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| This cop in Fairfax County, Virginia spent a lot of time ticketing cars in auto repair shop parking lots for expired inspection stickers. The cars were in these parking lots because their owners were trying to get these cars inspected. |
I highlighted one of these last year, when it turned out Fairfax County, Virginia were ticketing cars that had expired inspection stickers.
Ticketing people for expired inspection stickers is fine by me, except when the cars they were ticketing were in repair shop parking lots, awaiting required state inspections.
In a rare dose of common sense, the Virginia legislature has stepped in and banned this practice.
Says the Washington Post:
"State Det. James M. LeMunyon (R-Fairfax) investigated the situation after reading about it in the Washington Post in October. He introduced a bill in December to prohibit ticketing cars awaiting state inspection, and it passed both chambers of the Virginia General Assembly unanimously.
On Wednesday, Gov. Terry McAuliffe signed the bill into law, his spokesman said."
I'm certainly glad Virginia lawmakers did this, but the whole thing still smells like a scam between the industrial park condo association where the repair shops were being targeted, and local police.
Nobody has formally accused these parties of doing this, and I have no proof that I'm right. Still, the whole thing stinks to high heaven.
The industrial park management and board gave Fairfax police a letter about seven years ago giving police permission to enforce traffic and vehicle ordinances on their private property.
So, police had a field day ticketing the cars there awaiting inspection. I'm pretty sure that the police department reaped oodles of money on fines, and maybe, just maybe kicked back some of these profits to the property managers and condo board.
No proof of that, but what else could it be?
Tellingly, the condo board is not talking to the press.
Fairfax police said they were merely responding to calls for service in the area
Riiiiggght.
A particular parking enforcement officer, Jacqueln Hogue, would always show up and start ticketing like crazy. (Bet there were bonuses in her paycheck!)
Shop owners would hastily move cars inside repair shops whe they saw Hogue.
Hogue one day had the balls to go inside a shop owned by Bruce Redwine to write a ticket on a car in the buidling.
Redwine snatched the ticket out of Hogues hand and admitted using colorful words to describe her. Who wouldn't?
She brought Redwine up on trumped up felony assault charges, but after several court appeals and such a jury took a grand total of 20 minutes to acquit him.
But the legal proceedings cost Redwine thousands of dollars in attorneys fees. That was the message from Hogue, and Fairfax County Police and the condo association. Mess with us, interfere with our scam and it'll cost you big time.
Here's why I care so much about this local case: Corruption like that exhibited by Fairfax, Virginia county police, with the collaboration of the rich guys in the condo association, is why faith in government has collapsed.
Corruption is rampant, people are pissed, and they turn to whoever can channel their anger. The people who are best able to channel this anger are strongmen, fascists, and in their own right corrupt.
In other words, people like Donald Trump.
In their big get rich quick scheme, Fairfax police and the people around them contributed to this dangerous shift in American government toward more crookedness.
Which makes me doubly grateful to the Virginia legislature and governor for putting a stop to this mess.
Here's a quote from the Washington Post:
"One would think you don't need to legislate common sense, said Dickson Young, Redwine's attorney who won his acquital. "If the Fairfax police had exercised common sense, legislation wouldn't have been necessary."
Yeah, but common sense flies out the window when there's money to be made through a municipally run scam, right Fairfax County, Virginia police?
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