PILOT SPIN
Spin Zone => Spin Zone => Topic started by: Lucifer on January 27, 2022, 07:03:38 AM
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https://www.al.com/news/2022/01/police-in-this-tiny-alabama-town-suck-drivers-into-legal-black-hole.html
Ramon Perez came to court last month ready to fight the tickets he’d been handed by Brookside police, including one for rolling through a stop sign and another for driving 48 mph in a 40 zone.
He swore he’d seen the cop from a distance and was careful as he braked.
“I saw him and we looked eye to eye,” the Chelsea business owner said. “There’s no way I was going to run that stop sign.”
When he got to court Dec. 2, he saw scores of people just like him lining up to stand before Judge Jim Wooten, complaining of penny-ante “crimes” and harassment by officers. He saw so many people trying to park in the grassy field outside the municipal building that police had to direct traffic.
He figured there was no point.
“I saw the same attitude in every officer and every person,” he said. “That’s why I hesitated to fight it. They were doing the same thing to every person that was there. They own the town.”
Perez, it appears, was right.
Months of research and dozens of interviews by AL.com found that Brookside’s finances are rocket-fueled by tickets and aggressive policing. In a two-year period between 2018 and 2020 Brookside revenues from fines and forfeitures soared more than 640 percent and now make up half the city’s total income.
And the police chief has called for more.
The town of 1,253 just north of Birmingham reported just 55 serious crimes to the state in the entire eight year period between 2011 and 2018 – none of them homicide or rape. But in 2018 it began building a police empire, hiring more and more officers to blanket its six miles of roads and mile-and-a-half jurisdiction on Interstate 22.
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This seems to be a systemic problem. Police departments become accustomed to ticket income (or civil asset forfeiture income) and it becomes the expected budget. Does this mean they aren’t being sufficiently funded normally? Sometimes they use the money for extras but do they also use the money for normal policing needs?
How are police departments normally funded, local income tax and property tax? So let’s assume some of the excessive ticket or civil asset forfeiture money is to make up for insufficient funding. If we crack down on this, do we need to raise property and income tax to fund the police?
By ticketing transients, you are making non-residents pay for your local policing. Not fair. Civil asset forfeiture disproportionately impacts the lower classes but is unfair to anyone innocent of crime. We who pay taxes might be fine with others funding our police, until we are the ones targeted.
Woke calls to “defund the police” can only exacerbate this kind of corruption. Not to mention cause a strong disincentive for anyone to want to be a police officer. But if this kind of money is gravy, maybe it becomes an incentive if you get money or perks under the table. Civil asset forfeiture seems particularly prone to this. Cop seizes your $10,000 but only turns in $8,000 to the evidence room.
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I live just south of Birmingham and this has received attention of state authorities. They’re going to propose legislation to stop these small town from doing this. There’s a few more I’ve heard about still practicing this but hopefully with the attention Brookside is receiving it’ll stop.
By John Archibald | jarchibald@al.com
The fallout over aggressive policing in the tiny Jefferson County town of Brookside continued Tuesday, as Alabama Lt. Gov. Will Ainsworth asked for an official state audit of the town, its police force and more.
“I am extremely concerned about the circumstances that have been recently publicized regarding the Brookside Police Department,” Ainsworth wrote to Rachel Riddle, the Chief Examiner of Public Accounts. “Please accept this letter as an official request that the Examiners of Public Accounts conduct a full audit of the City of Brookside, focusing on, but not limited to, their police department, municipal court, general and departmental funds.”
The effort came the same day Brookside Police Chief Mike Jones resigned, after stories published by AL.com detailed aggressive policing that fueled a 600-plus percent increase in traffic fines in a two-year period. By 2020 money from fines and forfeitures accounted for half the town’s budget.
Ainsworth, a Republican, and Democratic leaders in the Legislator have said Brookside represents a problem that is seen in other towns across the state. They have called for both investigations and legislation that could stop small cities and towns from using drivers on passing interstates to fill their coffers.
Ainsworth said former state Rep. Connie Rowe, who joined his staff this year as an advisor, was spearheading an effort to see what the Legislature could do to prevent situations like Brookside. Ainsworth said he expects to see legislation proposed this year.
Ainsworth said he did not know any specifics about what led to the resignation of the Brookside chief, but he said that was a good first step.
“What happened in that city, we’ve got to stop,” Ainsworth said. “And so we’re looking at what we can do from a legislative standpoint. You know, all the options on the table, and that’s a good first step, but there’s a long road ahead to make sure we solve that problem.”
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While there ain't much I can do to stop a cop from ticketing me for something I didn't do, I do use a Valentine One 2nd gen) radar detector to alert me to cops in the area who are radar-gun happy. And that's true even though I am now an old guy who rarely drives over the limit.
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The state pretty much stopped speed traps in Georgia. Also, a local or county authority cannot write you for less than 10 over. Only the State Patrol can do that and they generally allow 5 over.