Long story. Read it or don't. For your entertainment, but I'd be curious for thoughts.
So. The other night, around 09:00 p.m. I tripped getting out of a shower and I'm positive I almost killed myself. It's a small bath and I was falling at perfect angle to Hillary Swank my neck Million Dollar Baby style on the vanity. That would have happened, I'm sure, but I managed to get an arm under me at the last second in a frantic attempt to grab anything and although I still managed to hit both my knees hard on the toilet (one shin, one knee cap), the TP dispenser on the side of my vanity broke my initial fall and saved my life. But my weight leaning on it broke it and I started the second part of my fall, hitting my elbow on the vanity and then hitting by other kneecap on the floor as I goose-neck jammed my wrist on the floor trying to brace this fall. All this happened and I'm pretty sure I almost gave myself a heart attack in the process. I lived. There wont be any running for a few days and I'm banged up, but alive.
I'm sure this sounds like just a klutz almost hilariously killing himself and it is, to be sure, but I tell this bathroom accident part because it sets stage for why I was out so late and why I was no state, physically or mentally, do deal with the BS I was about to. In hindsight this accident was also clearly an omen.
I should have gotten into bed with ice and motrin and stayed there until morning. But I couldn't sleep and after limping back and forth to change out ice packs every few hours, it was somehow 02:30 a.m. and I was wide awake, coffee awake. So I said, "Screw it, I'm up. I'll make a quick Wal-Mart run, drop five bucks on a new TP dispenser kit and fix it now while I'm thinking about it." I get to the store, get the kit, and I'm driving home. As I come to the end of this road at a T intersection (I'm heading south and need to turn left to go east), I see a cop car just stopped at a red light with his spotlight on. It strikes me as odd, because his car is running and he's not blocking the road across lanes. He's in traffic with his spotlight on, coming from the west but facing east like he's going that way. I think "Whatever," and hope he's going to turn north to turn onto the road I'm leaving. I have a green light so I pull out in front of him and go east.
It's a 45 MPH zone but it's oh-dark-thirty in downstate NY and white-tailed deer are everywhere and don't care. So I'm going like 40. The light changes behind me now and cop pulls up behind me in traffic, his rooftop spotlight still on. I have no idea what he's doing, but we both stay straight on this road which makes a sharp turn. I'm going like 35-40 on this turn because a. turn, b. night, c. deer, and now d. cop right behind me. The road straightens out and I'm not sure what this cop with his spotlight on is doing - if he's looking for something or communicating with another cop and about to roll out, lights flashing to an emergency and need me to pull aside to let him by, etc. -, I don't know. But I keep going 35-40 through this 45 and this cop keeps following me for a half mile. Then the first 55 MPH posted sign appears and I accelerate. Before I had been going a little slow so I could pull over get out of his way and now, again, trying not to get it his way, I speed up so I'm not holding him or other traffic up.
I start accelerating but only get up to like 45-50 before his flasher lights come on immediately, within a tenth of a mile from the 55 MPH sign (I went back today and measured - exactly 1/10th of a mile), and he pulls me over. I pull over immediately. He comes up and asks for license, registration, and insurance. I give him the first two and tell him I have proof of the third on my phone, I need to bring it up. While I was looking, I ask him if he knew he spotlight was on and tell him I was going slow because I didn't know what was going on and thought he might need to get by. He doesn't say anything to this. I'm waiting for my phone to load and he says, "You know what. Don't worry about the insurance. I don't need it." I tell him "I have it." and again, he says "It's fine. I believe you., You're good. I'm just going to run these and we'll be good." So I wait five minutes and for some reason I was getting a weird vibe from him and turned the video on my camera on to record the rest of the stop.
The cop comes back five minutes later as I'm going through papers in my registration book, figuring "I know I put my insurance cards in here somewhere..." The cop asks me if I've been drinking. I tell him the truth, "No, sir" thinking at first he's joking, as he's about to hand me back my info and he's saying "OK you're good to go..but you haven;t been drinking now, right?" Like he was good-heartedly messing with me or something. Not at all what he meant.
Anyway, I said "No, sir" . Then I look up at him and he tells me to step out of the car for a roadside sobriety test. I protest but I get out of the car, taking my phone with me in one hand. to keep recording. I tell the officer, "Sir, I haven't had anything to drink tonight or for weeks. (true) but I'm tell you straight up I'm going to fail your eye test. My eye crosses when I'm tired and it's 03:00 am. (Its true). " He makes me do this stupid gaze test anyway - you know - follow the pen with your eye, don't move your head, etc. Then he tells me we're about to do the stand on one leg and the walk-the-line tests. Well, from the fall earlier my legs still hurt every time I shift my weight, and esp when I walk. I can walk sure, but I don't want all that's standing between me and not going to jail to be me limping for a sec on an imaginary line or me shifting my weight uncomfortably being interpreted as a sign of impairment. Plus, I'm in Crocs on a cambered roadside littered with glass and pebbles.
I ask him if I'm legally obligated to perform these tests and he responds but doesn't answer me. He says something to the effect of "I'm trying to do my job to see if you're OK to drive." I say, "Sir I understand, but am I legally obligated to do these tests?" He's vague again but then says "No, but if you refuse everything we arrest you and you go to jail. Are you refusing?" He doesnt specify what ''everything'' is either, he leaves me to wonder if everything means "all the field tests" or "field test and breathalyzer". He's as vague as possible. I tell him, "No, I'm not refusing because I haven't had anything to drink." He says "Then what's the problem?" I ask, "Have I given you any reason to think I'm drunk? Do you smell alcohol?" And then comes out with "Yes! I detect alcohol in the vicinity of your person or your vehicle." He suddenly turned into a robot for that response like he was quoting an official regulation or giving a deposition, which I think was for the phone. I tell him "You do? That's ridiculous. I haven't had anything to drink in weeks. " but the subtext is clearly "We both know you're full of it, officer".
Then I said what I'm pretty sure saved me: " I'm not refusing to do any tests, but I just don't know what my rights here are, exactly, sir." He said, "Then what's the hang-up? Are you going to do the test?" I point out that I'm in Crocs and he says "So take them off. Do it barefoot." I point out "There's broken glass everywhere." At this point he snaps, "You know what? You go sit back in your car. Don't you worry about it." And he says "Don't you worry about it," with an unmistakable, NYC/NJ/LI cop tone (He didn't have the accent but he had that cliched...douche tone) as if he was saying "I've got something for you." like he was about to escalate the situation. I have him on video saying it. He screamed at me to get in my car. I do. I wait ten minutes, and I'm shaking now from adrenaline. It was close to 80 degrees out and I turned up the heat in my car because I felt freezing cold I was shivering so much. I was absolutely expecting a couple guys with Malinoises to show up to tear my car apart for fun or another cop car with a roadside breathalyzer, maybe rigged. I'm thinking I'm getting arrested, car's getting towed...
Instead, the cop comes back with three tickets. 1. driving 35 in a 55 (which never happened), 2. driving without insurance (which I didn't), and a totally made up 3. driving while driver's side view obstructed. I ask him to explain what the tickets are when he hands them back before I even read them, but he just screams at me "Read the tickets!," gets in his car and drives away. I was still shaking for a few minutes and the cop sped away so fast I couldnt even see if he was a town, county, or state police officer. This all happened about a mile as the crow flies from town police office so I drove right there, still shaking. It turned out to be that officer's police station but he wasn't there. I spoke to his sergeant, who couldn't have been nicer. He took care of the bogus obstructed view ticket right there, told me the insurance thing was just as easy to fix but that the town clerk office had to do that. He also said he's pretty sure I'll be able to get 35 in 55 reduced or dismissed.
But the officer who pulled me over was highly unprofessional. And it wasn't until I got home that the whole field-side sobriety test thing happening and then just stopping abruptly occurred to me. What just happened there? I don't get why he just stopped the field sobriety test? Did he ever actually believe I was impaired? Did he think I might be at first and then realize I wasn't? Did he never think I was and put me through the whole thing to try to get me to escalate it to the point of an arrest or to where he had probably cause for a breathalzyer? And why did he stop it after the gaze test? Did I just back into saying the exact right thing in denying drinking but at the same time saying I'm not refusing and telling him I didn't understand my rights? All were true, but I dont get why he just stopped and wrote me bogus tickets instead?
Any thoughts or similar experiences?