Some people think they can talk their way out of speeding tickets.
I mention this because there’s quite a catalog of imaginative excuses that drivers have used while sitting in their cars and talking to the police officer who has just pulled them over.
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Well, we’ve got a new one, thanks to a Florida Man who was stopped for speeding in Flagler County. The dialogue that follows was recorded on the deputy’s body camera and later posted to social media.
Driver has multitude of bad excuses
The driver, as you will see, starts out with a variety of garden-variety excuses before reaching for the big one.
***
Officer: Do you know the reason I stopped you?
Driver: Yeah.
Officer: How fast do you think you were going?
Driver: Forty?
Officer: Don’t even. Fifty.
Driver: Fifty?
Officer: Fifty in a thirty.
Driver: I’m so sorry.
Officer: I’ll need to see your license, registration and proof of insurance.
At this point, the driver keeps saying “I’m so sorry” and he fishes for his documents and formulates a plan to blame his speed on his Dodge Challenger’s enhanced-power option known as “sport mode.”
Officer: The worst part of it is you ran that stop sign as well because you didn’t see me sitting there. Didn’t ya?
Driver: I was looking at this thing.
Officer: So you were looking at your dash while doing 50 miles an hour in a 30-mile-an-hour zone?
Driver: I was trying to get it out of … it was in “sport mode” and I was trying get it out of. I just got this thing, OK?
Officer: Sir, I literally saw you run the stop sign, make a left and then hop on the gas. I was sitting right at the intersection.
Driver: I’m so sorry, sir.
Officer: So, your excuse was …
The driver abandons the “sport mode’’ excuse and cites a phantom vehicle.
Driver: I saw a car coming and …
Officer: You didn’t, ’cause I was sitting right there.
Driver: I saw a car coming and I wanted to get out before them.
Officer: You hopped on the gas and then you took off.
Driver: I’m so sorry, sir.
Officer: I’ll need to see your insurance card, please.
Driver: You got the registration?
Officer: There was no reason for that at all.
Driver: I know, I know.
Officer: You were putting people’s lives into (danger).
At this point, it appears that the driver is out of bad excuses, and he has resigned himself to getting a ticket. But no, he’s got a new idea. He’s about to employ the nuclear option.
Driver: I just found out. I’m trying … To tell you the truth, guy, I just found out that Putin said he’s going to launch nuclear, thermal war against the world, and I was trying to get back to my house to find out what was going on.
***
The Flagler Sheriff’s Department has dubbed this the “Putin Made Me Do It” excuse for breaking traffic laws.
Worst speeding excuse? Hard to pick one
In the annals of bad excuses, I think “racing home for the nuclear war Russian President Vladimir Putin is about to start” may have broken some new ground, so to speak.
I’m not saying it’s better than “Oh, I thought the I-95 sign meant the speed limit,” but it’s up there.
It would be impossible to crown an undisputed winner in this category. There’s some stiff competition, especially from other Florida men who seem to excel in this.
A Florida driver who was pulled over for speeding three years ago in Pinellas County gave the deputy a novel explanation for why he was doing 90 mph in a 55-mph zone.
“He needed to get home in a hurry because he was cheating on his wife,” the police report said.
The excuse didn’t work, and the 52-year-old driver’s problems were compounded when the deputy found crack cocaine in his shirt pocket.
A police website that collects stories of best excuses people have used to try to get out of tickets has some doozies.
“A drunk guy told me he was pregnant then urinated all over himself claiming his water broke,” an officer wrote.
Other officers claimed speeders explained they were trying to get to McDonald’s before it stopped serving the breakfast menu. Or that they had a cold, and every time they sneezed, they’d inadvertently step harder on the gas pedal.
”My car has a recall on it for unexplained acceleration and I’m on my way to get it fixed!” one motorist explained, according to an officer.
Some officers admit to being so impressed by the excuses they hear that they let the driver off without a ticket. These excuses include:
“The box says, ‘If you have an erection over 4 hours, see your doctor IMMEDIATELY!'” and “I wasn’t speeding, I was qualifying.”
One officer said he pulled over a guy driving a Corvette doing 100 mph late at night on a highway with no other traffic.
“I told the driver, ‘You were flying. Unless you have a pilot’s license, you are going to jail.’”
“Yes, he handed me a pilot license. Yes, I let him go.”
fcerabino@gannett.com
@FranklyFlorida
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Flagler County: Man’s excuse for speeding? Vladimir Putin
