Police Officers Share The Laws They Disagree With And Feel Uncomfortable Enforcing

It's hard being a police officer. On top of risking their lives to serve and protect their communities every day, they also face ethical dilemmas that force them to examine their own morality. Society has been groomed to believe that the law is always the right way; however, in many cases, it is actually flawed and far from perfect. Police officers, therefore, have to decide: should they follow the law, or should they do what they believe, in their hearts and souls, is right?

Police officers from around the globe took to the internet to share the laws they disagree with and feel uncomfortable enforcing. After reading some of these stories, you may start to realize that nothing is ever totally black-and-white: when it comes to the law, there are always grey areas. It's those grey areas that make being a police officer so difficult.

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#1 Just Let People Live

Most town and city ordinances. Things like not being able to park on the street in front of your house between certain hours of the night. You want me to ticket some dad's car because he moved it out of the driveway so his five-year-old son could bike around the driveway? Yeah, that's not happening. Also, certain traffic violations in the middle of the night. You forgot to signal your merge when you're the only vehicle on a two-lane road at 3 a.m.? God help us all.

Recently expired driver's licenses and plates. A neighboring city wrote up a car whose plates expired 11 minutes prior. He said the person should have known it was about to expire and taken care of it ahead of time. Like, give the guy a break. We've all had life interfere with things. There's a huge difference between the letter of the law and the spirit of the law. I would say I'm probably just a terrible cop, but my coffee mug says I'm the world's best policeman, so it's definitely not that.

#2 It's Just Grass

Before I was a police officer, I was put in a sort of “catch-all” position. Duties included evidence custodian, animal control, court bailiff, code enforcement, and part-time police work. This was 2012-2013, and Kansas had a rather wet season. For about a month and a half straight, we had rain almost every day. No one had a chance to mow their grass. The city manager saw it as a grand opportunity for me to start writing people tickets for their grass being too high. I told him I didn’t feel comfortable doing that.

I told him I didn’t think it was right for me to write people tickets for tall grass when there are city-owned properties all over the city that had grass just as tall. We went back and forth, and he got my captain involved while throwing a fit. Before he stomped out of the captain's office he made a comment: “This is my city, you work for me and what I say is the law.” Captain agreed he was a jerk but ultimately said I should just write the tickets.

So I went back to the evidence locker, which is what everyone called my office because I was the only one who had access, and I did some research. An hour later, I walked over to the city manager's office (which happened to be right across the street) and handed the city manager about 14 tickets. He asked what those were, I told him I was doing exactly what he told me to do—I was writing tickets for the grass being too tall. The first 14 tickets were for the 14 city-owned properties that had grass over 12-inches high. He said those weren’t his responsibility. I calmly reminded him of his previous comment about him “owning” the city, and he called the chief. He insisted I be fired for insubordination. A month later, I was promoted to full-time patrol officer.

#3 Good Looking Out

Not exactly a "law" but it's the closest thing I have that's semi-relevant. I did a spell as deputy and had to work in the city jail. When working the jail, I would be put in charge of the holding cells where you would go while you wait to see a magistrate judge. You could be in these cells for up to 72 hours in the same cases.

Anyway, the rules for this particular part of the jail were that you could not shower for 72 hours. You also got one meal every eight hours while you were there. Meals were served at 6 a.m., noon and 6 p.m. If you showed up at 6:30 p.m., you were not getting fed until 6 a.m., for example.

The food they would serve was always the same: Bologna sandwich, white bread, American cheese, one apple and one bag of pretzels. Nothing fancy or delicious, but it would keep you going until you were released or sent up to the normal jail cells. Anyway, I'd always order a dozen or so extra lunches to have on hand for anyone who showed up late or for the homeless who were arrested. I made sure they could shower much sooner than 72 hours and I would help anyone who needed to get in touch with a bondsman to get them out of jail. The way I saw it, I was saving taxpayer money getting them out of jail and they already had the food that would have just lead to wasting the taxpayer money.

#4 A Gesture Worth A Nickel

Cops in my town carry nickels and feed the meters instead of taking the time to write tickets. I think that's pretty cool of them, especially since there are cops in other towns who hide behind corners and wait for the meters to run out so they can sprint to the cars and slam tickets on them. I hate cops who can't give people a break, especially when they really didn't do anything overly terrible.

#5 Perspectives On Protests

My best bud and his ENTIRE FAMILY are cops. His dad, mom, sister, and two brothers: ALL COPS. Anyways, I have dinner with them from time to time. Once, I recall his brother discussing having to go monitor a protest, with all the other cops in their riot gear. I was fascinated that every person at the table had the same reaction of hating protests, for different reasons. One person said it was boring and you have to stand all day. Another said it sucks when the people you're protecting start yelling at you. His mom, who was a dispatcher, said it diminishes responsibility because all the cops were tied up at the protest and that meant fewer patrols elsewhere.

#6 Float On

#7 Fighting The Scam

I was working security for a low-income housing facility. The people that ran this facility had a little scam they did where they would turn off the fobs of the tenants so they couldn't open the front door. It was $35 to get the fob turned back on. There were 400 tenants at this complex. At any one time, a quarter of the fobs might be turned off. I was working the front desk and if a tenant had a turned off fob I wasn't supposed to let them. I would let them in any way, and I got fired.

#8 The Cops From Superbad

I had a run-in with the cops a few years ago where they could have easily taken me for at the very least public intoxication, but they cut me a break and gave me a ride home instead. I had taken a cab back from a work party and I was pretty tipsy. My friend and I had just moved to this new apartment so I accidentally gave the cab driver the wrong address. I ended up on a building that looked like mine. There were two doors before getting to my apartment door, which was on the first floor. Like my apartment building, they left the first door unlocked and locked the second door. I kept trying my keys to open it but I couldn't and was confused. I went outside to look for my car and it wasn't parked there. That's when I realized I was on the wrong block.

I started walking in the direction I thought my apartment was when a cop car pulled up. They asked me what I was doing and I told them, "I'm really tipsy and I just want to go home," which was the honest truth. They told me they got a call about someone trying to get into an apartment building. I guess the people in that apartment building woke up and thought I was trying to break in. They were super suspicious of me at first, but eventually, it became clear I was just some tipsy idiot and not a burglar. They ran me through to make sure I didn't have warrants or anything and when I checked out, they offered me a ride home.

The ride back was hilarious because when we were getting to my apartment, I tried telling them that it was a bit complicated to get to because of all the one-way streets. The officer driving was like, "Who do you think you're with?" and then turned on the lights and went the wrong way down the street to get me home faster. It honestly felt like I was with the two cops from Superbad.

#9 Time-Consuming Is Not An Excuse

A friend of mine is a cop in Rhode Island, and this is what he told me. Sadly, DUIs are a time-consuming hassle. Sometimes, you just want to go home. I would ask them to call a friend or family member to pick them up. One time, a dude argued with me and I kept trying to convince him to get a ride. He was like, I'm fine to drive. He got back in his car, so I had to bust him for a DUI after trying to give him so many chances.

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Kadena Air Base

#10 Pepper Spraying A Minor

In Canada, you are allowed to pepper spray a minor for spitting in a public place. I was living at college residence in a small town and I wasn’t doing very well, I was the youngest person there, but I was still drinking a lot and partying. At some point, I gave myself a massive concussion and one of the side effects was depression. I slowly became a danger to myself. They put me in a psychiatric unit, and I signed myself out after three days.

The person in charge of residence didn’t want me there, so she called the cops to detain me. She was trying to find my psychiatrist too. Needless to say, I was all sorts of messed up by this point. I was belligerent and spit on the ground. The small-town cop decided this was a form of assault or something and went over to arrest me. I refused, so he forcibly tried to put handcuffs on me, with his partner jumping on me as well. They hit my leg with a nightstick (I still have hairline fracture) and pepper-sprayed me. I was traumatized.

#11 Share The Sidewalks

Riding bikes on pavements. If there are pedestrians on it then yes, use the road, but if it's completely empty, why not use it? Its a lot safer than riding on the road.  I live in a community where most regular bikers are completely strict about policing people over this. Not police, mind you—random people who think if you're not being 100% street legal (because a bike is a VEHICLE), then to them you're about as bad as a tipsy driver. The funny thing is, we even have super wide sidewalks all over too.

#12 Senseless Ticketing

I worked for a city station in Australia that fully expected us to give tickets to people for being homeless or begging for money. These tickets were $600 at least. I pretty much refused to give them out because it felt barbaric. Like, homeless people didn't already have it rough enough without getting a $600 ticket (which, if they didn't pay, would turn into a court case). How were they going to pay it anyway? The only point to it seemed to be to kick them while they were down.

Plus, begging for money is a summary offense here, not an indictable offense, and we have discretion for summary offenses, meaning the superior officers wanted us to be jerks for the sake of it. I was in charge of training new recruits at the time and I thought it was better to demonstrate compassion to them and teach them what services were available to the homeless and when, how to get them fast-tracked into emergency housing and what places would offer free food.

#13 An Indecent Practice

I worked for a time in criminal investigations with our office. I was not a sworn employee, but a civilian one; probably at one of the lowest rungs on the ladder. One day, the captain said that the sheriff wanted us to go through all Hispanic people currently in jail and determine if their criminal backgrounds designated them to be turned over to ICE for deportation investigation. As I found out, the majority of them were arranged for deportation, regardless of their immigration status.

Essentially, I had been given the responsibility of telling the higher-ups who should be allowed to stay in the country and who shouldn't be. They gave me some parameters, but the majority of these people were in for minor infractions, and their histories reflected the same. It was the only time I ever said no to doing a job for the agency, and my career came to an end for "unrelated" reasons not long after.

#14 Mercy In A Snowstorm

I've had a few good experiences with reasonable cops over the years. One time, I was rolling into a small town in western NY during a snowstorm and had a radar detector on the dash. I saw a cop coming from the other way and his sirens went on suddenly! I looked down and I was apparently going like 32 in a 25. I looked in the mirror and he flipped around, so I just pulled over and waited for him to catch up. He got out and said, "You were going a little fast back there, why'd you pull over?" I said, "The roads are slick, I didn't want you to have to catch up to me." He went back, ran my plate, then came back and said, "You have a good day, get out of this snow!"

#15 Strict No-Tattoo Policy

Back in the day when I was a police officer in the State Prisons, I was expected to write up people who had fresh tattoos. It was the stupidest thing ever. I just pulled them to the side and told them not to let me see it again. Then, I made them mop the day room. It was the only way I could actually give them some form of punishment.

#16 Useless Speeding Tickets

I refuse to enforce speeding under 15 mph unless it is a school zone with kids visible. 5 mph tickets make me sick. I also do not like to enforce suspension for non-payment when I am stopping them on their way to work. Why punish someone with a fine and tow fees when they are actively doing something to fix the problem? To this date, I have yet to write for a headlight or rear-light being out. I give a 3-month minimum for expired plates but even then, as long as they are cool, I just give a warning or courtesy notice since the state will give them a fine them anyways.

#17 Stick It To The Man

My dad is an officer and in my state, the patrol officers DO NOT have a minimum quota for tickets they have to write. In fact, it is illegal here for a superior officer to tell the lower ranking officer to write so many tickets. Anyways, a while ago, one of my dad's coworkers was told by a superior officer: "You're not writing enough tickets, you need to write more tickets." The officer replied, "Yes, sir," and he wrote the superior officer a ticket for telling him to write more tickets. It's the best story I've ever heard from my dad about his job.

#18 Barely Late

I got pulled over last year, on some Friday, not long after moving back from Arizona to Louisiana. The cop got me because my tags had expired a few days before. I had planned to swap the tags over that coming Monday. I hadn't been able to earlier that week because of work, and I thought I still had a few more weeks since, for some reason, I thought the tags were still good for the rest of the month. Anyway, I told the cop all this and after running my info he asked me:

"So you're swapping the tags over Monday, right?"

"Yes, sir."

"Alright. Be safe and enjoy your night."

I could've kissed the dude.

#19 The Perfect Comeback

A friend of mine is an ex-cop and he was the type to only hand out tickets to people who were endangering others or behaving like jerks. He once got in trouble for not writing enough tickets. He was told to write a certain number of tickets by the end of the month or face an official reprimand. So, he went to his CO's tiny, quiet little neighborhood and started handing out tickets, even for the most minor offenses: failure to signal, failure to stop at a stop sign, being 2 mph over the limit, etc.

He told every person exactly why he was giving them a ticket and what to tell the judge. All the tickets were dropped and the judge chewed out the CO for wasting everyone's time. My friend almost got fired but he didn't have to meet a quota after that.

#20 Fighting The Good Fight

My dad was a correction captain. He fought the good fight and didn’t care who called him an inmate lover. Fighting is one thing, but hitting someone who’s cuffed or restrained is just plain abuse, no matter what happened. Some people just don’t get that it isn’t personal. They’re attacking the uniform and you’re fighting back against the jumpsuit.

#21 Compassion Over All

I started out in juvie systems. The CO was a female and you could just tell she was born to work with us. If you ever had an encounter with her, it was definitely because you were having a bad day. She'd be the one calming you down and everything. There are some rules that prohibit you to get too personal to the inmates, but she didn't care. She's a really good person. I don't live in that area anymore, but I've occasionally seen her when I've been back visiting. I've never had many urges to hug COs but yeah, I hug her.

#22 Basic Decency

When I was doing my oral board, one of the higher-ranking officers said something that stuck with me: "Everyone in this room was one mistake or bad day away from being in jail. They're people too. Treat them as such and you won't have as many issues."

#23 Arresting Children

Not anymore, but I was a cop for a couple of years. I felt uncomfortable when I had to arrest children. Not necessarily one law, but I felt bad because they weren't adults. I guess it all depends on the gravity of the crime they commit. One reason I can say I left the force.

#24 Good Cop, Good Cop

"Dave, Dave. It's the cops. I'm going to ask him for directions."

I said, "Chip, no! Chip! Don't do it!" It was too late.

He was walking over there. The man was tipsy as heck. "Excuse me, sir," he said, touching the guy and everything. "Excuse me! I need some information." He then started confessing things he shouldn't. "I'm a little tipsy. All I want to know is which way is Third Street."

The cop was like, "Hey! TAKE IT EASY... You're on Third Street. You better be careful. Go ahead. move it. MOVE IT!"

#25 Moral: Jump Into Pools

I was a tipsy teen at a party which was being busted up by cops. I already had a juvenile record by this point. I was stuck upstairs in a room which may or may not have had some suspicious substances in it. So I went out on to the balcony and jumped into the pool (there was also a gate at the other side of the pool that I wanted to head for but the cops got to the pool too quickly).

The response of the cops to the whole situation was: "Uh... You're tipsy and soaking wet... This is annoying." So they just called my uncle to come get me. No arrest, no tickets, no questions, no search, no investigation. So now, I just jump into a pool every time I see any cops.

#26 He Did The Right Thing

My brother went out and got super tipsy. He realized he was too tipsy to drive ended up sleeping in his truck so he didn't have to... Then, a cop came and almost gave him a fine for public intoxication until my brother begged to let him call my dad (at 3 a.m.) to pick him up. After some hassle, the guy finally agreed! What annoys me is that my brother was trying to do the right thing for once, and it's like the cop didn't care.

#27 Air Force Rules

I was an Air Force cop. I hated taking cell phones from people from the flight line. The flight line is where the jets sit. It is surrounded by a red line that you aren’t allowed to cross unless you have a special badge and security clearance. You’re not supposed to have your phone because you cannot take pictures of the flight line for security purposes. However, we always had our phones on us, we just knew not to post our pictures to social media. I’d never seen or even heard of anyone being arrested for it.

#28 Petty Calls Are Useless Calls

911 call-taker here. Any kind of petty non-emergency call where someone isn't directly bothering anyone will immediately be ridiculed by the staff. If you call in to report teenagers skating or a party going on at 3 p.m. on a Wednesday, there's almost a 90% chance at least one person is insulting you for it. If it's not us, it's the dispatchers or the police themselves.

#29 Less Hassle, Less Problem

A friend of mine is a cop in a small town in Western NY. He's told me before how much he hates having to chase people. People who know they are the reason the cop turned his lights on and just pull over right away are much less likely to get a ticket.

#30 Civilian Interactions

In my city, they don't have a ticket quota, but they do have a "civilian interactions" quota. So, they have to talk to so many people each day. They don't have to write them up or even stop them for a crime, they can just talk to someone on the sidewalk and it would count. I think that's a much better way to build rapport between the police force and the local communities. Handing out tickets for the sake of reaching a quota just puts an unnecessary strain on social relations between cops and the people.

#31 A Waste Of Everyone's Time

Just as an example, a buddy of mine's dad is pretty high up in his local police force in Canada. Anyway, they stopped enforcing possession laws years before legalization. It was just too much trouble and a waste of time. They still go after dealers, but anyone who happened to be possessing when booked got a chance to chuck it or the like.

#32 Burn Bans

Burn bans. My city has a full burn ban and I find it ridiculous. The fine is insane too, like $400. So most of the time, I act like I don't see anything unless it's a safety issue. Or, I just give them a heads up to finish up what they need to so we don't keep getting calls on it. People in my town call for petty stuff a lot.

#33 Dad Saves The Day

I was driving with my dad through the middle of nowhere Kansas going about 91 on the highway because we were visiting colleges and we were running late to our first visit. Some cop pulled me over and when he saw that it was my dad, he just gave us a warning. He had said that if I was with my friends he would’ve given me a ticket because he thought I would’ve been showboating, but because I was with my dad (and given the nature of our trip) he decided to just let us off this time. The nicest cop I’ve ever met. 10/10 would get pulled over again.

#34 Companionship

I got in trouble for not arresting people who were intoxicated in public. I would find people passed out or tipsy on the ground. I would wake them up and sit with them until a loved one or taxi came to get them. I didn't see the harm, they were harmless and just needed to go home. The department told me that I was not able to make those kinds of decisions and that I needed to arrest the individuals. Body cameras made it so that the department got their way.

#35 Safety First

Having to ask Muslim women to remove their headscarves for searching when they come into jail for visits. I do it as respectfully as I can (in a separate room, with a female officer, gloves, etc.) but I hate doing it at all. If I don't do it though, everyone will start wearing a scarf in, claiming it's "religious attire" to avoid being searched.

#36 Child Custody Issues

Child custody issues. While we don't arrest anyone for them, we get called to those disputes all the time and there is never a good guy or a bad guy. The horrible things people do to kids during a divorce is tragic. The laws are generally unfavorable to dads for no good reason.

#37 Trash Can Dilemma

A friend of mine was a street cop. Once, he patrolling in a park when he spotted a lady throwing something in the trashcan. I can't remember what, but it's illegal to throw household waste into a public trashcan. A $140 fine is given for this. He walked to the lady and said: "Ma'am if you throw that on the ground, the fine will be cheaper". Throwing trash on the ground had a fine of $60. Today it's also $140. In the end, he just gave her a warning because he felt it was a stupid fine to give.

#38 Gun Control Laws

I am most uncomfortable dealing with gun control laws as I personally voted against them. They still get passed anyway, so I tend to give more slack for our law-abiding gun owners.

#39 The "Holy Cow" Threshold

When I worked patrol, I hated traffic enforcement. Unless you did something that made me yell, “Holy cow, did you see that?” I wouldn’t write tickets. I mainly worked assignments where we went after real criminals. I also hated DUI’s. I’ve thrown a lot of tipsy people's keys on roofs and sent them walking. I know tipsy drivers suck, but to me, they were labor-intensive misdemeanors. I just wanted to work gangsters.

#40 Give The Man A Break

Not too long ago, I rolled into a parking lot and was sitting behind an empty vehicle parked in the fire lane. I got out and was about to write a ticket for it when the owner walked out in his pizza delivery uniform and his hot bag. He told me he just ran inside to make his delivery. As a former pizza delivery driver, I decided to leave it at that and let him on his way. Someone saw that I let him go and called the department to lodge a complaint. I didn't get yelled at, but I was told to be more careful when making decisions like that.

#41 Stand-Off At The Meter

I once parked a car on the side of the street to look up directions. I didn't pay the meter because I was going to be there for literally 30 seconds. After about 15 seconds, a cop walked up, wrote a ticket and put it under the wiper. I rolled my window down, grabbed it and handed it back to him. He looked at me and handed it back, to which I handed it back to him again. I then explained how ticketing a car with the driver in it for a parking violation is illegal. So he took the ticket and ripped it in half. No questions asked.

#42 Body Cams

Body cams. I always figured this was the hidden cost of body cams: cops not being able to let small things slide because it's all on record.

#43 Policing The End-User

I had an officer tell me that they'd rather not police the end-user, but the problem is that the supply chain more often than not funds more serious crime. Like, the people bringing in and distributing hundreds of kilos of illicit substances are usually the same ones running trafficking schemes.

#44 That's Fair

Public intoxication due to any substance is what's illegal, although generally it isn't enforced as long as you aren't being a jerk and have a safe way home.

#45 Only 2 mph Over

I once got ticketed by a cop for going 2 mph over the speed limit and when I said that wasn’t fair, the cop basically said that I should go get a lawyer and fight it if I didn’t like it. Thankfully, his partner walked up after him and took back the ticket, apologizing for his partner's behavior and the inconvenience.

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