What's Wrong With This Video: Holding Up A Super-Citizen

The phrase “super-citizen” has entered the lexicon in the past few years, and it’s typically used to refer to police who simply believe themselves to be well above the law. I’ve had the chance to meet dozens of police officers over the years in situations from downright friendly to frankly adversarial, and I think it’s fair to say that many officers of the law plainly reject the notion that they can do as they please.

The Ohio Highway Patrol officer passing me in this video is not one of them.

Here’s the story: This week I was driving down the road in a mid-sized sedan, doing almost exactly 55 in a 55, when I spotted a highway patrolman approaching in my rearview mirror at a high rate of closing speed. I tapped my brakes to obtain his attention and set my cruise control at 53 to avoid the 56-in-a-55 ticket which Ohio police are known to give. (Don’t laugh. I’ve been pulled over for exactly that, driving my Phaeton down Route 33 near West Virginia.)

Although I carefully avoided looking the officer in the eye via the rearview mirror, wanting to avoid the beating and Taser job so beloved of Ohio police, I could see the aggression in the way he (or she) operated his vehicle. Several times the Crown Vic “nosed up” towards me in an intimidation move. Save your effort, pal; I’ve raced in the Koni Challenge and I’ve been bumper-tapped by the best.

After approximately five minutes of weaving back and forth, the officer pulled out to pass. I initially estimated his speed using the method used by most cops when estimating traffic accident speed: I made a random guess as to the vehicle’s maximum potential then added five for it being downhill. Therefore, I can state with authority that the cop is going one hundred and thirty-five miles per hour.

Another way to estimate it would be to consider that the policeman covers a visual distance of about an eighth mile in twenty or so seconds. At that rate, it would take him about three minutes to cover a mile, so he is traveling at about 20mph more than I am. I’m doing 53 in the video, so he is likely doing 70-75 in a 55 for no other reason than the fact that he wants to. He also deliberately endangered me by making an unnecessary pass. In fewer than ten minutes, I reached my destination, so he put both our lives at risk for a time savings that could not be more than a minute or two over that distance.

We know that the officer’s actions were illegal; his lights and sirens are off. Were they morally justifiable? I would suggest that the officer has just as much right to speed as I do in my Town Car, and I will let you, the reader, determine how much that is.

Some of you will not even bother to read this far before posting about how I am the bad, dangerous driver for using my Droid camera to observe the cop breaking the law. Let’s use NHTSA data to determine who was taking a bigger risk.

The new child-exploiting distraction.gov site states that,

In 2008, almost 20 percent of all crashes in the year involved some type of distraction. (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration – NHTSA).

In the same year, NHTSA released this document which claims

In 2008, speeding was a contributing factor in 31 percent of all fatal crashes, and 11,674 lives were lost in speeding-related crashes.

There you have it, straight from the government. Assuming we were in vehicles of equal merit and have received equal training (which you all know to be false, right? I’ve spent hundreds of laps being trained by some of the biggest names in road racing, while most highway patrol officers get a day or two of skidpad exercises), the cop was risking our lives by over 50% more than I was by “distractedly” filming him. Touche!

Last but not least, I will mail a free gift (meaning some garbage USB drive or sticker from a press event) to the first person who can name the song playing on this Accord’s sound system.