You got that right, DD!!! Can't remember how many times I got nailed for going 2 MPH over the limit... usually coming down a steep hill. For those small towns it's all about money... not to mention the $140.00 court cost fee. What I learned to do is tell the town magistrate, after I have been found guilty, that I want to appeal it to circuit court. That usually will cost them more in county attorney fees than they want to pay and I usually get off on a summary non-judgment. They used to make you still pay the court cost fee but I appealed it one time and got that thrown out.
Really wanna piss the small town cop off? Ask for Andy. They will usually look at you like you are stupid... until you call them Barney.
I got a speeding ticket in a small town in southern Kanawha County, WV, called Handley. Cop said he clocked me doing 21 in a 10. No speed limit sign nowhere. Cop didn't even write the ticket correctly. Ticket said I was on WV route 61, which is the Main Street in Handley. Rt. 61 is a 35 mph zone, I was actually on 3rd St, which is more like a one-lane paved (sort of) trail that ran along the side of the mountain parallel to Rt. 61. I had stopped there to make a delivery. Cop even testified that he had "pulled me over" on 61 when asked by the magistrate, I corrected him by tell him I was already stopped when he showed up.
Turns out the magistrate was not only on the town council, but also a part-time town cop. Nothing I said even registered with him.
Guilty, $100 fine.
He told me that if his wife had gotten a ticket, he would prosecute her. I told him I doubt that very seriously, and I'll tell you why. 1. That money would come out of YOUR pocket, and 2. doing something that stupid to your wife would give a whole new meaning to "sleeping with the enemy". He said that there are children in his town, and I was putting them in danger. I reminded him that it was 7:30am and the temperature was a balmy 18 degrees that day. Anybody that had children out in that mess was putting them in more danger than I ever could. He commented that I wasn't acting like I thought I'd done anything wrong. I asked if it would reduce my fine, he said no, so I told him that in the 20 years (at the time) that I had a license, that I had covered over 1 million miles on 2 or more wheels, including off-road racing, and this was my second moving violation. Any man that had accomplished that had to be either extremely lucky or an extremely good operator. So, NO, I didn't think I'd done anything wrong. I'm not that lucky!
He didn't like that much, but the trial was already over. I told the cop not to spend all that money in one place as I left the courtroom.
Another time, I was cruising south on the (in)famous West Virginia Turnpike, coming out of Charleston. I had just exited the middle tollbooth (there are 3 of them, +1 more for exit 48 at Beckley), so I was still in Fayette County. I came up on a Raleigh County deputy cruiser in the left lane about 2 miles out of the tollbooth, doing about 57 in a 60, with traffic backing up behind it. I passed her (yep, it was a "she") on the right, doing about 61. She pulls me over, starts ranting about how fast I was going. I told her I was doing 61, what did her radar say. She didn't have radar, but she said I should have known I was speeding, I was "passing everything on the road." I told her the only things I had passed since the tollbooth was her and 3 tractor-trailers, all on an uphill grade. She claimed I was doing over 85, I told her if she could get my POS truck over 80 I'd give it to her. It wouldn't do 85 if it was pushed off the New River Gorge Bridge! She said she was going to write me a ticket anyway, and I told her go ahead, I like to hear her explain to the judge why a Raleigh County deputy was writing tickets in Fayette County. She tried to claim that we were in Raleigh County, until I turn on my headlights and showed her the county line signs, 50 yards further down the road.
She threw my license and registration at me and stormed back to her car. I gave her a 5 minute head start before I left, then I got off at the next exit, and took backroads thru Beckley all the way to Winterplace!