public and another member of the public called him out to address the noise. That's his job. Then when he shows up there is indeed noise, but who knows where he was going to take it from there. Around here, we're allowed to play until 10PM. But because I have to live beside my neighbors, I don't do it often and usually I'm shut down by 9. The cop was probably going to explain why he was called out, and was probably going to inform you of your rights (noise ordinance or whatever), but when he was trying to talk he gets some dude continuing to [DEL]wank[/DEL] 'cooling down' his fingers. Yeah, that would piss me off too. You ever tried to work something out with bandmates, while your guitard continues noodling in the background? It's annoying to say the least. Fight the ticket. You might win, but don't bs a person. Show some respect and you'll be surprised how often it is reciprocated.
LMAO. That's a line of BS and the cop saw right through it. Now, granted the whole putting you in the car and then giving you a ticket was simply a ploy to scare you, but you pissed him off by being defiant and then trying to excuse yourself with a line of BS that shows you were trying to be the expert explaining to him a lowly non-musician layman. How do you know he didn't play an instrument too, and knew you were full of it with your 'cooling down your fingers line'? Personally, I think the ticket was a little overboard, but when a cop asks you to stop (even if you're unplugged) you should stop so you can hear him out and you guys and the cop can work out some kind of agreement. He was called there because he serves the public and another member of the public called him out to address the noise. That's his job. Then when he shows up there is indeed noise, but who knows where he was going to take it from there. Around here, we're allowed to play until 10PM. But because I have to live beside my neighbors, I don't do it often and usually I'm shut down by 9. The cop was probably going to explain why he was called out, and was probably going to inform you of your rights (noise ordinance or whatever), but when he was trying to talk he gets some dude continuing to [DEL]wank[/DEL] 'cooling down' his fingers. Yeah, that would piss me off too. You ever tried to work something out with bandmates, while your guitard continues noodling in the background? It's annoying to say the least. Fight the ticket. You might win, but don't bs a person. Show some respect and you'll be surprised how often it is reciprocated.
I agree with Maki on the "cooling down your fingers" point, dont insult us on the forum. That being said the cop overstepped his bounds, assuming the rest of your story isn't embellished, and if he indeed entered your practice space without being invited in.
go ahead and fight it, you'll probably win, but in the future be more respectful of authority.
there is a reason the song is "i fought the law and the law won"
go ahead and fight it, you'll probably win, but in the future be more respectful of authority.
there is a reason the song is "i fought the law and the law won"
What good would it do me to embellish the story, ive presented the incident 100% as it happened. I seriously was just running my fretting fingers on the board, my right hand was not even on the strings :/ if that really was BS on my part then so be it, but had you been there and witnessed it first hand your opinion might differ.
Also, why were you the only one to get a ticket? Seems a bit discriminatory to me. Was it your house?
Putting you in the car when you were not under arrest also appears to be out of line. Seems to me you were abused under the "color of authority".
You never made a threat to the officer so why would he put you in the car?
same reason everyone embellishes a story; they want everyone on there side. Like I said, if its true which you are adamant that it is then you will have no trouble whatsoever beating it in court.
It was BS, and most of your problems resulted from being disrespectful to cop by feeding him a line of BS to justify being non-compliant. While I do feel that your ticket was excessive, and that I do feel you should try to fight it, even if it's just to reduce the fine, I do hope that the lesson learned here is to be compliant when a cop asks you to, and to not feed him a line of BS to continue being non-compliant. As you can see, this only leads to bigger problems.
That old chestnut started in Scotland apparently
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
+ 2 Billion
Come on dude. Seriously. 'Cooling down your fingers?'.
That's a line of BS and the cop saw right through it. Now, granted the whole putting you in the car and then giving you a ticket was simply a ploy to scare you, but you pissed him off by being defiant and then trying to excuse yourself with a line of BS that shows you were trying to be the expert explaining to him a lowly non-musician layman. How do you know he didn't play an instrument too, and knew you were full of it with your 'cooling down your fingers line'? Personally, I think the ticket was a little overboard, but when a cop asks you to stop (even if you're unplugged) you should stop so you can hear him out and you guys and the cop can work out some kind of agreement. He was called there because he serves the public and another member of the public called him out to address the noise. That's his job. Then when he shows up there is indeed noise, but who knows where he was going to take it from there. Around here, we're allowed to play until 10PM. But because I have to live beside my neighbors, I don't do it often and usually I'm shut down by 9. The cop was probably going to explain why he was called out, and was probably going to inform you of your rights (noise ordinance or whatever), but when he was trying to talk he gets some dude continuing to [DEL]wank[/DEL] 'cooling down' his fingers. Yeah, that would piss me off too. You ever tried to work something out with bandmates, while your guitard continues noodling in the background? It's annoying to say the least. Fight the ticket. You might win, but don't bs a person. Show some respect and you'll be surprised how often it is reciprocated.
Agreed.
I simply stated my actions to the cop? in my opinion and those of the people who witnessed it, my response was neutral. He however chose to interpret the neutrality as smart assing
When a cop says stop, you stop. You don't tell him what you're doing while implying that his request is unwarranted.
They have to deal with a lot of ********, so often they'll be harsh any time they see it coming.
