Police and Speed Cameras
The Montgomery County (Maryland) Police believe the law doesn’t apply to them.
The police of Montgomery County believe that speed limits are for little people, not big important people like them. Or to put it another way, they are above the rule of law at the very least with regards to speed limits, who knows about other crimes.
I think most rational people understand that when a police officer is responding to a call or if they somehow made the mistake of getting into a pursuit situation they are authorized to travel as quickly as they safely can to respond to that call. This is not in dispute or even a consideration. The question is why does the police officers believe the speed limit doesn’t apply to them when they aren’t on a call?
I’m generally in favor of unions and against speed cameras, but in this case I seem to be against the police union and siding with the speed cameras. The union has claimed that the county should be responsible for tickets issued by police officers ignoring the speed limits. Police sergeants have gone so far as refusing to check if an officer was responding to a call when the camera issued the ticket.
The chief directed lieutenants, not covered by the union, to investigate the matter and in the last 8 months 76 of the 224 tickets issued have been dismissed because the officer was responding to a call. Two thirds of the remaining 148 tickets have not been paid. The union advises its member that speed cameras issue citations to the owner of the vehicle not the driver, so they should not pay the tickets or set court dates.
The Fire Department has had no issue holding its firefighters responsible and making them pay their fines. It is the police who believe they should not be held to the same rules as the rest of us. That is a serious problem.
Sadly it is not limited to Montgomery County, there is an entire web site dedicated to police officers grousing about the injustice because they were issued tickets for traffic violations while they were off duty. This belief that they are above the law is dangerous in police officers, it represents a belief that they are an over-class with some right to oppress an under-class, rather than citizens like any other, attempting to keep order. It isn’t clear that these people should be police officers.
It seem more likely that they are nothing but bullies who wanted to continue the feeling of power as they became adults, rather than individuals with a desire to server their community and make it safer. I’m not so naive as to think all of our police are there or should be there because they have a desire to serve. We need to pay them and give them sufficient benefits so it is an attractive option to enough people. The union should be on the forefront of negotiating those things.
However, we can not negotiate about the rule of law.