Legitimate police tactic or bad judgement?

[TR03Mach1]

Seems there is a new tactic being used by some Delaware State Troopers that borders on the insane! I read a letter to the editor in the local paper today from someone who had it used on a family member, and it reminded me that I had the same experience back in the winter.

Basically, it involves the trooper tailgating a car late at night without any lights on his cruiser at all! When it happened to me, I was coming out of a shopping center parking lot onto a main road that was very sparsely lit, just an ocassional street light about every quarter mile or so. I had noticed the trooper before pulling onto the road, but then he just disappeared and it wasn't until I passed under one of those few street lights, that I was able to make out the distinctive sillouette of his cruiser with it's light bar, and he was only inches off my rear bumper!

He followed me like this for about a mile, then suddenly turned his headlights on, ripped around me and proceeded to make an illegal U-turn and head the other way. I was like WTF was that about? Suppose a deer, or some other animal, or a person for that matter, had forced me to brake suddenly, and this guy plows into the rear of me? Number one, if it wasn't for that quick glance I got of him as we passed under the street light, I would have never known he was there, and the collision would have scared the shit out of me, secondly, I would have to assume that he would be written up for some kind of traffic violation, would he not? Third, what really is the point of doing something like this in the first place?

I've been driving on Delaware roads since 1970, and I've had my share of dealings with police officers, in cars, on motorcycles, even horseback, and bicycles, but I've never seen anything so blantly unsafe being used on the highways until now, and evidently it's not just confined to a few isolated incidents.

Any thoughts or comments from other LEO's regarding this practice.

 

[FordSVTFan]

I have neither seen that occur nor have I ever heard of such an operation that utilizes that tactic.

 

[ROADWARRIORSVT]

Nope, never heard of that,......

 

[jshen]

Not only have I not seen or heard of it...I cannot not think of a law enforcement agency approving such a manuver. I can tell you no accredited LE agencies would do so..A policy such as that would make the agency a sitting duck for a 42 USC 1983 action...First...it's illegal and second and more important it's dangerous and third....Around here, if it were ever done, it would probably be a career altering event.

 

[TR03Mach1]

LEOs only

It wasn't an article, it was a letter to the editor describing what happened to this persons family member. There is a little more to this incident than what happened to me, but it starts out exactly the same way. Here's the letter from this morning's paper.

"Trooper belittled driver for no apparent reason

I would like to thank the state trooper who proceeded to tailgate my brother on Route 7 with his lights off at 11 p.m. Monday. My brother pulled over because he was concerned there might be an emergency and the trooper needed to be somewhere. That was not the case. The trooper pulled alongside and decided to question my brother's yielding skills coming out of my apartment complex.

When my brother stated there was no problem and that a yield meant caution when proceeding into traffic, the trooper began to yell at my brother and told him he should write a ticket for his mouth. I did not know a ticket could be written for someone asking a question.

My brother, a military veteran, was belittled inappropriately. If this is the kind of person we have representing the state of Delaware, then there is a real problem. My brother is now reconsidering his decision to relocate to this state due to this incident."

 

[Spade]

I worked in Delaware for four year, 1998-2002, and went to the Delaware State Police Academy and I do NOT remember that kind of train. Delware is a very easy state for traffic citation and to do something like that is CRAZY!! If something like that would happen to me there is a very good chance I would go to the Troop for that area and file a complaint with the desk SGT to make the him aware of what happened.

Spade