…is apparently how many are required to harass two motorcyclists who did nothing wrong. That is how many stuck around anyway. A total of four Monroe County Sheriff’s Officers and one City of Rochester K-9 Unit responded to this major threat.

The Pull Over

About a week ago, as my buddy and I made a right turn from a just turned green light we were greeted by the first officer who “thought we might be able to help him with something.” Seconds later we were swarmed by the rest of the force. I was awarded additional questioning thanks either to my out of state driver’s license, nice bike, or maybe I just look like the kind of guy who doesn’t own the bike I’m riding. By this time the K-9 Unit and fourth County cop had left the scene.

The Douche Bag

So we have remaining the original guy, silent guy, and Officer Standup, the comedian. The first guy heads back to his car and is doing whatever it is they do at this point, run my plates, whatever. This is when Standup starts his routine. This guy is the stereotypical fat ass, douche bag cop. He starts out letting us know that we were “driving like assholes,” which is interesting given that neither him, nor any other cop, witnessed anything other than us turn a corner at below 10mph and then pull over as requested.

He then asks what exactly we were doing. After explaining to him that we did nothing remotely erratic he says, “We got a call that a black and a blue sportbike were driving west like assholes, know anything about that?” No, not really. “Well, were you driving west?” I told him, I wasn’t really sure, as this was the first time I had been in the area and the road we had intended to travel on was closed (which was the truth). He then tries to make some sort of (not so wise) crack about how they don’t teach geography very well at RIT (where we attend school, the first officer asked where we were coming from). He then starts to really make us sweat (lol) by telling us that we are in big trouble because officer one is really mean and writes a lot of tickets. “How many last month,” he asks silent guy. “Uh, I don’t know, I guess a lot,” Silent responds in a monotone ‘I fucking hate you’ sort of tone. “Hundreds,” fatty adds, “but maybe he will go easy since it’s a new month.” So they do have a quota system after all?

Again, he asks what we were doing like assholes because obviously it was us since we are riding a black Yamaha and a blue Suzuki, which is what the he says the caller described over the phone. Hmm, did that description just get more detailed? He then heads back to officer one’s car to ask what the plate number the caller gave was. Officer one totally ignores him, never even glancing towards him. Fatty then recites my plate number while staring at the plate. Who would ever see through that one…

At this point, it’s pretty clear they don’t have a damn thing on us, but we aren’t done yet. Now it’s determined that my bike is clearly illegally modified, despite the inspection sticker from 5 days prior. My bulky and blank exhaust with ‘Suzuki’ and a part number stamped on the bike-facing side is clearly aftermarket. After about three minutes of discussion I finally point to the part number and tell him to go look it up, I’m done talking about a stock muffler. If it wasn’t painfully obvious they were fishing before, it certainly is now.

The Conclusion

Finally, Number one comes back out of his car to tell us this surprise, they don’t know what we did wrong. He at least has the courtesy to thank us for pulling over instead of taking off. Standup takes this opportunity to try to drop a line about filling out paperwork to scrap us off a phone poll. Everyone, including the other two cops, sighs and shakes their heads. He still doesn’t get the hint. Thirty minutes after we got pulled over we get to leave, no tickets of course. Monroe County tax dollars at work.

Oh, and Standup, lay off the Krispy Kremes and tone down the dickhead attitude. You are why we all hate cops.