DC Council & Traffic Enforcement

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MPD needs to do more traffic stops, not fewer. Traffic stops have multiple benefits: addressing dangerous driving, serving as a very visible deterrent to others, and an important tool for detaining people with outstanding warrants (and sometimes illegal weapons in the vehicle).

+1000

Pull over every vehicle with fake paper tags. You are likely to find guns and criminals.

And they need to immediately impound every parked car that has fake tags. With a fake tag, there isn't even a legitimate address to mail a citation to, so it needs to be dealt with on the spot.

For a while most DC police cruisers and ticket writer vehicles had special devices mounted on the trunk that could read the license plates of parked/passing vehicles and automatically run them through a data base. Would that be an efficient way to spot fake paper tags and boot/impound the vehicles.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree with the OP that nothing will change without enforcement. But things are changing/moving, albeit very slowly. There's little way to have MPD do more traffic stops without hiring more MPD, which both the council and mayor haven't allocated money for. The budget adds a whole bunch of cameras to the city, and the new bills will allow the city to go after tickets. Whether they will.... I kinda doubt, but it's moving!

Maybe if MPD officers looked up from their phones while parked in front of 7-11 they could do it within existing staffing levels. But then they'd have to give a crap first.

If they pursue and someone dies they will be charged with murder. If someone doesn't feel like pulling over, they do not have to.

That's such a bullshit take.

When someone chooses to flee and illegally drive recklessly and either they get killed or kill some bystander as a result that is purely the fault of the fleeing driver. They should have pulled over, end of story.

A police officer was charged with murder in DC within the last year for this happening.

If a BIPOC does not want to pull over, they do not have to.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MPD needs to do more traffic stops, not fewer. Traffic stops have multiple benefits: addressing dangerous driving, serving as a very visible deterrent to others, and an important tool for detaining people with outstanding warrants (and sometimes illegal weapons in the vehicle).

+1000

Pull over every vehicle with fake paper tags. You are likely to find guns and criminals.

And they need to immediately impound every parked car that has fake tags. With a fake tag, there isn't even a legitimate address to mail a citation to, so it needs to be dealt with on the spot.

For a while most DC police cruisers and ticket writer vehicles had special devices mounted on the trunk that could read the license plates of parked/passing vehicles and automatically run them through a data base. Would that be an efficient way to spot fake paper tags and boot/impound the vehicles.

How about we just have MPD enforce traffic violations again? It seems like a much easier solution

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree with the OP that nothing will change without enforcement. But things are changing/moving, albeit very slowly. There's little way to have MPD do more traffic stops without hiring more MPD, which both the council and mayor haven't allocated money for. The budget adds a whole bunch of cameras to the city, and the new bills will allow the city to go after tickets. Whether they will.... I kinda doubt, but it's moving!

Maybe if MPD officers looked up from their phones while parked in front of 7-11 they could do it within existing staffing levels. But then they'd have to give a crap first.

If they pursue and someone dies they will be charged with murder. If someone doesn't feel like pulling over, they do not have to.

That's such a bullshit take.

When someone chooses to flee and illegally drive recklessly and either they get killed or kill some bystander as a result that is purely the fault of the fleeing driver. They should have pulled over, end of story.

A police officer was charged with murder in DC within the last year for this happening.

If a BIPOC does not want to pull over, they do not have to.

Just try that with the Secret Service or the Park Police.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree with the OP that nothing will change without enforcement. But things are changing/moving, albeit very slowly. There's little way to have MPD do more traffic stops without hiring more MPD, which both the council and mayor haven't allocated money for. The budget adds a whole bunch of cameras to the city, and the new bills will allow the city to go after tickets. Whether they will.... I kinda doubt, but it's moving!

Maybe if MPD officers looked up from their phones while parked in front of 7-11 they could do it within existing staffing levels. But then they'd have to give a crap first.

If they pursue and someone dies they will be charged with murder. If someone doesn't feel like pulling over, they do not have to.

That's such a bullshit take.

When someone chooses to flee and illegally drive recklessly and either they get killed or kill some bystander as a result that is purely the fault of the fleeing driver. They should have pulled over, end of story.

A police officer was charged with murder in DC within the last year for this happening.

If a BIPOC does not want to pull over, they do not have to.

Just try that with the Secret Service or the Park Police.

Sure. But what point are you trying to make? That doesn't change what happens if a criminal wants to run from MPD.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And if they don't want to chase cars then the alternative should NEVER be "just let them go." That is completely irresponsible and unacceptable. Instead MPD should invest in alternatives like GPS darts. Let them go but then safely follow them right to their house.

https://pappalardolaw.com/2023/04/gps-darts-police-use-vehicle-pursuits/

This is a good point.

The MPD has interpreted the policy that they don't do pursuits to actually mean that they just don't pull anyone over.

The policy is supposed to be that if MPD attempts to pull someone over and they fail to stop there is no pursuit which is probably a sensible policy.

But that isn't where it should end.

In DC failing to pull over for the police is actually a felony that should lead to jail time.

So if we had a functioning police department after a car failed to stop it would get referred to detectives who would look up the plate (assuming the car has one but as bad as the paper plate issue is most cars in DC do have legal plates) and then send someone to arrest the driver later and charge him with both the traffic infractions and for failing to stop.

With social media it would not take that long for word to get out and for drivers to find out other drivers have gone to jail for trying to dodge a $100 traffic citation.

But this is DC so MPD uses his policy as cover to dodge doing work and no one in the Executive branch or the DC Council dares to question this ineffective department and its coddled and lazy officers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree with the OP that nothing will change without enforcement. But things are changing/moving, albeit very slowly. There's little way to have MPD do more traffic stops without hiring more MPD, which both the council and mayor haven't allocated money for. The budget adds a whole bunch of cameras to the city, and the new bills will allow the city to go after tickets. Whether they will.... I kinda doubt, but it's moving!

Maybe if MPD officers looked up from their phones while parked in front of 7-11 they could do it within existing staffing levels. But then they'd have to give a crap first.

If they pursue and someone dies they will be charged with murder. If someone doesn't feel like pulling over, they do not have to.

That's such a bullshit take.

When someone chooses to flee and illegally drive recklessly and either they get killed or kill some bystander as a result that is purely the fault of the fleeing driver. They should have pulled over, end of story.

A police officer was charged with murder in DC within the last year for this happening.

If a BIPOC does not want to pull over, they do not have to.

Just use a GPS dart and track it to their house or wherever they are afterward (and bring that tow truck if they've been in the habit of failing to pull over for a while now). And tack on an additional citation for failing to pull over. Problem solved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree with the OP that nothing will change without enforcement. But things are changing/moving, albeit very slowly. There's little way to have MPD do more traffic stops without hiring more MPD, which both the council and mayor haven't allocated money for. The budget adds a whole bunch of cameras to the city, and the new bills will allow the city to go after tickets. Whether they will.... I kinda doubt, but it's moving!

Maybe if MPD officers looked up from their phones while parked in front of 7-11 they could do it within existing staffing levels. But then they'd have to give a crap first.

If they pursue and someone dies they will be charged with murder. If someone doesn't feel like pulling over, they do not have to.

That's such a bullshit take.

When someone chooses to flee and illegally drive recklessly and either they get killed or kill some bystander as a result that is purely the fault of the fleeing driver. They should have pulled over, end of story.

A police officer was charged with murder in DC within the last year for this happening.

If a BIPOC does not want to pull over, they do not have to.

Just use a GPS dart and track it to their house or wherever they are afterward (and bring that tow truck if they've been in the habit of failing to pull over for a while now). And tack on an additional citation for failing to pull over. Problem solved.

And then the Council and all the Good Ones go insane citing the disparity statistics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MPD needs to do more traffic stops, not fewer. Traffic stops have multiple benefits: addressing dangerous driving, serving as a very visible deterrent to others, and an important tool for detaining people with outstanding warrants (and sometimes illegal weapons in the vehicle).

+1000

Pull over every vehicle with fake paper tags. You are likely to find guns and criminals.

And they need to immediately impound every parked car that has fake tags. With a fake tag, there isn't even a legitimate address to mail a citation to, so it needs to be dealt with on the spot.

For a while most DC police cruisers and ticket writer vehicles had special devices mounted on the trunk that could read the license plates of parked/passing vehicles and automatically run them through a data base. Would that be an efficient way to spot fake paper tags and boot/impound the vehicles.

That is not equitable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And if they don't want to chase cars then the alternative should NEVER be "just let them go." That is completely irresponsible and unacceptable. Instead MPD should invest in alternatives like GPS darts. Let them go but then safely follow them right to their house.

https://pappalardolaw.com/2023/04/gps-darts-police-use-vehicle-pursuits/

This is a good point.

The MPD has interpreted the policy that they don't do pursuits to actually mean that they just don't pull anyone over.

The policy is supposed to be that if MPD attempts to pull someone over and they fail to stop there is no pursuit which is probably a sensible policy.

But that isn't where it should end.

In DC failing to pull over for the police is actually a felony that should lead to jail time.

So if we had a functioning police department after a car failed to stop it would get referred to detectives who would look up the plate (assuming the car has one but as bad as the paper plate issue is most cars in DC do have legal plates) and then send someone to arrest the driver later and charge him with both the traffic infractions and for failing to stop.

With social media it would not take that long for word to get out and for drivers to find out other drivers have gone to jail for trying to dodge a $100 traffic citation.

But this is DC so MPD uses his policy as cover to dodge doing work and no one in the Executive branch or the DC Council dares to question this ineffective department and its coddled and lazy officers.

Because anyone who doesn't want to pull over now doesn't have to, we'll have detectives not handling murder cases but instead go after speeding tickets even though a high percentage of the offenders have expired dealer tags or out-of-state plates?

We add this on top of an environment where I cop will be charged with murder if they did pursue a fleeing suspect.

Criminals are smarter than the Council and recognize this gives them free reign.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:MPD doesn't care about traffic enforcement.

They have much bigger problems. They should give traffic enforcement to DDOt including speeding enforcement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MPD doesn't care about traffic enforcement.

They have much bigger problems. They should give traffic enforcement to DDOt including speeding enforcement.

This is what I believe many on the DC Council would like to do. But it wouldn’t work. Nothing gets better without drivers being pulled over. Armed DDOT traffic officers doing that are effectively MPD with poor training; chaos ensues. Unarmed DDOT traffic officers will be ignored at best and get themselves and/or bystanders killed at worst. Anyone who thinks about for more than a couple of seconds realizes that, with the abundance of guns in DC now and the number of criminals driving around with fake plates and tinted windows, there really is no other option than MPD. The sooner everyone in positions of power in this city realizes this, the sooner the upward trajectory in both crime and traffic chaos will be arrested.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And if they don't want to chase cars then the alternative should NEVER be "just let them go." That is completely irresponsible and unacceptable. Instead MPD should invest in alternatives like GPS darts. Let them go but then safely follow them right to their house.

https://pappalardolaw.com/2023/04/gps-darts-police-use-vehicle-pursuits/

This is a good point.

The MPD has interpreted the policy that they don't do pursuits to actually mean that they just don't pull anyone over.

The policy is supposed to be that if MPD attempts to pull someone over and they fail to stop there is no pursuit which is probably a sensible policy.

But that isn't where it should end.

In DC failing to pull over for the police is actually a felony that should lead to jail time.

So if we had a functioning police department after a car failed to stop it would get referred to detectives who would look up the plate (assuming the car has one but as bad as the paper plate issue is most cars in DC do have legal plates) and then send someone to arrest the driver later and charge him with both the traffic infractions and for failing to stop.

With social media it would not take that long for word to get out and for drivers to find out other drivers have gone to jail for trying to dodge a $100 traffic citation.

But this is DC so MPD uses his policy as cover to dodge doing work and no one in the Executive branch or the DC Council dares to question this ineffective department and its coddled and lazy officers.

You can’t be this naive. The epidemic of traffic offenses are being committed by cars with fake tags. There’s nothing to follow up on. But you knew that. You also know that, no matter how many citations a vehicle receives, there are no criminal penalties until the Lexus kills innocent people on Rock Creek Parkway.

But yes yes, more fantasies about traffic Batman, please.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And if they don't want to chase cars then the alternative should NEVER be "just let them go." That is completely irresponsible and unacceptable. Instead MPD should invest in alternatives like GPS darts. Let them go but then safely follow them right to their house.

https://pappalardolaw.com/2023/04/gps-darts-police-use-vehicle-pursuits/

This is a good point.

The MPD has interpreted the policy that they don't do pursuits to actually mean that they just don't pull anyone over.

The policy is supposed to be that if MPD attempts to pull someone over and they fail to stop there is no pursuit which is probably a sensible policy.

But that isn't where it should end.

In DC failing to pull over for the police is actually a felony that should lead to jail time.

So if we had a functioning police department after a car failed to stop it would get referred to detectives who would look up the plate (assuming the car has one but as bad as the paper plate issue is most cars in DC do have legal plates) and then send someone to arrest the driver later and charge him with both the traffic infractions and for failing to stop.

With social media it would not take that long for word to get out and for drivers to find out other drivers have gone to jail for trying to dodge a $100 traffic citation.

But this is DC so MPD uses his policy as cover to dodge doing work and no one in the Executive branch or the DC Council dares to question this ineffective department and its coddled and lazy officers.

You can’t be this naive. The epidemic of traffic offenses are being committed by cars with fake tags. There’s nothing to follow up on. But you knew that. You also know that, no matter how many citations a vehicle receives, there are no criminal penalties until the Lexus kills innocent people on Rock Creek Parkway.

But yes yes, more fantasies about traffic Batman, please.

Yep. And that’s why we’re back to the unfortunate but inescapable conclusion that there is no way out of the mess other than going all the way back to good old fashioned police chases. Sad but that’s the way it is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And if they don't want to chase cars then the alternative should NEVER be "just let them go." That is completely irresponsible and unacceptable. Instead MPD should invest in alternatives like GPS darts. Let them go but then safely follow them right to their house.

https://pappalardolaw.com/2023/04/gps-darts-police-use-vehicle-pursuits/

This is a good point.

The MPD has interpreted the policy that they don't do pursuits to actually mean that they just don't pull anyone over.

The policy is supposed to be that if MPD attempts to pull someone over and they fail to stop there is no pursuit which is probably a sensible policy.

But that isn't where it should end.

In DC failing to pull over for the police is actually a felony that should lead to jail time.

So if we had a functioning police department after a car failed to stop it would get referred to detectives who would look up the plate (assuming the car has one but as bad as the paper plate issue is most cars in DC do have legal plates) and then send someone to arrest the driver later and charge him with both the traffic infractions and for failing to stop.

With social media it would not take that long for word to get out and for drivers to find out other drivers have gone to jail for trying to dodge a $100 traffic citation.

But this is DC so MPD uses his policy as cover to dodge doing work and no one in the Executive branch or the DC Council dares to question this ineffective department and its coddled and lazy officers.

You can’t be this naive. The epidemic of traffic offenses are being committed by cars with fake tags. There’s nothing to follow up on. But you knew that. You also know that, no matter how many citations a vehicle receives, there are no criminal penalties until the Lexus kills innocent people on Rock Creek Parkway.

But yes yes, more fantasies about traffic Batman, please.

Umm..? The cops have managed to figure out a way to deal with it in NYC. So, there is a way to deal with the “epidemic” of fake tags, if only our police weren’t so lazy and coddled.

But you knew that.