Posted on 02/06/2014 9:00:02 AM PST by fungoking
Headlight flashing OK, Missouri judge says ST. LOUIS (AP) — It's a common practice among drivers who pass through a speed trap: Flash your headlights at approaching cars as a warning to slow down. Now, a federal court judge in Missouri says penalizing drivers for the headlight flash violates their First Amendment right to free speech. U.S. District Judge Henry E. Autrey in St. Louis on Monday issued a preliminary injunction prohibiting the St. Louis County town of Ellisville from citing and prosecuting drivers who flash their lights to warn of radar and speed traps. Ellisville's city attorney said there are no plans to appeal. ...Elli flashed his headlights to warn oncoming vehicles of a radar set up by Ellisville police. An officer saw the flash and pulled Elli over, citing him for a city ordinance violation, though a similar statute exists in Missouri law. Elli was told he would likely face a fine of up to $1,000 if convicted. The case was eventually dropped. Ellisville City Attorney George Restovich said the city changed the policy and no longer pulls over people for flashing headlights. Ellisville continued to fight the suit. At a hearing last year, Ellisville officials made the case that flashing headlights could interfere with a police investigation. But Autrey said in his ruling that the flashing of headlights was essentially a good thing, sending "a message to bring one's driving in conformity with the law — whether it be by slowing down, turning on one's own headlamps at dusk or in the rain, or proceeding with caution." Jonathan Turley said courts across the country are dealing with the same issue. In virtually every case except those still being decided, the person cited has prevailed, Turley said. p>
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
“Where I live we have police jurisdiction upon police jurisdiction. Village police, town police, sheriff, state police...each with a full contingent of officers. You cannot drive a mile without seeing at least one, and usually several police officers.”
Here in Castro Valley, CA (which isn’t a municipality) we have The California Highway Patrol (you know, the union thugs that just arrested a firefighter in Chula Vista) and the Alameda County Sheriff in a pissing contest over “just whose turf CV is.” On one 25mph street you will find both of them within a couple of blocks using radar to try and fatten their respective coffers. It’s so bad that whenever we go there and are forced to drive on that street, we use our cruise control (yes, it begins to work right at 25mph). Just jackals with guns!
Or to a truck that it is safe to come back into the lane.
Flashing lights is an individual thing, personally I could care less if a speeder gets nailed. Don’t forget speed kills and it could a friend or family member.
Truckers use the radio, or turn signals. In the left lane, and you see a truck opposite coming toward you, flash your left blinker once. He flashes back - once. Over and done.
You normally what? Thanks for the chuckle tomcat!
Eh?! Why-a you no-a wanna italianize de quote?
Regards,
Don't get between a cop and a donut and don't interfere with a speed trap.
People in Missouri rarely use their headlights before 10pm, even while driving a white car in a driving blizzard (as seen about 100 times this week).
Well oops. Guess that is fine now. Haven’t actually posted a thread in probably years.
Wrong. It's not speed that kills, it is difference in speed that is dangerous.
Some jackass driving 40 in a 55 is endangering everyone around him. Several years ago Montana eliminated speed limits on many interstates. The fatality rates decreased even though the average speed was higher than it was previously. The bottom line is, that people don't generally want to die, and drive to match local conditions.
In Texas, the way speed limits were once set in many areas (don't know if this is still the case, but it very well might be), is that after completion of the road, cars would be allowed to drive it. The road was monitored for a while, and the speed limit set at that average speed that 80% of the traffic. Americans are actually pretty good judges of such things. If you're on a road and 80-90% of the traffic is exceeding the speed limit, you know it was artificially set too low for revenue reasons.
My car is over 10 years old, and it has AUTOMATIC headlight controls. I thought that became pretty standard on newer cars.
I used to get off work at 5:00PM. Since it took about an hour to get home at certain times of the year I would turn on my lights immediately so I wouldn't forget.
The first part of my drive took me through a small but ritzy city. One day I was stopped by a cop and told that one of my headlights was out. I told him I didn't realize it had burned out but he wrote me a ticket anyway, all the time while wearing sunglasses.
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