My 200 seems to be cop bait here in alice. about 3 weeks ago i was driving home from a mates at about 4am. i dont usually drive this early in the morning, but it just happened a big Chelsea vs. Man Utd match was being played. Chelsea lost which annoyed me.. i live out of town and i know about roos. Speed limit is 100, but i sat on about 60, if not lower, as the bumps tend to make the speedo needle bounce... i hit a roo and although it was small i did break half my grill, and unfortunately did not kill the roo, but broke its leg(s). Later in January i drove to the airport to pick up my coach who came back from holidays. as i pulled up, the Feds stopped me and refused to let me go until they checked my rego. i try to look after my cars the best i can, and if they arent clean, i try and make sure that EVERYTHING mechanically is perfect. a couple weeks later i was driving home mid morning and on turning into my road, i just cut the double white lines at the end due to the angle of which the road turn off is. a pursuit car about 3 cars (and 100m - 150m) back followed me then pulled me over. the constable asked me what i did wrong and i explained i was unaware of anything i had done wrong. He RBT'd me once, from which i blew zero, he looked at it dumbfounded and made me blow again to make sure i wasnt bloody drunk or had any alcohol in my system. after i blew zero AGAIN he took my license and gave me an infringement notice. he spent about 5 minutes writing out this notice, which after i got it back noticed it had my name spelt wrong. that is ridiculous, honestly how could a ranking police officer speel a surname wrong with the bloody license in front of them?!?! 2 days later i was pulled over around the corner from where i was previously pulled over from and had another RBT by the same cop. a week after that i was going home from the gym at about 9pm when going down the highway there was only one other car i could see on the double lane highway. it had its high beams on the pr!ck; i was only going about 65 in an 80 zone as there was no rush to get home, and the copper (same pursuit car as the last 2 times) does a U-turn and follows me home. funny thing was i checked the next day, and where he did the U-turn has double white lines.
Now i generally like the job the police do and i respect them for that, in fact im heavily involved with soccer and the cops have their own team, along with a couple on my own team. they are good blokes but it seems there is a couple that like to be pr!cks.
What angers me is that i was at centrelink the other day having turned 18 and wondering about youth allowance, am witness to a troopy carrier with what i counted was 25+ people in it, and i think a dog hopped out too. this situation is rife in alice springs, and the cops do try to sort it out but why a $90 fine for just cutting a double white line, when they could sit outside of centrelink all day long and find about 95% of unroadworthy cars pulling up to claim cheques...
i understand its a matter of principle and a question of where do you draw the line, but a stern talking to would certainly be enough in a situation such as mine.
These younger coppers seem to be much more by the book and take their job seriously which i do like, but in the same respect, the older cops deal with things better, with A LOT less force and are a lot nicer in the way they go about things.
My dad has often been a recovery vehicle driver for a local company here. he met one of our (now ex) neighbours at a station in charge of a country police station on the job. as they moved up near us into town, the two young coppers who took over gave this one drunk indigenous guy a hard time. once they had finished, he drove away and made it 50m before the other pulled him over and again searched the car for anything defective. later on that day the cops nearly died while in their office cause the same guy they gave a hard time to earlier in on the day got on the piss and drove his car straight through their new police station, not only wrecking the place, but their new pursuit vehicle. this would never have happened if the RIGHT words were used, and a kinder word were used instead of brandishing the law as they did.
More recently there was two coppers up in katherine who made an old drunken indigenous man sing happy birthday and dance and sing to that "Rivers of babylon" song. i saw the video before it was taken off youtube and although it was an abuse of power, i did see the funny side.
even more recently i was out of town at the clay pans. this is a place where people come to muck around, whether it be driving cars or riding moties, its generally a fun and safe place. I DISAGREE with hooning, which is why i go out there to muck around and practise my driving and things i would dare do on the road- away from other people as well. me and a mate saw a paddy wagon coming so we bolted in my 200, in which we then went through a nice deep puddle and had lost sight of most of the tyres. as we were walking away the cops pulled up and asked what the dust they saw from the road was about. i apologised, said it was us just coming to muck around, they said sorry for not having anything to tow us out with, we had a quick chat, they even laughed at our situation, jumped back in their wagon, did a couple doughies then took off. obviously not the best thing to do, but they were nice about it and it definitely was my week's highlight.
Im 18, and have had my license for over 2 years now. been on my opens almost a year, along with other licenses such as motorbike and learners for MR's/ we have different rules here, which are slowly being brought into line with other states.
I AGREE with DAZDA, in saying i thought i was a good driver. we have a local rally club and even though i havent raced yet, i know ive no skill compared to some of them, but i do have the common sense to do it off the road; it does seem however that young male drivers, driving by themselves seem to be targeted here and from what ive heard, elsewhere too.
i have a few more things to say but i think this is long enough as it is! thats my whinge for today