Anectode Seen on Pandagon

From the “If It Ain’t True, It Should Be” file, as seen on pandagon.net:

Back in 1985, I was flying back from London to Newark when one of the engines had a problem and the plane had to return to Gatwick. We had a choice of hotel or voucher, I chose a voucher because I was staying with friends—who had taken vacation the day I left. So, I didn’t get much sleep and arrived home 24 hours late.

I rolled through a stop line in the Newark airport parking lot, and was pulled over by a port authority cop. He asked for license and registration. I handed over the license looked for the registration. He went to write two tickets, one for failure to stop, and one for failure to present registration. When he came back I had the registration in hand. He refused to take it, saying I had to show it to a judge. I refused to accept the ticket, so he wrote me up for resisting arrest, at which point, I said, “You’re a cock-sucking mother-fucker.” At that point, we went to the Newark municipal court.

The cop told his story, and I told mine. (Keep in mind, this is a judge who is usually adjudicating serious felonies, not traffic offenses.) The judge said, under NJ law, you can present the registration at any time during the stop, and dismissed that ticket. He then said that under New Jersey law, it is not illegal to resist an illegal arrest, and dismissed that. Then he said, “Under the circumstances in question, the defendant’s description of the police officer in question was accurate.” I was given $10 for court costs and all was dismissed.