Something was off

cozmik · July 20, 2007, 12:05:58 AM

So tonight I was driving home with some friends after seeing a movie, and as we stop as a red light, a previous generation Dodge Stratus with PA tags (we're in DE) blows through the red light in the turn lane, and almost t-bones an Infiniti G35. So seeing as this is pretty odd, and def not normal, once the light turns green, we catch up to it, and I hit my high beams so that we can read the plate and call 911. The driver doesn't like this and pulls to the side to let us pass, then after we do this, he turns on a set of LEDs in his visor (red and blue) and pulls up next to us at the next light, screaming and cursing, making threats, etc. He's wearing a wife beater and a bullet proof vest that simply says "state police" and nothing else. No ID of any sort. After screaming at us for turning on our high beams, he drives off. No tickets, no warning, just screaming.

We still call 911, cause he had still blown through a light (and not even with his special LED visor lights on), and had out of state tags, no identification, nothing, and the cops that meet up with us basically say thanks for telling us, have a good night, and nothing else, not, it's ok, he was a real cop, not, hmm, that's not right, nothing.

Am I the only one who finds this all odd? I mean, first off, there's no way an DE "state police" would be driving a car with PA tags. Secondly, he did nothing too us, and we had gotten to a pretty good speed to catch up with him, and he did nothing. The other officers doing nothing I'm not real surprised about (but at least we tried), but this one in the Stratus, there was definitely something up with. Anyone ever hear of anything similar before? Am I crazy in thinking something was wrong?

Soup DeVille · July 20, 2007, 12:09:40 AM

That is odd.

I would think that a report of a police impostor would tick most cops right off, and I believe that's a felony almost everywhere.

CJ · July 20, 2007, 12:49:57 AM

That is quite odd. I would go ahead and call the po-po again and report it again.

the_koof · July 20, 2007, 01:29:22 AM

That is one of the strangest things I've ever read. Impersonating a police officer which that clearly is and nothing is done about it?

Raza · July 20, 2007, 10:09:30 AM

At first I read "mullet proof vest", conditioned by the wife beater, I assume.

That is strange...

bing_oh · July 20, 2007, 12:05:26 PM

How do you know they didn't do anything?

First, you have to assume he wasn't legitimately an officer (and, if the scenario was as you said, I'd kinda doubt that it was). If he was legit and involved in something, then the officers who you talked to might either have not known about it or it was one of those secret-squirrel things that they weren't going to tell the public.

Assuming it was suspicious, it was an out-of-state vehicle (which means no local address to start the investigation at), so the first course of action would have been to re-locate the car. That doesn't happen instantly. For all you know, a BOLO might have been put out and the car pulled over anywhere from 10 minutes to several hours later.

rohan · July 22, 2007, 06:48:48 AM

Quote from: bing_oh on July 20, 2007, 12:05:26 PM
How do you know they didn't do anything?

First, you have to assume he wasn't legitimately an officer (and, if the scenario was as you said, I'd kinda doubt that it was). If he was legit and involved in something, then the officers who you talked to might either have not known about it or it was one of those secret-squirrel things that they weren't going to tell the public.

Assuming it was suspicious, it was an out-of-state vehicle (which means no local address to start the investigation at), so the first course of action would have been to re-locate the car. That doesn't happen instantly. For all you know, a BOLO might have been put out and the car pulled over anywhere from 10 minutes to several hours later.

Or they could have jsut been using an out of state plate on an ops car- our drug interdiction teams do stuff like that here all the time. The screaming and yelling and cursing - where was this a big city or a smaller area?- doesn't sound right but his clothes and what he looked like don't mean a thing- think undercover? Something about the driving sounds fishy.

cozmik · July 22, 2007, 12:00:37 PM

Quote from: rohan on July 22, 2007, 06:48:48 AM
Or they could have jsut been using an out of state plate on an ops car- our drug interdiction teams do stuff like that here all the time. The screaming and yelling and cursing - where was this a big city or a smaller area?- doesn't sound right but his clothes and what he looked like don't mean a thing- think undercover? Something about the driving sounds fishy.

It's not big city, but I wouldn't call it a small area either. Busy suburb is the best way I can think of to describe it.

TurboDan · July 22, 2007, 09:41:38 PM

Around here, they've had a few problems with EMTs thinking they're cops. They get lights in their car, and have "threatened" drivers who beeped at them or gave them the finger. Apparently, they sometimes have "police-like" jackets and IDs since some town police departments run the EMT services in some towns.

I once talked to an officer who told me it was beginning to get out of hand, and these guys were really abusing the lights/IDs.