POLICE SPEED TRAPS AND TRAFFIC QUOTAS: WALDO, FLORIDA IMPROPRIETIES CAUGHT

www.CharlesJeromeWare.com.  "Here to make a difference."

For many years the north Florida town of Waldo has been known as a traffic "speed traps."  Even automobile traffic organization AAA knew it.  It named Waldo, a very small town between Jacksonville and Gainesville one of only 2 "traffic traps" nationwide, and AAA even paid for a large attention-grabbing billboard just outside the town limits to warn drivers to slow down before entering the traffic-sneaky jurisdiction.

A short segment of the highway going through Waldo requires unwitting drivers to speed up and slow down at least six times: from 65 mph to 55 mph; then 55 mph goes quickly down to 45 mph; then 45 mph abruptly shoots up to 55 mph again; then back down to 45 mph; then quickly back up to 55 mph; and eventually the ordeal ends with 35 mph.  Exhausting.  A flood of driver complaints and bad publicity eventually forced an investigation by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement into suspected and alleged improprieties.

Now, the Waldo police chief as well as his replacement interim police chief have been suspended.  At a Waldo City Council meeting recently a group of Waldo police officers testified that they had been ordered by the two chiefs to write at least 12 tickets per 12-hour shift or face repercussions.  The officers also alleged that the two chiefs mishandled evidence.  By the way, ticket quotas are illegal in Florida, and should be illegal everywhere in the United States.

In 2013 Waldo, Florida's small force of 7 police officers filed an astounding 11,603 traffic citations, according to the Gainesville Sun newspaper.  That figures with 25,461 citations filed during the same time period for the much larger 300 police officers in Gainesville with its 130,000 residents --- and not including over forty thousand college students at the University of Florida, et al.

Fines paid by victim drivers through Waldo in 2013 amounted to over $1 million.

[http://news.msn.com/crime-justice/waldo-suspends-2-police-chiefs-after-quota-claim/9-2-2014]