Be careful if you are a Canadian in the US!

If anyone is owed an apology, it the arresting officer, who is female, by the jail house lawyers on this forum who DON'T know the law or facts. They are all quiet now. Few hours ago they was certain the the little white girl had been railroaded by southern rednecks because she is Canadian.

I am mad because she got off. That is the tragic part of the story, is she escaped justice. If it had been a local Bubba, he would still be sitting in jail for doing 87 mph in a 70.

I think the OP and others are being unfair to Law Enforcement and the State of Georgia. As a Georgia resident who works with Law Enforcement, I can help clear up a few things.

The arresting officer had every right, indeed a duty to arrest the young lady.

1. She was doing over 85. Georgia and many other states east of the Mississippi have super speeder laws. Go over 85 mph, automatic trip to jail. Automatic car towed. So we could could stop here. The arrest was justified. Period. End of story. I can name at least 5 other states that have the same or stricter law.

2. She was here illegally if she does not have a passport or Visa. The arresting officer had no obligation to take electronic forms. She has a duty to have her passport. Period. She already committed one crime. The officer had a duty to hold her for ICE. That is THE law, no matter how you feel about it.

3. The arresting officer applied the law fairly. If it had been an Hispanic male stopped for doing 87 mph with no passport and arrested, nothing would have been said. Since it was a pretty white girl, all the white Knights come out.

4. Her story does not add up. I don't expect everyone to know that Cook Co. is approx 400 miles south of the University of Tenn. But surely everyone is not so geographically challenged to know there is no need to go to Georgia to get from Canada to Tennessee. Her story is suspect and warranted further investigation. The Officer had a right to hold her to check the story out.

5. If she had car titled and registered in Tennessee, she declared she was resident of that state, she should have had a Tennessee License. The arresting officer more than likely would have thought she was not showing her Tennessee License because she had a warrant or suspended license from that State. Again, another reason to hold her.

6. Speed traps. LOL! she was doing 87mph and 17 mph over. There is no Jurisdiction in the USA where you could do 17 mph over, and not get stopped. Georgia is the only state I know where all police cars used in traffic enforcement have to be marked. This to prevent speed traps. No county or City can write a ticket for less than 15 mph over, if they receive more than 50% of their budget from traffic fines. Again, to prevent speed traps.

toedtoes wrote:
You're pulling one sentence out of my post.

My point is that it is likely that an "invalid license" is used to arrest non-citizens in an attempt to identify illegal aliens and have them deported.

This type of policy is focused on Hispanics and is pretty much ignored (or lauded) by the public and media. Seems a nice Canadian white woman got the treatment and it's showing up for what it is.

what is it?

You're pulling one sentence out of my post.

My point is that it is likely that an "invalid license" is used to arrest non-citizens in an attempt to identify illegal aliens and have them deported.

This type of policy is focused on Hispanics and is pretty much ignored (or lauded) by the public and media. Seems a nice Canadian white woman got the treatment and it's showing up for what it is.

SoundGuy wrote:

toedtoes wrote:
I don't believe the police thought this was "something silly". She had a driver with a license from another country and was acting according to what she believed/was told was the right procedure. I suspect it's very likely she was taught that if you stop someone and they don't have a U.S. license, arrest them, they may be here illegally.

Arrest a Canadian citizen because they don't have a US driver's license? Seriously? :S

Yes, seriously!

According to one report aired here this morning the car she was driving was registered in HER name and had TENNESSEE plates on it. That’s a big problem right there. When she was asked to explain that she allegedly said it was because she lived in TN. When questioned further she admitted that she was no longer in university there. More issues.

The devil lives in the details more often than not.......

The “arrest” BTW was to ensure she posted a bond to return for court, her fleeing the jurisdiction back to Canada was more than an possibility, it was a likelihood.

1L243 wrote:
She did do something wrong, she was doing 87 mph! If she was not speeding she would hot have been stopped.

The officer did nothing wrong and was justified to ask for a passport because of the Canadian license. Apparently their are alot of phony licenses out there.

Asking to see a passport is a way to verify the legitimate holder of the license.

According to the officers supervisor she would have been taken to jail just for the speeding violation....

A friend who was entering Canada and could not find his passport. He was detained, his car wad searched. His passport was later found but it took hours. And there was no apology!

I think you are putting your own reasoning into this story.

And if she was speeding we’ll over the speed limit that would’ve come up but it didn’t. The only thing that came up was she was arreseted for having a Candian license. If it was note than that then I don’t believe this story would be as big as it is!

She did do something wrong, she was doing 87 mph! If she was not speeding she would hot have been stopped.

The officer did nothing wrong and was justified to ask for a passport because of the Canadian license. Apparently their are alot of phony licenses out there.

Asking to see a passport is a way to verify the legitimate holder of the license.

According to the officers supervisor she would have been taken to jail just for the speeding violation....

A friend who was entering Canada and could not find his passport. He was detained, his car wad searched. His passport was later found but it took hours. And there was no apology!

toedtoes wrote:
I don't believe the police thought this was "something silly". She had a driver with a license from another country and was acting according to what she believed/was told was the right procedure. I suspect it's very likely she was taught that if you stop someone and they don't have a U.S. license, arrest them, they may be here illegally.

Arrest a Canadian citizen because they don't have a US driver's license? Seriously? :S

toedtoes wrote:

Cummins12V98 wrote:

valhalla360 wrote:

Cummins12V98 wrote:
Let's remember this is ONE side of the story.

Exactly, and we likely will never find out what really happened as the police agency wants to get this PR issue gone, so they apologize in the hope that it goes away because no matter how right or wrong the cop was, it doesn't come across well in the press that loves nothing better than to run stories about evil police agencies.

The cop likely overstepped his bounds, possibly by a wide margin but I can guarantee, she isn't as innocent as the story makes it out to be. It's not logical to simply harass people for no good reason and an arrest over something silly is a lot of hassle for the cop.

I was Jury Foreman once and thankfully I had ONE person like you that sided with me on FACTS and not emotion.

I don't believe the police thought this was "something silly". She had a driver with a license from another country and was acting according to what she believed/was told was the right procedure. I suspect it's very likely she was taught that if you stop someone and they don't have a U.S. license, arrest them, they may be here illegally. If that's the case, I actually applaud her for not using ethnicity/license origin as a factor in her decision to arrest.

Of course, if that's the reason the woman was arrested, then it makes sense that the department would not speak out...

I honestly can’t believe you are ignoring the facts! Watch the reports. Everything shows she was arrested illegally! If you are an officer then you should know the laws. She made a mistake and the department will be paying for it. As I see it she did nothing wrong.