Pulled Over
It was late in the summer of 1992. I had moved from Belfast in June and was settling into my life in Minnesota when I saw the flashing lights of a police cruiser pull up behind me. Unsure of what I had done, I pulled over to the side of the road.
Being new to the country I did what I would have done in Belfast after being pulled over. I turned off the engine, grabbed my license, opened the door, stepped out of the car and began walking over to the police officer who had stopped me. It was the clearest and most obvious way to declare to him that I wasn’t any kind of a threat. I wasn’t going to drive off and start a car chase, nor was I going to get out of the car and do a runner on him. Through my actions I was demonstrating that I was fully ready to cooperate with him. He didn’t see it the way I did.
I quickly realised that something wasn’t quite right with the way the officer was reacting towards me. He started shouting at me to stop and not move. His physical demeanor changed as he adopted a much more aggressive posture. I stopped and he asked me if I knew why I was pulled over? When I answered that I didn’t he heard my accent and responded, “You’re not from here, are you?” The situation was quickly deescalated. He explained to me what I should do if I ever got pulled over again in the United States.
I often wonder if things would have been different if I was a person of colour rather that a fair headed, blue eyed, English speaking, white man? Obviously that question can never be answered because it’s a hypothetical.
I’ve been pulled over on three other occasions in my almost thirty years of life in America. One time I had just pulled away from a traffic light when the flashing lights came on. When the officer approached the car he asked me if I knew why I was pulled over. I didn’t have a clue. He said my license tabs on the car had expired and that he could order the car impounded. I had no idea they were expired and told him so. He told me to get to the DMV and pay them. End of story.
On another occasion, when Jenny and I were dating, I was dropping her off at her apartment after dinner. It was dark out and there was very little traffic on the road. So, as we often did, we turned into her apartment parking lot even though there was a “no left turn” sign. The lights appeared in the rear view mirror. I drove down the driveway and pulled into a parking space. The officer wanted to know why I didn’t stop right away. I told him I didn’t want to block the driveway. He seemed to be OK with that. He asked whether I had seen the no turn sign? I acknowledged that we knew it was there but since it was late and there was no traffic we had turned. He accepted that and went on his way.
The last time I was pulled over was on the day of our oldest daughter’s college graduation. We were driving home from the ceremony when the lights came on. After pulling over the officer approached the car and asked for my license and insurance. As I was reaching for it I asked him why he had pulled us over. He said our daughter hadn’t been wearing her seat belt, but acknowledged that she was wearing it now. I was shocked, I looked back at our 19 year old and she said she’d had it on the whole time. After a brief conversation and her explanation, the officer ended up not even looking at my license and we were on our way again.
That’s my experience as a middle class, white, male being stopped by the police in America.
