Speed Trap Flashing..

MacCool

Generally, I would prefer to not lie under oath.

onzedge

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Lemers

Entering a plea on not guilty and not making any statement is not lying under oath.

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MacCool

I agree, but that's not what he said.

But you're right. If you go to court having plead not guilty, your attorney (or you if you are acting as attorney pro se) on cross examination will ask the cop to prove that you were flashing to circumvent the law. He won't be able to. You'll ask him, "officer, is it possible that I was flashing because I missed the turn signal, etc etc etc" and he'll say yes. But let's look at the practicalities. When it's time for the defense, (you), to present your case...what are you going to do? Call yourself as a witness? No, you wouldn't want to do that because your choices then are going to be either lying under oath or keeping silent. You can keep silent, but in traffic court (rather informal), I'm pretty sure the judge is going to ask you why you flashed your lights. Your choices now are lying under oath, or pleading the fifth amendment. Not good. If you do that, I suspect that most judges are going to find for the prosecution and tell you they recommend you appeal if you disagree.

Smart move, if you decide to take such a case to court, would be to move for dismissal before presenting your case, asserting that the prosecution didn't prove its case. I'll bet the odds are no better than 50-50 that the judge would go for that.

Red__Zed

That's why the laws are rarely written to make it illegal to flash as a warning. To my knowledge, MD was the only state that tried to do that (interfering with a criminal investigation) and they gave up on that in the 90s.

FL 4Motion

/\ x2, minus the radar detector part (don't have one).

gurneyeagle

Whether a ticket, if ever written, would hold up in court is really irrelevent. The fact that a trooper could pull you over for a chat is enough to make me careful when/if doing it.

When I was stopped, the trooper was professional, but pissed. The check of my registration took about 20 minutes and scared the sh1t out of a 21 year-old college student that was 600 miles from home.

That was in a 1980 VW Scirocco. I'm sure a 370Z might draw even more ire. Some of you "legal eagles" want to push it, go right ahead.

Just curious, of all the guys giving legal opinions, how many of you guys are attorneys?

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daisuke149

you dont have to be a attorney to give any kind of advice. Im sure you've given advice on a various amount of topics all your life.

If someone wants to take other peoples "advice" at 100% fact, thats their damn problem, not the fault of anyone giving their opinion or advice.

MacCool

I'm not an attorney. Don't take legal advice from me. But I'm just running the scenario here. If you plead not guilty to anything, even a traffic ticket, you have to put up some kind of defense. You can't just sit there and be silent and hope that the prosecutor blows it. The judge is likely to get pissed for wasting his time. Not good when it comes time to levy the fine.