How long's a traffic stop?

[G35 Mass]

I am telling you in all absolute honesty, 3/4 of all cars I stop smell like weed. That said, I've never been wrong. If I've smelt raw marijuana, I've found it. EVERY time. If I've smelt burnt marijuana, I've always gotten an admission to smoking marijuana in the vehicle. EVERY TIME. (It's easier to get admissions in a state where some marijuana possession is a civil infraction and people think they can't get in trouble anymore).

Don't take this as me saying 3/4 of all cars on the road have mj in it or smoked in it. I'm just very selective as to who I stop, and work in an area where drug use is ramped.

The odor of marijuana is very obvious to people who don't smoke it.

I can't speak for every cop, but I've never made up a fake odor to constitute a search. I never know if I'm stopping a judge, another cop, fed., etc., and the lie will end my career. You can bet your *** if I lie about smelling something that's not possible and search an FBI agent's car, I'll be in federal court on the wrong end of a 1983 case...

[G35 Mass]

And, btw, you're a douche. You're complaining about a legal search for contraband YOU ADMIT TO HAVING was taking too long.. AFTER YOU GOT AWAY WITH IT!~!~!

Man, you REALLY need to lay off the herb for a while. You're brain is fried like an egg.

[lm/]

I am telling you in all absolute honesty, 3/4 of all cars I stop smell like weed. That said, I've never been wrong. If I've smelt raw marijuana, I've found it. EVERY time. If I've smelt burnt marijuana, I've always gotten an admission to smoking marijuana in the vehicle. EVERY TIME. (It's easier to get admissions in a state where some marijuana possession is a civil infraction and people think they can't get in trouble anymore).

Don't take this as me saying 3/4 of all cars on the road have mj in it or smoked in it. I'm just very selective as to who I stop, and work in an area where drug use is ramped.

The odor of marijuana is very obvious to people who don't smoke it.

I can't speak for every cop, but I've never made up a fake odor to constitute a search. I never know if I'm stopping a judge, another cop, fed., etc., and the lie will end my career. You can bet your *** if I lie about smelling something that's not possible and search an FBI agent's car, I'll be in federal court on the wrong end of a 1983 case...

Honestly, that's all interesting to hear a cop say. Thanks. If I wasn't confident about where it was, I probably would have said I had it too...

And, btw, you're a douche. You're complaining about a legal search for contraband YOU ADMIT TO HAVING was taking too long.. AFTER YOU GOT AWAY WITH IT!~!~!

Man, you REALLY need to lay off the herb for a while. You're brain is fried like an egg.

Hahaha Yeah, well I'm not making a formal complaint. (oh - and OF COURSE I wanted them to stop looking and quit taking so long)
Still - I just think there's other things they could have been doing. I honestly was surprised at how long they were willing to hang out with us once they'd figured out we didn't have some transport of weed. I was like "so....quiet day?" Ya know, I'm just concerned for the safety of the community as a whole.

Not that I'm paranoid. lol.

[Citicop]

Hmm. Alright, to be honest, I guess you might call it 1/32nd to be generous. Bout 1/2 a 16th, at the very most. That's not enough to make the car smell really strongly of weed, sitting where it was, packed how it was (and the car did smell like McDs at the same time). I think sometimes cops just say a car smells like weed - I know you won't confirm/deny that. Not telling you where it was. DeltaV may have found it. Maybe.
I think the dog did smell it but it got distracted (ha, I know why too, maybe the cops didn't want to get as close as they did, but I know I cleaned it well).
I still think the cops were more suspicious than they had reason to be. Legally - that was a real minor amount - I just think that the response was greater than it needed to be. It seemed like too much effort by the cops to be honest - sure, search and make sure I'm not some big time dealer but by the time they got to the 7th search - they had run out of any big size places to look, it was never going to be much... Don't you feel like that's a waste of time yourself?
I don't make a habit of carrying btw.

I don't buy for one second that you "don't make a habit of carrying." Again, I don't know who you think you're fooling, but I've been around too long to buy that. No one who "doesn't make a habit of carrying" has a spot to hide their dope which would require that kind of disassembly to reach.

And you know it wasn't much, but they don't know until they find it. So they know it's there, and they didn't give up at first when they didn't find it. Again, this is good and not bad police work.

The cops had plenty of reason to be suspicious. Your car smelled like dope, and a dog alerted on the car. You HAD illegal drugs on you.

I also don't know cops that make up probable cause. Clearly they didn't here, as the dog alert and your admissions show that they were right. I love it when people tell me "there's no way you could have smelled that in my car, it wasn't that much!

My response is always the same: "Funny how I said I smelled marijuana and that's what I found. I must be really lucky then." People might have a leg to stand on if I said I smelled marijuana and found Meth, or a gun, or something... but when the search turns up exactly what I said I would find, maybe I COULD smell it...

-Citicop.

[CPL1897]

I am seriously disapointed in you guys...who cares about dope, like he said legalize i, who cares about job security anyways....

Not one of ya"ll asked the most basic and important question of "if he was wearing his hat"?

Since no one else did, i will ask..did all officers on scene have their hats on? Because few citizens are aware of this...but if the officers are not wearing their hats they have no authority and you (as a citizen) can detain them for false detentention (i know confusing) until an officer wearing his hat arrives...

Just fyi....

[lm/]

Citicop - Nah, I actually don't make a habit of carrying (for this very reason). "Disassembly" isn't really the right word.
Yeah, the cops didn't find anything at first. So they didn't give up at first. Fair enough. I still think that by the time you get to search #7 or even, I dunno #5, you should be thinking to yourself "there sure ain't much of it if it's around here...should we spend another 25 minutes looking?". Maybe I'm just being an economist or something about it. Maybe good police work just takes more time than it's sometimes worth. You'd know better than me.

I also don't know cops that make up probable cause.

Good to hear.

[lm/]

I am seriously disapointed in you guys...who cares about dope, like he said legalize i, who cares about job security anyways....

ha. money money money.

Not one of ya"ll asked the most basic and important question of "if he was wearing his hat"?

Since no one else did, i will ask..did all officers on scene have their hats on? Because few citizens are aware of this...but if the officers are not wearing their hats they have no authority and you (as a citizen) can detain them for false detentention (i know confusing) until an officer wearing his hat arrives...

Just fyi....

Oh WOW!! CPL1897 I NEVER knew this! This is really interesting. I wish I knew this years ago I would of been citizen arresting their asses all over the place. Does that include the dog? Because the dog definitely didn't have a hat on. Thanks for sharing this valuable information. I'll be sure to let a few more people know!!!

















Oh wait. I've read some other posts here too.

[CPL1897]

The K-9 is except from the rule, lucky dog...

[lm/]

The K-9 is except from the rule, lucky dog...

I'd rather it had a hat.

A top hat.

(also, it would have struggled at getting it's head in the right place to sniff things if it had a top hat on.)

[Joeyd6]

[quote=lm/;1154001]Hi,
I feel like I was stopped for an unreasonable amount of time for minor stuff and I was wondering what an average time might be for this.

Me and friends went to grab lunch. We were going back to school, I got pulled over, cop said I didn't stop at a stop sign. Yeah, ok, I California rolled it.

Aka- You admit you broke the law...the officer has probable casue to stop you. No problem so far.

He asks me questions/license/all that stuff. He writes me a ticket. Then he goes "your car smells really strongly of marijuana" (no, it doesn't). Then he wants us all out of the car. Then he wants to interrogate all of us. Then he wants to know if I want to 'tell him anything about what's in the car', I can tell he's checking out my eyes and everything. Then he searches all through the car.

he had probable casue to believe drugs were in the vehicle and everything is on the up and up!

Some other cop arrives. They can't find anything. Then he says they're getting a dog since it smells SO strongly. And we're like "come on...we gotta go to school...". So we wait for the dog. The dog runs around. Then it hits on some spot. Then the cops are all over it. They find nothing. They look again. Then again. Then all through the car again. Nothing. They look like they're about to start searching all over again so I just go "there was a little pot in that spot recently".

You just admit you have had marijuana in your car.....a crime. You can now be detained while an investigation is conducted. That could include impounding your vehicle and obtaining a search warrant and then searhing that vehicle.

I figure they can't charge me with anything from that and more importantly, they might leave. One cop tries to interrogate me about that statement but I was like "I don't have anything else to say"

Your rights as given with the US Constitution.

(I can't be bothered making up a whole story, just let us leave).

Making up a story? You mean LIE?

They look real close at that spot, sniff it, lick it. Have another casual look through the car. Then they huddle and decide we can leave. And then school was angry about us being so late back.

Oh well!

So...I'm wondering - how long would you expect all that to take? (I guess ignoring the dog's travel time, I know that could change it all) I'm just curious about whether that really took for ever or if that's to be expected...

Easily an hour!

By the way - what a waste of time...legalize it

Not your choice. The law states it is illegal. Period.

That all looked like bad use of resources to me.

This coming from a person who admits they broke vehicle & traffic law....admitted to having marijuana in the car....wants a illegal substance legalized and considered lying to the police and thinks they can't/shouldn't be held liable for their actions!

After school I grabbed a friend, a complete innocent bystander and I was like, hey, can you get in my car, does it smell like pot? And he goes "...umm....only like a little bit...it smells more like McDs" (SO strongly).

So the cops were right and they had probable casue.

I don't know man, I guess I'm just trying to understand the process behind it.

Find violaters of the law and punish them? Or maybe keep idiots off the street?

I guess you might call it 1/32nd to be generous. Bout 1/2 a 16th, at the very most.

So you did lie!!!! Now you have a VTL offense...a misdemeanor for posession of weed...and a felony for lying to the cops. So you think it should be legal and is not a big deal, but you are not man enough to admit what you had and take the consequences. Not only is that immature, it shows the characteristics of being a coward!

Ya know, I'm just concerned for the safety of the community as a whole.

Me too......especially with folks like you in it!

[marinepilot]

OP has been banned for posts basically admitting to felonious actions.

No reason to keep this one open as he won't be able to see or respond to it.