I was recently cited for driving without a license by the Jackson Police Department.  The only evidence against me is the officer’s claim that he seen me driving, which still doesn’t give him a reason to run or stop me.  Though when I was confronted by him I was never behind the wheel of a car as seen in this video.  So I had my second court date today, a pre-trial conference, and decided to stay and watch the system at work.

I arrived a little before my 1:30pm court time to find the room nearly full, about 45 people.  Most were there to speak with the DA (like me) and see if they could settle their case before trial.  Others were able to enter a plea to the judge and if it was a no contest or guilty plea he would hear the details of your case.

I have been in courts before and they’re all pretty much the same.  Though the one in Jackson seems less formal and reminds me of the game show Lets Make A Deal.  The judge, Steve Cain,  is a younger man, not your typical grey haired middle aged judge, and didn’t even require everyone to rise when he entered the room.  He started by telling everyone their options noting that if they plead guilty or no contest that the city would then be inclined to reduced the charges and if they plead not guilty the process could be lengthy.  Clearly suggesting that people plea guilty and pay the fines.

It wasn’t long before I started to see the pattern in which the system operates.  The accused come up, enter a plea (normally guilty or no contest), then an officer reads off the account and prior arrest of the accused, then the judge reduces the fine and gives them X amount of days to pay.  But as more and more people came forward I started to see another common theme.  The initial reason for all the stops read off in court were for one of two things; Failure to wear a seat belt or the car was registered to a suspended driver.  It’s sad that the Jackson Police have nothing better to do than stop people who choose not to wear a seat belt.  It’s their choice and they’re only harming themselves? So why do they do this?

Those examples above are not crimes people, cops enforcing them doesn’t keep you safe, it merely allows police the ability to harass you.  Even the judge noted that pulling people over for not wearing a seat belt was a ‘push.’  But went on to say “its the world we live in” and went on ordering people to pay the reduced fine for such ‘criminal acts.’  When I asked him for an interview (on video) he declined stating it would get him in trouble.  But he did answer several questions of mine and chatted with me on a 15 min break in court.  When I asked why not just dismiss every seat belt violation, which would send the message to the police on patrol to stop wasting their time ticketing people, he stated that his job is to translate the law and make sure it is in fact a violation per the law as it stands.  Not to dismiss tickets  he disagrees with because then everyone would get off.  I replied with, “if there is no victim there is no crime.”  He went on to say that’s true except when officers pull over someone for a seat belt they often find other things to cite them for.  Which was my point, that it’s a tool for cops to profile people.  I seem to be making no progress with Steve in my attempts to state that without a victim there is no crime.  That people have a right to face their accuser and that’s not possible with victimless crimes.  No matter what points I brought up to him he felt he was helping people by giving them a break, whatever.  I returned to my seat disappointed.

I then got my turn to see the DA, who was clearly upset that there were 5 more people after me, and headed into a conference room.  My defense is simple, I want them to prove I was driving as I feel they can’t.  I stated that I have a video that shows my entire interaction with Kyle Henning and I’m never driving.  He asked me if I had intentions to get my license back and I asked how that is relevant to this case.  He said that if I were to get them back then the city would reduced my fine and allow me to keep all my points.  I said, “I have video evidence that I wasn’t driving, so I would like the charges dropped.”  He said I can’t do that and went on to explain how his firm is hired by the city to act as their DA.  I said, “so I can’t show you this video and after watching it if you feel that I didn’t deserve to be stopped (under the law), let alone be issued a ticket, you can’t throw this out now?”  He said fine and had me pull up my video.  Not ten seconds into it, never taking his eyes off the police report, he stopped me saying, “well here in the report the officer states he seen you driving.”  I was like, “so, watch the rest of this video.”  He said, “I don’t care whats on there as long as this officer is willing to testify to you driving then we can go to trial.”   So that was that.  Which is fine by me, I have nothing but time and no matter the outcome I won’t be paying the fine.

I then stuck around to watch a motion to suppress evidence hearing.  Where a drunk driver claimed the officers reasons for pulling him over were caused by the officer himself.  This man was pulled over for ‘almost’ hitting (yes, almost he didn’t actually hit ANYTHING)  a curb.  The officer, who is the same officer I have encountered here, states that the man took the turn at a ‘high’ rate of speed and then struck  (almost) the curb.  The cop thought he could need medical attention or that the driver could be under the influence so he pulled him over.  He failed to mention that he (the officer) was approximately 500 yards from said man and driving in the MIDDLE of the road.  Seriously, I seen the video (couldn’t get a copy),  the cop has more than half his cruiser in the oncoming lane.  The accused man took the stand stating he was startled to see a car in his lane, not knowing it was a cop, and took defensive actions to avoid the car.  The decision is pending though I hope the judge does what’s right, as he seemed to side with the drunk driver, who was finally stopped in his driveway.

So after spending the day in court I started to think of the motivation behind each person I encountered today, the accused, the judge, the officers and the DA.  For the accused it’s simple, go to court and hope to save points or money.  But the others have added and different incentives.  There were two officers in the court today, one was on his normal shift and the second on off hours, as he works night.  The first officer is wasting tax dollars babysitting a courtroom full of non violent, non victim ‘criminals.’  When he could be out investigating actual crimes, ones with victims.  The second is there to bare witness to his accounts of certain stops.  He presumably is being paid, above and beyond his normal hours, therefore his incentive is to ticket as many people as possible hoping that some will come to court.  Which in return gives him hours on hours of overtime.  Then there is the DA for hire who without watching my video, all the way through, decided that a trial is best.  His reason was that the officer’s statements in the report don’t match my video (the 10 seconds he seen).  Well no kidding, that’s because the officer is lying.  Or is it because the DA works for a private law firm and it would be profitable for them to go to trial.  He wasn’t interested in settling this today so what other motive can he have? Then you have the judge who routinely allowed people who were caught driving without a license to get it and come back.  He made it sound like he was doing them a favor because if they came back and proved to the court that they have a valid DL he would reduce the charge to driving without ID on person.  Which is still over a $100 fine but zero points.  Is it really for them judge?  Or is it because for most these people to obtain a DL they have to pay off a fine or the DMV?  Which should get you sales person of the year award, the revenue you must generate for the other state agencies, as well as your own, has to be huge.  Or do you do it to keep your court room full each month?  All the people in court today seemed to be hard working productive members of the community.  Except for the ones who participated in stealing several thousands of dollars from peaceful people today.  Money that could of been spent at the local bakery, tavern or otherwise in the community.

The police, district attorney and judge personally feel they are doing right by what I call the win win theory.  The accused get to save some money, the state still gets a cut, the police are still encouraged to ticket victimless crimes (as they see the conviction as keeping the community free of criminals) and the DA has played its role in keeping the accused from going to expensive trials.   That teaching these people to buckle up, get a DL or vehicle registration is a meaningful contribution to society.  To them its a win win for all involved.  Where all I see is a shameful game of ‘lets make a deal’ where the participants leave with lighter wallets nonetheless.   They (cops, judge, DA) are not interested in doing what’s right, only what benefits them.  For the cops that’s writing more tickets for more overtime.  For the DA and the judge it’s about making that deal with little or no cost to the state.  Instead of what’s best for the community all together.  For police it would be to let people be unless called or they personally witness harm being done to someone.  For the DA and judge it would be dismissing charges against people that have no victim, allowing them to keep their money.   Instead if you don’t take the deal you are swept off to the next round, an expensive (for tax payers) and time consuming trial.  Which is where I’m headed. Yah!

Check out Cop Block’s YouTube channel to see the boring videos of my day in court. Sorry about the audio, working on an upgrade soon.

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