Connecticut has found a new way to tax the drivers... snowy car tickets.

State Police are aggressively ticketing drivers who ignore Connecticut's new "ice missile" law, which requires motorists to remove all snow and ice from their vehicles.

Since the law took effect Jan. 1, state police have issued at least 230 tickets to truckers and motorists who were driving snow-covered vehicles. At $120 per summons -- the fine is $75 plus $45 in various surcharges -- that amounts to $27,600 in tickets in a month and a half.

If snow is on a vehicle and it comes off, you're responsible," Vance said.

Vance could not break down the number of tickets issued to motorists and truck drivers, who face the added burden of clearing snow from tall trailers not easily accessible from the ground.

According to the law, drivers must "remove any accumulated ice or snow from such motor vehicle, including the hood, trunk and roof of such motor vehicle, so that any ice or snow accumulated on such vehicle does not pose a threat to persons or property while the vehicle is being operated on any street or highway of this state."

The law was passed in 2010 but implementation was delayed to Jan. 1, 2014, to allow the public to become aware of the regulation and for trucking companies to develop ways to remove snow from big rigs.

If snow falls off a passenger car and damages another vehicle or causes an accident, the operator can be fined $200. Commercial drivers face a $500 fine.

Found on
http://www.greenwichtime.com/local/article/Ice-missiles-snowball-into-cash-for-state-5243274.php

And that is my news for the day

sneaky cops using radar...

found on http://flaviogomes.warmup.com.br/

Cop arrests cop, gets harrased

A Miami Police officer, was late for an off-duty job. While in full uniform, he ran his marked police cruiser up to 120 miles per hour on a city freeway trying to make it to work. Florida Highway Patrol Trooper Watts was one of the cars he blew past.

Uncertain of who was in the speeding car, Watts spent seven minutes with her blues-and-twos running, trying to catch the speeding Lopez. Once she pulled him over, Watts confiscated Lopez's gun and cuffed him. Lopez eventually lost his job.

after the incident, Watts alleges that she started receiving threatening and prank phone calls (some were even to order pizza), along with other forms of harassment including police cars and unmarked vehicles idling outside her house. According to MSN News, a public records request with the Sunshine State's Department of Motor Vehicles revealed that her driver's license information had been accessed by 88 different officers in 25 different agencies over 200 times in just a three-month span.

found on http://www.autoblog.com/2014/02/12/officer-who-issued-120-mph-ticket-suing-police-harassment/  and demonstrates that of the few police who do their jobs with intergrity, they can't get justice from the cops either. I suspect she's been harrased for not giving him a pass for being an idiot in uniform. They expect that from everyone else in uniform. So astoundingly corrupt.

If you read past hte link you'll see she's got a damn good case and is sueing every damn department that has run her info, in violation of a law that gives police secrecy of their residence, furthermore, for no cause to run her info. I'm shocked nothing in the news from her department head, division officer, etc decrying the outrageous behavior of everyone that has searched the database for her info, and demanded their resignation for being unprofessional, etc

Baltimore Maryland stoplight cameras grossly inaccurate and ripping off residents. City didn't bother releasing this info, the newspaper did

a secret audit from 2012 of the traffic cameras in Baltimore, MD should heat things up a bit. In an audit of the city's 83speed cameras, The Baltimore Sun is reporting that 13 had a double digit error rate, which helps account for a system-wide error rate of 10 percent. Of course, the secret part of this secret audit was that the findings were never released to the public.

City officials originally said that the cameras had an error rate of less than a quarter of a percent, but the audit found that most were not only off, they were way off – three specific locations in the city had error rates that varied from 35 to 58 percent. As the article points out, a total of 700,000 tickets were issued in fiscal year 2012 averaging $40, and a 10 percent error rate would mean that close to $2.8 million in fines were collected erroneously.

http://www.autoblog.com/2014/01/24/audit-finds-baltimore-speed-cameras-wrong-2-8m-video/

a rare survivor, a 1949 Ford state patrol car found stored since '54, getting restored in Seattle for the police museum

It was found largely disassembled with parts in boxes and the garage, is being restored to its former squad-car glory by the Seattle Metropolitan Police Museum.

But the ’49 model was something special from the start, loaded with a mechanical siren, heavy-duty brakes, a spotlight and a flathead V-8 engine that could create 110 horsepower with the help of a three-speed overdrive transmission, according to Ritter. The 1949 Ford sedan was the first “police package” vehicle manufactured in the country, meaning those cars came already equipped with special amenities for use in law enforcement, according to Seattle police Officer Jim Ritter, the museum’s president and founder. Before that, police “used civilian cars without any special suspension or brakes or engines or anything on them,”

Ritter said that after the car’s stint in Ellensburg, from approximately 1949 to 1952, it was auctioned off.

Little is known about its journey after that, until Ralph Voorhis bought it with one of his sons in the Renton area and hauled it home to Westport about four years ago.

Ritter said he learned about the car from a friend, who had seen it on Craigslist. Ritter drove to Westport in December, inspected the car and bought it for $600, then donated it to the museum.

“It was in amazingly good shape considering that it’s a 64-year-old vehicle,” said Ritter, who considers it a rare find.

“I mean most police agencies that restore old cars, they are simply civilian versions they’ve mocked up to look like police cars,” he said. “This is actually an original and one of very few original police cars from that era.”

phtos from and full article at http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2022741388_patrolcarxml.html

1962, Rome... Police were rewarded for suppressing crime, asked for a couple Ferrari as a reward, Enzo obliged!

found on http://www.petrolicious.com/ferrari-250-gte-on-special-assignment (where do they come up with such great stuff?)

WTF is the deal in Queensland Australia with cops needing to give a biker a dressing down for riding a bike while wearing a vest? 6 cops needed to stand around and ask stupid questions without writing a ticket or making charges

Thanks George for letting me know!

What a waste of time, Aussie tax payers dollars, etc. Readers, this is the most foolish cop pull over I've ever seen. Two cops had to ask him the same questions about his vest, his bike, his job, etc

They act like they are confronting Chopper Reed after a murder, instead, they have Joe Businessman refueling!

I wish I could drop in, ride a harley, while wearing a clever Mickey Mouse MC vest. Just to spin the the hell up.