Again. Police murder two more innocent black men. How do we stop this?

[Aristotle]

I am really sad to see a bunch of people I like getting really angry and going after each other so aggressively. I think we have a lot of smart people here who could have an interesting discussion of this topic if we all chilled out a little and made an attempt to see where the other folks are coming from.

Then again maybe I've become a wuss in my old age...

I can agree with this. The war on drugs is stupid, expensive, and not having the sort of impact lawmakers hoped it would. I would love to see the vast majority of drug laws removed, with the exception of those that apply to alcohol at the federal level (and potentially a few extra, since alcohol has to be directly consumed where many drug products can have indirect effects):

1. No use by or in the presence of minors, due to developmental and health impacts.
2. No driving under any influences.
3. Local policies could decide on public use, I'd prefer use to stay in private homes or businesses myself.

This would be a boon to police, jails, etc.

Also, this is a brief and interesting read.

Robert Peel’s 9 Principles of Policing - Definition of policing by consent

The principles which were set out in the ‘General Instructions’ that were issued to every new police officer from 1829 in Britain, and are widely considered some of the first, founding documents for modern policing.

[Red Syns]

Self-evident

By what standard? That, in a discussion of black individuals being shot, I point out that most of the cases have been deemed justified?

I'd make the exact same argument for whites, latinos, asian, etc. It's not a racism thing, it's an opinion/logic thing. If this discussion shifted to any other race, it'd be the exact same statements from me.

Implied

Same as above. In a discussion of a black child playing with a toy gun, what implication is there to make? My statement was that the gun was realistic. Again, if the statement would be identical in all cases, regardless of race, I'm not implying that only black children shouldn't play with realistic guns in public. I'm explicitly stating that nobody should be playing with realistic looking guns in public.

Restraining someone is to be expected. I'll give you that one. I have to question why officers were so interested in restraint after the fact, but not before? There was no mention of shots fired. At worst the situation the officers were responding to was a hostage situation. The more likely (statistically) was an emotionally unstable individual contemplating suicide (given the information the cops had been given - random individual with a gun, not firing it, but rather playing with it). Absolutely NOTHING of this situation warranted officers charging in. In fact pretty much all military/police training DEMANDS the officers not charge in unless there is a specific need to act immediately. No shots reported as fired? Then the shooter is not an active threat. Immediate, maybe. But not active. So the police are real interested in restraint, except when they're not. They're real interested in civilians following orders and protocols, but not so much themselves.

As you already said, to my knowledge, the sister was never arrested, only restrained and placed in the police car. I have not read anything about her in particular other than the words "tackled", "handcuffed", and being put in the police car. I cannot watch videos out at sea (bandwidth is too low), so without any further text descriptions, that's the extent of my knowledge on the matter.

I'll confess to my training being military, and not police. Furthermore, I do not know the policies of the police department involved, so I cannot testify to whether the officers behaved in accordance with their training or not. That being said, the only information I've found says dispatch told the officers there was an armed individual pointing the weapon at other civilians.

As military, that closes my "deadly force triangle": Capability, Opportunity, and Intent. The capability is the firearm, the opportunity is being within the maximum effective range (50m for the Beretta M9 service pistol). Intent is the hardest to prove, but drawing the weapon and pointing it at others is definitely enough to "close the triangle," which authorizes us to utilize deadly force.

Again, military (Navy), not police. That being said, much of our watchstanding takes place on US soil, with US Citizens being the subject of these rules of engagement. Military and police training tends to be very similar, but maybe it differs. If anyone can find their policies, I'd gladly read through them.

The worst situation they were rolling into was an armed individual who had made every action, indiscriminate of target, except pulling the trigger. It's not quite the same situation as a potential hostage situation.

If officers had followed training, if they had exercised restraint, if they had sought to deescalate, they would have had more than 1/10th of a second to ascertain and establish that the weapon was in fact not a weapon, and thus lethal force was not only not necessary, but in fact very excessive.

Until I see departmental policy on the matter, I cannot testify either way.

First - The very link that you cite here shows that the evidence doesn't show shit except that the assistant county prosecutor (Remember that little blurb about self-investigating and how a PROSECUTOR presented the Defense FOR the officers? This was that specific incident) claims that there was indisputable evidence showing blah blah blah - except further into the article, surprise, surprise, it's disputed.

But again - if the officers had not just raced in to within mere feet of the kid, they would have been able to learn that the gun was not real. Also, I'd like to point out that this article also state, and I'm copy/pasting directly from it so all the copyright whatever go to it:

"That point of contrast, prosecutors said, is the replica Colt 1911 that Tamir was seen aiming at people in the HOURS before someone called 911." (BOLD ADDED BY ME FOR EMPHASIS)

HOURS. fucking HOURS this kid was playing with this gun. Nobody shot. Nobody dead. No body count.

I might have missed something, but the only counter-argument I saw is the family's attorney stating that "It could be argued beyond a reasonable doubt whether Tamir pulled the gun."

Not "Without a doubt, he did not pull the gun." Not "Without a doubt, he did not have the gun in his hand." The evidence is overstated as "beyond a doubt he pulled it from his waistband," but the video (from what I have read) strongly indicates he pulled a dark object out of his waistband, and the object was kicked away (as an officer would do with a dropped firearm) after the shooting.

Also, I'd like to comment on the irony that later in this post you ask for evidence stating that you want to see stats, not video, as evidence. But I digress.

It's actually not ironic at all. I posted a link to a video about one specific incident, in which (unedited) video would be the strongest possible evidence of the actual events. Xywalan is making a broad, generalized statement regarding frequency of white hostile individuals getting "off the hook" vs. black hostile individuals getting shot. Unless he intends to show videos for the hundreds of OIS each year, numbers are going to be a much more valid statistic than isolated incidents.

You're right. You didn't say it. You implied it.

Again, until you show me where in this discussion I had the opportunity to prove my duality of opinions regarding actions by different races (I haven't, given that we've never discussed toy guns and any child of any race beyond Tamir Rice)...I don't get how you're getting that implication.

The officer got out of his cruiser and was pulling the trigger before he would have even had a chance to differentiate color. He was falling out of his car he was exiting it so quickly, squeezing the trigger as he went. Orange wouldn't have even registered to him.

Everything I've read said he fired ~2 seconds after exiting the vehicle. Two seconds is a relatively long time, but I don't think either of our opinions is going to hold much water regarding whether or not he would have seen it. The only fact is that the firearm in question did not have the requisite markings, and as such, there was a 0% chance of the officer seeing them.

Nobody has argued that you should have that right. Also, no, I don't think anyone on this forum is fucking retarded.

Xylawan made that exact argument, saying that Ohio is an open carry state. Here's his exact words: "Ohio is an open-carry state. So even if he had a real gun, the police should not have shot him in two seconds."
Whether the state is open carry or not is irrelevant. Drawing a weapon as the police approach you is illegal. Open carry states don't allow you to just draw your pistol whenever you feel like it, they allow you to have it on the outside of your clothing, in plain sight.

Any words thrown into your mouth are either a lack of your proper explanation, or proper interpretation of what you imply.

In this particular case, Xylawan was implying that I share the opinion that "black kids grow up faster and look like grown men." That argument has, to my knowledge, never been an argument I made in any such topic.

Because he was a kid, playing with a toy gun, and didn't think he was doing anything wrong. Suddenly a wild Rattata appe....I mean trigger-happy officers appears! It might seem stupid to you. A lot of things seem to. But this was a kid just enjoying a day of play when he's taken by surprise by a giant fucking car parking at his feet, two people ejecting themselves from the vehicle and unloading into his chest. Why in the hell would you EVER expect the kid to do something reasonable?

Because when I was a child, I was not allowed to play with toy guns until I had been taught firearm safety, to include NERF guns. The failure of a parent to teach their child any sort of common sense rules (like don't point guns at strangers) is not the failure of a police officer.
Does a bullet become less lethal when it is accidentally fired? If not, why does it matter if the shooter was aware of it being wrong or right?

See, told you that you did this!

And as stated before, it's not ironic in the slightest. Different arguments requiring different types of evidence.

Protocol would be to ascertain actual level of threat, number of individuals at risk, etc. Also mental state of the individual (was he suicidal, was this a death-by-cop scenario?

I'm contesting it right now. Hell, the article you cited with the "indisputable" evidence contests it.[/quote]

As above, the situation was by any training I've received a situation requiring immediate resolution. As above, different trainings that tend to be similar/identical, so if you can provide any sort of reading I'll gladly partake.

Also, I like you. You're colorful in your wordings. Nothing original or particularly great in imagery, but I assume you're either young or old. So you're either inexperienced or you're outdated.

Being the internet, I might be missing the /s, but thanks. Young and inexperienced is what you're looking for.

Except the kid din't pull a gun on the cops. He was holding a toy. It was because of the officers disregard of training, protocol and human life that they never took 2 fucking minutes after HOURS (again, bolded for emphasis) to find out what was really going on. Just to be a sarcastic shit, I'd say that means their investigative skills are sub-par for an officer and they should be fired for that incompetency alone.

Pulling a realistic-enough looking toy is, at the time of the event, the same effective thing as pulling a real firearm. As above...unfamiliar with their training and policies.

If the park was empty, then I would argue it would be better for the officers to move in than if there were innocent bystanders that could be hurt in such a bumrush. No. I'm not arguing they should have rushed in - just that the consequences would have been less severe in such an instance.

I'd make the argument that with nobody in the area, giving him room is less likely to result in bystander injuries, but different logics that are unlikely to be reconciled, so to each their own.

Negative. Presence of non-involved citizens requires EVEN GREATER RESTRAINT. There's this thing that Law Enforcement is taught that places priority on what you protect. The first thing you protect is HUMAN LIFE/CIVILIANS. Meaning you DON'T FUCKING RUN IN, GUNS A-BLAZIN'. After that you protect other things like the suspect, yourself and lastly, property.

You ascertain threat, and if none exists, you don't use Force.

If that's the department policy, then they certainly acted inappropriately in approaching him. I don't see fault with the follow-on actions given the presentation of a firearm, but if the initial action was wrong, then I assume legally the following actions are equally wrong. In a rare break from monotony, I'm not a lawyer, so I'm once again unfamiliar.

He got shot for the officers incredibly reckless, stupid behavior.

IF the act of driving up to him was wrong (I'm not convinced), then he was still shot for the stupid action of drawing a firearm on police. That action may have been triggered by their driving up, but it does not make his actions any less stupid, or any less the reason that he was shot.

When you stop being a cop-apologist who enables the tyrannical behavior of a police society left (collectively) unchecked, then I'll stop calling you such. I find your total disregard for normal human behavior to be atrocious, dangerous and ultimately destructive to society. Also, imagine I ate some alphabet soup and a bunch of jello shots and puked up some colorful verbiage. Please and thank you.

I'll admit, I misread your previous post and after re-reading, you did not throw any insults into the fray, and I apologize.

As for being a cop-apologist, I don't understand how I am. I have said before that if they acted inappropriately, they should be charged and found guilty of such actions. Shooting someone drawing a weapon on you is not inappropriate. Not following departmental policy is inappropriate, but in this singular instance of Tamir Rice:

1. I'm not sure the drive-up was inappropriate, given the presence of bystanders. Could be wrong! I don't know. I don't have access to departmental policy.
2. As such, I'm not sure what actions the officers can be charged with. Shooting someone drawing a weapon on you is not wrong in and of itself, but if supplemented with a bad decision to drive up to him...I don't know. I'm not a lawyer, and I'm certainly unfamiliar with such cases.
3. Information from dispatch was likely lacking, and the system should probably get a look/overhaul. The words "toy gun" supposedly never made it to the officer's ears, so they had to act as though the weapon and threat were real.

Somehow, being the one person to point out that calling someone who hasn't had their day in court a murderer makes me a cop-apologist. The entire reason I even posted is because the title of this thread implies that the recent events were murders, and not justifiable homicides. After the investigation and court cases, it may turn out they were murders! If such is the case, then and only then should the discussion go from "Are the police guilty of excessive force?" to "Was the punishment adequate for the crime?"

Yes, I will assume the police acted appropriately until evidence shows otherwise. If you want the cases to always go to court and not grand jury, then fine. But that doesn't excuse the rioting and blind "HANG THE COPS" bullshit I keep seeing crop up everytime a black man gets shot (and it's ONLY when the black men get shot, never anyone else).

[Gromgor]

For context - I was not a cop. I was a correctional officer, however there is a very, very significant amount of crossover training as well as FYI style information put forth for the purposes of understanding the rights, responsibilities, practices and protocols of other subfields of Law Enforcement. While a specific department might differ, or a specific law/ordinance might dictate otherwise, there is a general cohesion among training among most law enforcement. The Basic Training I went through had me at a school, side by side, with city cops, county deputies and state police. In my state Highway Patrol are trained at their own, private schools, but their training is, from discussions, almost exactly the same in terms of use of force escalation and how to approach certain situations.

With that said - the cops should not have rushed in without assessing threats to others and themselves. One of those to be considered in that assessment is the individual with the weapon - in this case a 12 yr. old with a toy gun. They also should have waited for back up. No shots fired = likely a guy who is not trying to kill somebody but rather is upset about something. At least that's the most realistic assumption given the information the cops would have had.

There's likely cops who frequent this forum who might correct something I've said, but I'm fairly confident that what I've stated is correct overall (with minor differences due to jurisdiction).

So no - in the Tamir Rice case, the cops were very much in the wrong because the officers actions placed them in a position where they would have to make such a snap decision.

Then, during the Grand Jury Trial to decide if there was enough evidence to go forward with prosecution, a time when Defenses are not presented - it is literally a "Do we have sufficient evidence for this to be tried?" the Prosecutor presented a defense for the officer's actions, ensuring that the GJ would find insufficient evidence to indict. This was one of the absolute best examples of Cops Getting Away With Murder of any case I've ever heard about.

A 12 yr. old boy was playing in the park and was gunned down by an overzealous pair of cops and the A.D.A got them off scott-free after they let him bleed out in front of his sister's eyes.

As for the 2 seconds being a long time - that 2 seconds was the time the cop spent leaping out of the seat of his cruiser, drawing his weapon, assuming a firing position, and beginning to fire.

How long does it take you to get out of your car and draw a gun?

THAT is the problem with this case.

[Gromgor]

Somehow, being the one person to point out that calling someone who hasn't had their day in court a murderer makes me a cop-apologist. The entire reason I even posted is because the title of this thread implies that the recent events were murders, and not justifiable homicides. After the investigation and court cases, it may turn out they were murders! If such is the case, then and only then should the discussion go from "Are the police guilty of excessive force?" to "Was the punishment adequate for the crime?"

The primary issue with this is the amount of latitude afforded cops that would never, ever, in a million years, be afforded to a civilian. It is too well documented, too often seen, that an incident of incredibly questionable actions is deemed "justifiable" for multiple reasons. One being the mentality that cops must protect their brothers and sisters with shields. So reports get worded with "made aggressive actions" or "reached for an object at his waistband" or, and this one would be amusing if not terrible, "suspect assaulted officer Soandso" when the suspect, while cuffed and being yanked towards the car, stepped on the officers foot by accident. Yes. I have seen this. Yet another reason I left the job.

Other reasons are for liability purposes. If a cop is officially a bad cop, then the city/state owes a LOT of money to somebody.

Recruitment and the good-ole-boy syndrome are others.

I'm glad that you mention that you're at sea and you can't see the videos due to bandwidth issues, because that explains a lot about why the title of this thread seems misleading.

One of those videos shows a man with both hands restrained, pinned to the ground, one hand under each of two cops. The man was fighting, yes, but restrained. He was then shot multiple times. Resisting is not an act that permits lethal force. You're trained to gain compliance through non-lethal methods. Application of pain usually works, and is the next reasonable step. Apply what is referred to as the "bent wrist". It works. My god does it work. You inflict no damage to the tissue, but people stop being assholes and start becoming apologetic really quick. That didn't happen. It was caught on video. Very clearly. Not because of the officer's however. Their body-cams had conveniently all "fallen off" during the scuffle. No, instead the it was all caught by a bystander. Granted the guy holding the camera got scared and turned the camera away for a moment when shots started firing, but up to that moment, it was framed pretty well. Also, a couple of days later, after the bystander uploaded his video, he was "inconvenienced" by officers when he just happened to match the description of "somebody who had committed an assault and battery in the area". He was arrested and taken in. Ultimately he was released when he paid something like $1300 for the only thing the cops really had on him - some traffic violations. Incidentally, assault and battery is a crime that, if charged with - not even guilty, just charged, he would have been fired from his job for. Luckily his boss isn't stupid.

Now, I've been called a conspiracy theorist before, but that sounds an awful lot like police retaliation/intimidation/coercion.

The other begins brief moments after the shooting. A woman, still well composed after her boyfriend was shot multiple times, tells the cop quite plainly, and I'm paraphrasing, but it's pretty damn close, "Sir, you told him to give you his I.D. He told you he had a concealed carry. He was following your orders." meanwhile the cop can be heard offscreen screaming and generally being extremely aggressive and clearly emotional. The woman is worried about her boyfriend when he just slumps over, as he's bleeding out in the car. Meanwhile the officer is not rendering aid. He is still screaming. It's a pretty tragic video. While we don't see the actions leading up to the shooting of the man, the sheer amount of composure by the woman would suggest that both she, and her boyfriend, were calm and compliant. Absolutely NOT the type of behavior one would associate with a guy who was reaching for his gun to fire on the officer.

[Gromgor]

Yes, I will assume the police acted appropriately until evidence shows otherwise. If you want the cases to always go to court and not grand jury, then fine. But that doesn't excuse the rioting and blind "HANG THE COPS" bullshit I keep seeing crop up everytime a black man gets shot (and it's ONLY when the black men get shot, never anyone else).

It's because there's a disproportionate number of young black males that get shot by police. Whites outnumber blacks 7:1, yet the ratio of whites to blacks that are shot is closer to 2:1 - so the numbers are off by give-or-take 3.5 times what they should be. If we view people as nameless, faceless numbers, each black male shot by police has a much greater impact upon the black community than a white male shot has on the white community.

If we view people as people, the disparity does not disappear and in fact becomes even more tragic.

There is a systemic issue present. Black males are being killed far more often largely because there are more black males stuck in a system where criminal activity is a way of life. Not by choice, but because of a lack of education (not just school, but also life skills that helps elevate one out of such situations), reliance on the system for basic necessities, prominence of drugs in the community, etc.

You pair that systemic set-up for failure with the fact that, possibly due to the 7:1 ratio, more cops are white than black. I can only imagine the impact of a kid seeing his father being hauled away in cuffs does to one's thoughts on police as well. This can only negatively effect recruitment numbers for black cops. What you end up with is a lot of white cops shooting black males. Add on that PD's like to recruit individuals with more aggressive, alpha type personalities, who don't exhibit empathy towards suspects, and other factors and what you really end up with is a hyper-aggressive police force of white males and some minorities who have ego issues and are given the weapons and authority to enforce their wills upon others.

Except now white people get to see it as well - because FB and Snapchat and whatever other social media sites all play videos.

[Aristotle]

1) Take the guns away from the police and they'll police differently and have far less accidental or inappropriate killings. This works just fine elsewhere, and I think we could do it even better.

2) If a situation is too dangerous to go in unarmed, remove gun from locker and/or call for appropriate armed backup. So many things are rushed that don't have to be. Traffic stops where you have the make, model, and license plate of the car virtually guarantee you could easily get the person later. Grab video/photo evidence and wait if needed.

3) Stop using police as tax collectors and marvel at how much more helpful the public at large will become.

4) Get rid of most drug laws so police aren't tasked with the impossible job of trying to solve drug addiction.

I hate saying things that make it sound like the solution is simple, because I'm not saying it is. But we can make giant strides forward with minimal effort, just plenty of will.

This is for everyone's benefit. I feel for many of the police officers in these situations whose error in judgement/panic/overreaction resulted in them killing someone. In many cases, they ruined their own life in the process of taking someone elses.

[Red Syns]

Your training as a correctional officer is more likely to parallel police training than mine is, so I'll defer to your experience WRT policies. As to the handling of the post-investigation, what you've said would make me wonder why there wasn't a bigger outburst regarding Tamir Rice than many of these other recent cases. You're absolutely correct, a Grand Jury should be rigged in favor of "Send this to trial," and a Prosecutor should not be playing the role of Defense attorney.

I still will not say that the police officers murdered Tamir Rice until a trial is set and completed (which I understand will not happen now), but it certainly seems like there are a lot of things that need to be reviewed in the followup of the case, and if possible a new Grand Jury with a more honest Prosecution. Again, I know it won't happen, and I'm still not certain about the liability of the officers even if it were to go to trial because I'm not clear on how legally "interlinked" their wrongful approach is to their shooting of a seemingly aggressive individual. Personally, I feel there is at least some degree of responsibility for a reaction to a reaction of a wrongful action, but I would need to see precedence in either direction (and the logic therein) before outright agreeing to it.


Thank you for the synopsis of the videos, your descriptions certainly sound like the first case should result in a trial that should result in a guilty sentence, absent contradictory evidence. The second case is not quite as clear, given the shorter time frame of the video, but it also sounds highly suspect. As before, I won't use the term murder or murderer until it has been deemed such, but please understand that's just a matter of connotation of the word and not me saying they're innocent.


I understand that the ratios of population to homicides (justified or not) is imbalanced, but it's not as simple as saying population ratios are skewed. In what could be/is a "positive feedback" loop, most of your crimes/reports of crimes that would result in an officer drawing their weapon tends to be (from what I've read before, forgive my lack of links now) inner city and poorer areas. Those areas tend to be heavily populated by black families. Those areas also get the most police attention because crime fighting is drawn to crime. When you combine those three things, you end up with a higher-than-proportional number of situations where violence may be the end result (again, justified or not). The few articles I've read before that try to balance these factors universally agreed that the skewing is non-existent/minor, I wish I could find them again.

[Red Syns]

1) Take the guns away from the police and they'll police differently and have far less accidental or inappropriate killings. This works just fine elsewhere, and I think we could do it even better.

I'm not sold on that concept in particular. Yes, I know an "Appeal to Tradition" is not a valid argument, but police have been armed since the "Wild West," and many situations that result in OIS today are situations where the cop is ambushed and would not have had time to return to their vehicle/locker. Many other places do this, but they also have drastically different populations and laws, to include firearm control in nations small enough to actually have some degree of success with it.

It might be possible to start having a more "hands free" approach to policing, I would need a more detailed concept covering a variety of situations to say for certain. Many crimes that go more than 24 hours without finding the culprit go cold, from what I've heard/read, although that could just be bad information.

As for not using police as tax collectors, I'm not sure what to do in that situation. Are you saying to prune the vast majority of the minor offenses? Because someone is going to have to do the job of ticketing for minor violations, which means more people and more money being spent to enforce those laws, if you're not going to have the police do it.

[Aristotle]

I'm not sold on that concept in particular. Yes, I know an "Appeal to Tradition" is not a valid argument, but police have been armed since the "Wild West,"

I think when you have a gun right there on your hip, it always feels like the solution. It also inherently ramps up the aggressiveness of any situation because it is right there, staring everyone in the face.

And the argument some people make that the intimidation factor is good, is wrong imho. Intimidation should not be the role of the police. That's the role of the military (or specialized divisions of the police, like SWAT).

Also, we need to step farther away from the Wild West part of our culture as much as possible nowadays. Good analogy though!

As for not using police as tax collectors, I'm not sure what to do in that situation. Are you saying to prune the vast majority of the minor offenses? Because someone is going to have to do the job of ticketing for minor violations, which means more people and more money being spent to enforce those laws, if you're not going to have the police do it.

Less minor offenses. Less aggressive seeking out of offenders (speed traps, tricky speed changes designed to deliberately bust people and make money). More warnings. Absolutely no quotas or "strong encouragement" to give lots of tickets to make money.

They do all that here in Lexington, KY and it has a tremendous effect on how the police are viewed.

Do they give tickets? Sure. But you have to be really flaunting the law and you're far more likely to get a warning if you aren't a dick about it.

[Red Syns]

Hm. I cannot personally empathize or sympathize with that feeling, as I am a CCW permit holder and exercise that right at every opportunity (sadly, my job and place of work [military base] heavily restrict that right), but I feel that I am less confrontational due to the fact that I can no longer allow myself to become entangled in a fight. I am also a single point in the spectrum of personalities, so I cannot attest to the way others feel, only to how myself and my family members feel while carrying.

I have never understood the "intimidation" argument. There's really only two responses: indifference or terror, and neither is a positive result. The same discussion comes up with open carry, which I am also not an advocate of. I much prefer concealed carry, although I would not ask to ban open.

I am a firm believer in "An armed society is a polite society." While I can understand not wanting to become identical to the Wild West, I would never ask someone to disarm themselves, to include police on the job.



I definitely think there needs to be a country-wide review of traffic laws and enforcement. There is no need to have speed traps and deceptive speed changes, I have been victim to both. In Florida, police tended to stay in sensible areas (schools, dangerous bends, etc.) and I have received warnings for as much as 90 in a 55 (was en route to a dying grandparent, officer told me to slow down and not make it two family members). On the other hand, I've gotten three tickets in Virginia for as little as 61 in a 55 (on a four lane highway!) with no discussion or even the vaguest hope of a warning, and it has definitely soured my opinion of the traffic law enforcement.