On Nervousness (Traffic Stop)

[phantomnerd]

A bit of a traffic stop story...

I was pulled over for doing 50 in a 35, issued a citation, took a driving class, and had the charge reduced to Improper Equipment. Boom, done, no points, awesome. However, the reason that I'm posting is regarding a question I'd like answered: When you pull somebody over, and they appear nervous, does your "he's hiding something" alarm immediately go off?

I had to detour around some town parade or something, and coming back up an unused side street, the cop was behind a trailer and tagged me going 50. As soon as I saw him (and tapped my brakes), and saw his wheel turning my way, I knew I was being pulled, so I threw on my 4-ways and turned down a side street. Put the car in park, shut the engine off, windows down, hands on the wheel. He asked for my license, then the "Did you see the speed limit sign of 35mph?" And "You're not going anywhere important in that big of a hurry?" kind of questions. I was honest with him, I just told him I didn't realize I was going that fast (my dad's car, 120hp more than mine :-) )

Anyways, I know I was nervous. It's happened all three times I've been pulled over. He went back to his car, and about a minute later, two more squad cars show up. All three officers were in/around the first squad car for a minute or two. In this time, there was a good song playing on my radio, so I turned it up - my hands were tapping to the music on the back of my headrest (which wasn't a nervous thing, I just really liked that song).

So the third officer to show up started walking up to my car, and I turned the music off and put my hands back on the wheel. He asked me where I live, where I was going, and I told him. He asked if I had anything illegal in my car, which took my by surprise, but I told him that I didn't. He said something along the lines of "so you don't have any guns, knives, hand grenades, al-quaeda members, anything of that nature?" Being a smart ***, I told him I had an Al-Quaeda member in the trunk, which probably wasn't too smart, but he at least laughed and knew I was joking. He asked if he could search my car. I told him that was fine, and then he told me "If you have a dope bag or something, you can just tell me and we'll work it out." I told him again, I have nothing in my car, search all you want.

There was nothing in my car, but he did ask why there were 4 different cans of lysol and febreeze, which I got a bit of a laugh out of, and so did my dad. (Turns out he doesn't like the smell of cigarettes in the car, but I digress). I was stopped for about 20 minutes or so.

My thoughts on this was that I looked nervous at the stop, then tapping my hands to the music made me look nervous, and that's why they wanted to search my car. Or, I'm profiled as a "punk kid" being 21 and driving my dad's Avenger. But, I also think, being nervous at a traffic stop HAS to be pretty common. Seemed unusual that they'd want to search my car on nervousness alone, unless there was something I missed. I think I did pretty well.

What do you guys think? Is nervousness at a traffic stop so uncommon that it's considered a reasonable suspicion that the driver is hiding something? Or did I just pull the short straw on that one?

[GoDirectly2Jail]

A bit of a traffic stop story...

I was pulled over for doing 50 in a 35, issued a citation, took a driving class, and had the charge reduced to Improper Equipment. Boom, done, no points, awesome. However, the reason that I'm posting is regarding a question I'd like answered: When you pull somebody over, and they appear nervous, does your "he's hiding something" alarm immediately go off?

I had to detour around some town parade or something, and coming back up an unused side street, the cop was behind a trailer and tagged me going 50. As soon as I saw him (and tapped my brakes), and saw his wheel turning my way, I knew I was being pulled, so I threw on my 4-ways and turned down a side street. Put the car in park, shut the engine off, windows down, hands on the wheel. He asked for my license, then the "Did you see the speed limit sign of 35mph?" And "You're not going anywhere important in that big of a hurry?" kind of questions. I was honest with him, I just told him I didn't realize I was going that fast (my dad's car, 120hp more than mine :-) )

Anyways, I know I was nervous. It's happened all three times I've been pulled over. He went back to his car, and about a minute later, two more squad cars show up. All three officers were in/around the first squad car for a minute or two. In this time, there was a good song playing on my radio, so I turned it up - my hands were tapping to the music on the back of my headrest (which wasn't a nervous thing, I just really liked that song).

So the third officer to show up started walking up to my car, and I turned the music off and put my hands back on the wheel. He asked me where I live, where I was going, and I told him. He asked if I had anything illegal in my car, which took my by surprise, but I told him that I didn't. He said something along the lines of "so you don't have any guns, knives, hand grenades, al-quaeda members, anything of that nature?" Being a smart ***, I told him I had an Al-Quaeda member in the trunk, which probably wasn't too smart, but he at least laughed and knew I was joking. He asked if he could search my car. I told him that was fine, and then he told me "If you have a dope bag or something, you can just tell me and we'll work it out." I told him again, I have nothing in my car, search all you want.

There was nothing in my car, but he did ask why there were 4 different cans of lysol and febreeze, which I got a bit of a laugh out of, and so did my dad. (Turns out he doesn't like the smell of cigarettes in the car, but I digress). I was stopped for about 20 minutes or so.

My thoughts on this was that I looked nervous at the stop, then tapping my hands to the music made me look nervous, and that's why they wanted to search my car. Or, I'm profiled as a "punk kid" being 21 and driving my dad's Avenger. But, I also think, being nervous at a traffic stop HAS to be pretty common. Seemed unusual that they'd want to search my car on nervousness alone, unless there was something I missed. I think I did pretty well.

What do you guys think? Is nervousness at a traffic stop so uncommon that it's considered a reasonable suspicion that the driver is hiding something? Or did I just pull the short straw on that one?

Did you do a search? Did you see this thread right on the first page of Ask-A-Cop:

Tips for making traffic stops go smoothly?

Along with the comedy is some good advice about traffic stops in general.

[GoDirectly2Jail]

Is nervousness at a traffic stop so uncommon that it's considered a reasonable suspicion that the driver is hiding something? Or did I just pull the short straw on that one?

To answer your specific question: yes, nervousness of the driver can add to reasonable suspicion, along with a litany of other articulated factors.

[MikeLowrey]

Did you do a search? Did you see this thread right on the first page of Ask-A-Cop:

Tips for making traffic stops go smoothly?

Along with the comedy is some good advice about traffic stops in general.

Agree, we just had somebody with the same question, next time you can just add your story to that thread. As for being nervous, it is normal, I get pulled over too and when I do I get nervous too! lol, but the reason why he ask you all those questions is because he just wanna make sure everything is alright, at the same time he does it for his own safety and yours.

And yes nervousness will give me some reasonable suspicion too. It is a good thing you did all the right steps when getting stopped. Next time just don't go that fast.

[phantomnerd]

I've been following the Tips thread, just didn't mention anything about nervousness in general - apologies for the double post.

And, thank you for your input.

[scott715us]

I think it's odd that one would crank the radio up in the middle of a traffic stop. Normally people are "concerned" during a stop about getting a ticket and the last thing in their mind is to start groovin.

[Citicop]

Plenty of people are nervous on traffic stops.

I make a lot of traffic stops, and therefore see a lot of traffic violators who are nervous.

But when a driver is UNUSUALLY nervous compared to the average driver, it helps establish reasonable suspicion. Why wouldn't that be considered?

-Citicop.

[phantomnerd]

I think it's odd that one would crank the radio up in the middle of a traffic stop. Normally people are "concerned" during a stop about getting a ticket and the last thing in their mind is to start groovin.

Yeah, that probably didn't help. At that point, when the officer went back to his car, I figured there was really nothing I could do except take the ticket or warning, so I wasn't too worried about it at that point. Actually, from that point on, I was completely relaxed.