Darren
I don't work for them now. Retired a few years back. Hardly worth the effort trying to ask anybody about that issue, anyway, as I've said, it hasn't caused me any probs when I got out of the car. I have no doubt that some police will try you on and direct you to re-enter your vehicle, but we haven't reached the "police state" yet, so I work on the assumption that there IS a limit to what police can legitimately direct a driver to do. If you park the car correctly and legally, and there is no risk of injury, the only real reason a police officer would insist on you remaining in your car would be for his personal safety. Meh, they have the capsicum spray, the baton and the weapon,so if they have to insist that you re-enter your car, perhaps they are in the wrong job.:smoking:
There was another time I left my car after being pulled over and it was partly because I WAS pissed off with the cop. The first thing I said to him, before he could speak, was "Do you mind telling me exactly why you have pulled me over?" I knew the reason; I was driving my very clean and cared for HR Premier on a Saturday morning. I looked like crap because I had been working on the house and was on my way to the hardware store for materials. He had seen a scruffy looking thirty+ year old in an old Holden and thought it would be an easy mark. I had broken absolutely no laws, but he proceeded to tell me that my towball was obscuring the number plate. It wasn't. It had been sitting in the same spot for twenty years and had never raised a question until this prawn pulled me over. I argued the point with him and told him that I was employed by the Police Department and didn't accept his reason for pulling me over. I suggested that perhaps we should attend the nearest police station where we could "debate" the matter with his supervising Sergeant before I lodged a complaint about harassment. He backed off, saying that he was giving me a warning and didn't normally book people for obscured number plates due to tow-balls. The problem for him was he had his breach book in his hand and I said "Yeah, sure, that's why you brought your breach book with you. You picked the wrong boy this time round, mate."
I got back in my car before I said something I would regret and drove off very carefully. I had a mate with me so a witness was present for the whole incident. That prick was the kind of HWP cop that made life so hard for all the good cops I worked with.
