Um, when I got certified as a DUI officer, the training wasn't "highly subjective" at all. It was all rather specific, right down to how many feet short of a stop sign was considered overly cautious, and what percentage of impaired drivers showed which driving impairment. Stopping short of a red light was (I think) 20% but driving extremely slow (again, a certain mph below the posted speed, not some arbitrary "too slow") with no obvious reason like weather or mechanical issues jumped up to around 30%. Weaving, crossing the center line or fog strip, or other dangerous driving was way on up there. The reference book alone was 2" thick. We were also expected to be able to testify to all that stuff when it got to court.bob wrote: ↑Fri Dec 29, 2023 11:40 amYeah; (the highly subjective) "overly" cautious is indicator of possible impairment. And officers are trained to observe suspected impaired drivers (for like 15 minutes) before administering a breathalyzer. So waiting long enough for probable cause, all while taking advantage of a (compelled) plain view.Maybenaut wrote: ↑Fri Dec 29, 2023 10:03 am I think Bob’s right. Well, I think you’re both right. The overly cautious driving gave rise to reasonable suspicion so they could pull me over — for all the reasons you mention. But once they had me on the side of the road they didn’t have probable cause to believe I was impaired - Dude engaged in a lengthy conversation with me and I wasn’t exhibiting any of the behaviors associated with impairment. There was no smell of alcohol or marijuana. I had a reasonable explanation for my behavior - it’s a holiday, cops are out in force, and I couldn’t afford to get a ticket. Meanwhile, the other dude was shining his flashlight everywhere it would go.
So I think they were looking for probable cause so they could get me off the road if need be.
I'm not sure where the 15 minute observation came from, but I never spent that kind of time just deciding if they were possibly impaired or not. They were either long gone down the road or already doing the FSTs on the side of the road. There is a required 30 minute observation time between detaining someone and running them on the intoxylizer but that's to make sure the big breath machine is calibrated correctly and they didn't have anything in their mouth. Road side "blow on this tube" are for PC (or at least they were when I was doing this shit for a living) and were not admissible as BAC results. I have screwed around with a stop for longer than necessary if I had been sitting on my ass for so long my butt was asleep and I needed to be moving around. Maybe it makes a difference that I only worked traffic (wrecks, DUIs, traffic stuff) and beat officers do things differently, or they do things differently in your state.
Also, in general, for a simple traffic stop, the second man in a 2 man car doesn't really have much to do but shine his light around your car. It's an officer safety training maneuver. I was a solo unit so it wasn't an issue for me unless another officer was close and just decided to ride by and back me up. He would usually check out the car so he wasn't just standing there like a lump though.
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