Just lost my Valentine 1

[brettzo]

If your going to run a high end detectable RD in a place their illegal you should carry a throw away 20 cobra or cheaper.

This is genius, never thought of this before. Go to Walmart and buy a $30 cobra and do a quick swap when pulled over. That being said if RD detectors are being used you could be throwing away many cheap cobras.

[RebelGent]

The OPP are smart enough, though, to realize if you hand them a "throw away" detector, and it isn't warm from actually being turned on and used, they will not fall for such a deception and look for the one that was in use...so be careful.

Safe driving.....

Rebel

[JohnGalt]

FYI, as with most juridictions, it's not illegal to own one, just use it in Ontario.

Hence while you get a ticket and they take away the RD, you can request it back after pleading guilty and they have to give it to you. (I had my V1 taken away 3 times and given back before I finally got an STI... now I live in the states and use the V1 again in one car and the STI in the other one, and take the STI when I come back)

So all is not lost, it's just a PITA.

[fast guy]

I'm from Ontario also so got the STi Driver a few weeks ago. Installed with the visor clip so it's discreet and would be easy to disconnect in a hurry if need be (hopefully cop approaches from behind the car as my rear window has a sign on it and can't see thru from back). This unit works like a charm. Oncoming driver flashed me last week to warn of speed trap ahead. Wanted to test the unit so I deliberately pulled back from car ahead and slowed down to psl so LEO would put the gun on me. Sure enough she did and the unit alarmed to Laser (didnt specify what type of Laser)? Anyhow, great feeling to see the STi in action.

[fast guy]

FYI, as with most juridictions, it's not illegal to own one, just use it in Ontario.

Hence while you get a ticket and they take away the RD, you can request it back after pleading guilty and they have to give it to you. (I had my V1 taken away 3 times and given back before I finally got an STI... now I live in the states and use the V1 again in one car and the STI in the other one, and take the STI when I come back)

So all is not lost, it's just a PITA.

Are you saying if they take away my detector in Ontario I can get it back after pleading guilty to using it?

[JohnGalt]

Yup, I'm saying you can get it back. I had to go into the court offices and ask for it back, they made me fill out some paperwork, and in about a week and a half, volia, radar detector back in my hands (twice they mailed it to me care of the fee I paid, the 3rd time, they made me come in and get it)

Warning, it really pisses them off when they have to give it back to you, so you might have a target on your back.

[wolfpacal]

Yup, I'm saying you can get it back. I had to go into the court offices and ask for it back, they made me fill out some paperwork, and in about a week and a half, volia, radar detector back in my hands (twice they mailed it to me care of the fee I paid, the 3rd time, they made me come in and get it)

Warning, it really pisses them off when they have to give it back to you, so you might have a target on your back.

Are you from the States? My Sis-in Law is a Toronto Cop. Of all the RD's she's taken off people, she has never had one returned. I asked her this last night. She's never heard of anyone getting their RD back after conviction or acquittal. If you're American though, you may have an option to have it returned. I wish we still lived in Texas, Ontario is brutal. Cops here have waaaayyyyy tooooooo much power! My Sis-in Law says her latest favorite trick is to shoot her LA while standing at a bus stop with several other people around her. She takes off her Police cap and says she's blends right in. She told me her old "quota" even though it's not described as that, was 65 tickets per 10 hour shift. She has since been told, when working traffic, she now has to hand in 80 tix per 10 hour shift. Nice eh?

Wolfpacal

[nitricacid]

At least you got back your V1. Good stuff.

[Fastgt2003]

Are you from Canada or the US?

I personally wouldn't let anyone take my detector away.

I'd like to see you try

[JohnGalt]

At the time I was living in Canada and a Canadian.

They don't tell you about it, and they make it very hard to get it back unless you do everything right, but it can be done. This is likely why your cop friend doesn't know about it. Most of the ticket specialist guys that fight tickets for you can tell you how to get it back. (If they don't knee jerk and say "it can't be done")

This is also why they can't take 'em away from you when you cross the boarder into Canada. They're legal to own, just not legal to use against cops (you can even use 'em, just not to save yourself a ticket, which is determined to mean that you can't use 'em in your car while moving. I actually beat a ticket in Barrie when he took my detector because it was sitting on the dash when I went into a Tim's because the car wasn't moving and there was no way that it could be used to protect me from law enforcement...). And since they're a legal device to own, after even a conviction involving the device, the police have to return your property to you so long as it isn't illegal equipment to own in the first place.

The thing that I learned about the police, especially in Ontario, is that not one that I have ever met, or ever had to deal with knows any part of the criminal code. And even fewer have actually read the highway traffic act. They're told by their boss what to arrest people for and the rules of the day, and that's good enough for them. They know as little about the laws that they're enforcing as the people that they're enforcing them on.

I've routinely quoted criminal code to officers when people are trespassing on my property or some such, and they look at you with a blank stare, and when pressed say "I wouldn't know", and when you show it to them the code in writing, they get really uneasy, or claim that that isn't what the law actually says, because it isn't at all what they've been told to enforce. I've had to use a Justice of the peace to actually charge someone that trespassed and attacked me when I stopped them, and made them turn around, because the police didn't know the law. I got the person charged, and I won in court and the officer was ordered to have a formal letter of reprimand in his file as a result of his inaction, and all of my court costs were paid + my time at my standard billing rate by the courts. When I told the judge that the officer didn't even know the criminal code that he was supposed to be enforcing the judge flipped his lid. When I told him that this wasn't the first time, he ended up writing an op-ed in the local newspaper about the horrible state of the education of the people that are supposed to be enforcing the law.

Short version: Just because a cop says something to you about the law, doesn't mean it's true. In fact most of the time, it's a load of horse sh*t that they're talking out their a$$ because they're no better educated than you are, and often worse. (even if you haven't even read the criminal code, or highway traffic act either)

If you need proof of this little tidbit, the criminal code provides for dangerous driving. It clearly makes racing illegal. It also provides for seizure of the vehicle and immediate arrest and a trip to the jail in the back of the police cruiser, specially because it's a criminal offence. Not a highway traffic act violation, a criminal office under Canadian law. The police could have, and should have used this law to arrest people for racing or other things, but instead it passed the 50 over highway traffic act law to do the EXACT SAME THING and give them THE EXACT SAME POWERS, even though there is lots of precedent for the dangerous driving law being enforced in exactly the way that I describe.

The guys that write the law (Fantino admits that he wrote it and jammed it down the legislater's throat!) don't even know the bloody criminal code. I asked a lawyer friend about it, and he say "ya, it's a waste of time, but they don't have a clue what they're doing, and they needed to appear to be doing something after the transport truck driver died saving the woman when he was cut off by street racers. Besides, this is easier to enforce than dangerous driving". Translation, the cops didn't have a clue about the law, weren't using the law at all (not to mention incorrectly, as most officers don't even know that they case sieze the vehicle and take the person in immediately under the criminal code!) and they decided to pass another law (and no one in the Ontario legislature could figure this out either!!!) because of their ignorance!

In the mean time, we have people having their cars taken away and huge fines for driving 92 MPH (150 KM/h) in the left lane on highways like the 400 extension that have absolutely no one on them, and isn't dangerous at all. Or better yet, doing 110 right at the beginning of the off ramp from the 400 to the 400 extension where it abruptly slows down to go around the bend getting nailed by a cop hidden in the bush behind them and having their cars towed as a result (true story of a 65 year old woman!)

Sorry for the rant, but it just pisses me off!

Meanwhile, if you drive under the Bayfield St. bridge in Barrie, look to the right immediately after. You'll see a well worn path. Guess what it is? It's the cops to lazy to sit in traffic at the stop light on the proper off ramp like everyone else, so they exit traffic from a freeway across grass, then cross the on ramp without any notice and hop onto the road again and hang a left into the OPP office without their lights on and in no emergency. It's used by so many police officers that it's worn not only down, but hard as a rock from hundreds if not thousands of uses by the cops and only the cops. I have lots of photos on a instant camera here of them doing it! These guys think they're above the law! And when I went in with the plate number and tried to have the officer arrested, they all refused, even though it's clearly a dangerous driving charge that any citizen other than a cop would be charged for (if they knew the law that is... but I'm sure they'd arrest you and give you a ticket, and wait for head office to tell them what to put on the piece of paper!)

You say that they have way to much power in Ontario? I say that they're out of control, and ignorant to boot. That's a good combination for Tyranny and a police state.