I live in Los Angeles, but every once in awhile I venture into the county known as…well…Ventura.
Yet on more than one occasion I have been pulled over by their police departments.
A couple of years ago I was with a friend on the way to a party. Next thing I know a siren is blaring, and I am being asked to pull over.
Neither my friend nor I knew what the problem was, but one thing I did know was that we did not have any reason to have a guilty conscience.
We rolled down the windows, and the officer let us know that we had jumped a divider. I showed him my driver’s license, and he noticed I was a Los Angeles guy in his county. He asked me what I was doing.
In a cheery voice that made me sound like a 10 year old, I replied, “We’re going to Isaac’s house!”
This was not a sweet kid routine. I was in a cheerful mood, and again, had no reason to be pessimistic.
The officer asked for clarification, so I elaborated.
“We’re going to Isaac’s house. He’s our friend. We’re incredibly lost. Can you help us?”
The other officer looked at my partner, and asked him about a piece of paper in his hand. Sure enough, it was directions to the house.
The officer looked at his partner and concluded pretty quickly that we were not going to be trouble.
Now did it help that we were the whitest kids on the planet in the whitest neighborhood on Earth?
Perhaps.
Yet what the officers noticed immediately was that we were cooperative, and any mistake was unintentional.
I explained that I honestly never saw the divider, and I would not jump it intentionally. I was not in a rush, especially since I was not sure where I was going.
The officers explained to us where we made the wrong turn, and drew their own drawing on our map of exactly what we needed to do to correct the problem. They told us to drive safely, and even provided a convoy to help us go the right way. When we got to a turning lane, they came over their bullhorn and said, “Ok, turn here, make the u-turn, and you will be on your way. Drive safely.”
There are two lessons to learn from this when being stopped by police officers.
1) Be innocent. If you are guilty, you have problems. We were obviously law abiding citizens, and the officers saw that.
2) Be polite. Even in good neighborhoods, cops have danger every time they stop a car. There are remedies for abusive cops, but being an abusive passenger is not the answer.
Yet as surprised as I was by that experience, a very recent experience provided some tough life lessons.
Last Saturday night, I left an afterparty that was being put on at a bar by the Young Republicans for their Simi Valley Convention. At 1:15am, I decided to call it a night. A young lady at the party told me to, “be good, and drive safely.” If she only knew.
Several minutes on the road, and I was being pulled over. I pulled into a gas station, and the officer asked to see my license. I asked the question I would ask in this situation when I had nothing to hide.
“Is there a problem officer?”
Apparently they felt I was driving erratically. That might be overstating it. They informed me that I had crossed the divider of the lane I was in, and that I had done so more than once. I immediately realized that at that hour, they were looking for drunk drivers.
They asked me if I had been drinking, and I explained to the officers that I had not had a drop of alcohol, because I don’t drink at all.
They inquired as to what I mean by not at all. I clarified that I simply do not like the taste of alcohol. I don’t drink. I was in a bar hanging out with friends, but I had nothing to drink.
They noticed a bottle inbetween my legs, at which point I told them that it was diet cola with a lime and cherry in it. it was not Jack and Coke or Rum and Coke, just Diet Coke.
I offered to show it to the officer, but she said that was not necessary. She remarked that she did not smell any alcohol on my breath.
She also asked me twice if I had been taking any medication. I stated that I was taking nothing.
As is typical with me in this situation, I was very polite.
“Ma’am, if you say I crossed the lane, then I did. I don’t drink, I’m not on medication. I am a little tired, but I feel fine. Maybe I just wasn’t cognizant enough of the road. All I can say is that I have a long drive ahead of me, and I will make sure I am cognizant of the road.
She asked if I saw the siren.
“Officer, I did, but at first I did not think about it because I did not think I had done anything. Then after about 10 seconds I noticed that I was the only car on the road, which narrowed it down. So I pulled over.”
She asked where I was going, and I explained that I was headed back home to Westwood in Los Angeles. Then she asked an interesting question.
“That is a long way away. Why not take the freeway?”
I then offered her an answer that nobody would lie about.
“Ma’am, this is an old car. It doesn’t go on freeways. I don’t feel comfortable taking this thing on freeways.”
The officer laughed, and asked me what kind of car it was. At this point I think she was just seeing how coherent it was.
I told her the exact make and model of the car, and that the downside to an old car was longer trips on the road taking side streets.
She asked me if I had ever been arrested. I responded, “Heavens, no. Absolutely not. Never.”
The fact that I was surprised by the question most likely indicated to her that such a situation was a foreign concept to me. She asked me, “not once?”
I replied, “Ma’am, my dad would kick the blankety blank out of me. (I actually used the words blankety-blank rather than curse.) I’d be more scared of him than you.”
She asked me why, and I replied, “Ma’am, my dad was a military man. If I were ever arrested, I would be safer behind those bars where he couldn’t get to me. No ma’am, I don’t need that stress.”
She seemed amused, but I was not giving her schtick. These were honest reactions.
She then asked why I was in Simi Valley. I responded that I would be happy to tell her since the reason was completely legal, but that she should not hold my reason against me. She agreed, legality pending.
I explained that I was in town for a political conference. I showed her my political tote bag, emphasizing that if she did not share my views, I was still a nice person. She asked what I was doing politically.
I explained that I was a recent author, and did she want to see a copy of my new book. Her partner shined a light, which was obviously so he could see what I was reaching for. I showed her my book. I made it clear that I was not trying to sell her a copy, but just answering the questions she asked. I explained in a nutshell what the book was about.
After 10 minutes, she simply said, “just be careful on the road. Have a good night.”
Again, being innocent is a good start. Politeness can only help the situation.
Ten minutes is a long time to be interviewed, and even though it was genial bordering on friendly, I have to admit that I probably was distracted. Unfortunately, after the officers left me, I was even more distracted. My night was about to get worse.
I drove away from the gas station. Several minutes later, my car came to a complete stop. I was out of gas. I had forgotten to fill the tank. I changed lanes to enter the gas station! That is what the officers saw as me swerving. I was now stranded in the middle of nowhere, at 1:30am, with no gas.
I had a bunch of cash in my pocket, and asked God to let me not be killed. Yes, this was a good neighborhood, but Ennis Cosby was in a good neighborhood. Bill Cosby no longer has his son.
Triple A kept saying somebody was coming, but after two hours I was really starting to come unglued. Out of nowhere, I saw a car come driving fast. I rolled down the windows, and flagged the car down. It happened to be a police car. For the second time in two hours, a pair of officers would be questioning me.
These officers were less genial. They were not mean, just businesslike. It was 4am, and they did not want a problem.
I had a bright light in my face. I kept my arms outside the window so they could see me unarmed.
I said, “Officer, the light is very bright and straight in my eyes. I’m not drunk. I am not on any medication. I am out of gasoline. I am stranded.”
The officer asked me how I could allow my car to run out of gas. I again gave an answer that nobody would lie about.
“Officer this is an old car. The gas gauge does not work. I usually know when I need to fill it up. I hardly ever go anywhere, but tonight I drove far, and messed up. I ran out of gas.”
The officer asked if I called Triple A, and I explained that it had been over two hours. The officer seemed surprised by this. I then said something else.
“Officer, I am not going to make any sudden hand movements, but I would like to reach for my cell phone so I can show you how many times I have called these people. Can your partner shine the light on my passenger seat so he can see it is a cell phone?”
The officer did so, I slowly reached for my phone, and handed it to the officer. He saw that I began calling Triple A at 1:51am.
“Officer, this has been a nightmare.”
At that point the officers explained that they did not have any gasoline, and that they would call a tow truck for me. By sheer dumb luck, as they were doing that, my phone rang.
“Officer, that might be them.”
The officer handed me back my phone, and they listened to the quick conversation. The driver was about 60 seconds away. I explained that the driver was exactly 4/10 of a mile away. The officer was curious as to how I knew that to such specificity. I told him that if he shined a light on my passenger seat again, he would see my GPS tracker.
The officers waited for the tow truck to pull up. They then checked out the tow truck. After all, it was 4am, and maybe this was just a ruse for a drug deal. All I know is that everything I claimed, they verified just to be sure. They then told me to have a good night, and left. The tow truck put enough gasoline in my car to get me to a station, where I filled the tank.
Again, at the risk of being a broken record, an unfortunate situation ended without incident. I was innocent of wrongdoing, and I was polite. These officers had a bright light straight in my face, but no incident occurred. At 5am, I finally made it to my own bed for well needed sleep.
As much as I made plenty of mistakes on this long night and morning, I did a couple of things right. I made sure my cell phone had enough juice. I religiously charge the thing. Had I not been able to call, I would have been stranded on a barren road until the sun came up. I also used my GPS tracker to provide my exact coordinates.
I also made sure to keep my hands where the officers could see them, and made sure to let the officers know what I was reaching for, and that they could see what I was doing. I did not make erratic hand gestures.
I simply remained very calm. Well, sort of. I was angry internally, but calm when the police showed up.
While I cannot control the fact that I am a white kid with a poor car in a good neighborhood as opposed to a young black man driving a fancy car in a bad neighborhood, I can and did control my behavior. Again, I had a bright light in my face. The officers did watch my every move. They simply believed my explanations, because my explanations were believable. My explanations were believable because they were truthful. I simply was not up to anything deviant.
Professor Henry Gates could have done the same thing when confronted by Police Officer Sargent James Crowley. Instead Mr. Gates got belligerent.
Some would say he had a right to be angry, but even if he did (he didn’t), having a right to do something does not make doing something wise.
In fact, a driving term is “right of way.” I learned in Drivers Education that “No one ever has right of way.”
If a driver insists on right of way, and an accident ensues, it does not matter from a danger standpoint who was right. Either way there is an accident.
Situations like this, especially at odd hours of the night and morning, are like a bomb. They can be defused, or they can explode.
I made a conscious decision that going to jail or getting shot was not part of the plan. I acted appropriately, and the situations were quickly diffused.
Handling situations the right way does not guarantee the right results. I will be the first person to claim that no good deed goes unpunished. However, doing things the wrong way drastically increases the chances of negative results.
At 4am with police officers, negative results can be deadly.
Professor Gates chose escalation, and had it escalated any further, there could have been a dead individual, followed by racial riots and cities burning.
Ordinary citizens do not get invited to beer summits. They either cooperate or suffer potential grievous bodily harm.
These are life and death situations. Tread carefully, and handle with care.
It really is that simple, and does make a world of difference.
eric