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Alex Mayyasi writes that a close look at the cars outside Silicon Valley's venture capital firms reveals that the cars share a mysterious detail: they nearly all have a custom license plate frame that reads, "Member. 11-99 Foundation" which is the charitable organization that supports California Highway Patrol officers and their families in times of crisis. Donors receive one license plate as part of a $2,500 "Classic" level donation, or two as part of a bronze, silver, or gold level donation of $5,000, $10,000, or $25,000. Rumor has it, according to Mayyasi, that the license plate frames come with a lucrative return on investment. As one member of a Mercedes-Benz owners community wrote online back in 2002: "I have the ultimate speeding ticket solution. I paid $1800 for a lifetime membership into the 11-99 foundation. My only goal was to get the infamous 'get out of jail' free license plate frame."
The 11-99 Foundation has sold license plate frames for most of its 32 year existence, and drivers have been aware of the potential benefits since at least the late 1990s. But attention to the issue in 2006-2008 led the foundation to stop giving out the frames. An article in the LA Times asked "Can Drivers Buy CHP Leniency?" and began by describing a young man zipping around traffic including a police cruiser and telling the Times that he believed his 11-99 frames kept him from receiving a ticket. But the decision was almost irrelevant to another thriving market: the production and sale of fake 11-99 license plate frames. But wait the CHP 11-99 Foundation also gives out membership cards to big donors. "Unless you have the I.D. in hand when (not if) I stop you," says one cop, "no love will be shown."
[Editor's Note: I would also like to draw attention to a transport story that came out today.]
The BBC reports:
A rail union has claimed a hedge fund manager was able to "buy silence" after he repaid £42,550 in unpaid fares to Southeastern - but remained anonymous and avoided court action.
On Twitter, blogger Martin Shovel wrote: "Biggest rail fare dodger in history avoids prosecution because he's rich enough to pay back what he owed #OneLaw"
(Score: 1) by Joe Desertrat on Tuesday April 15 2014, @01:31AM
Well, yes and no. The law might be considered an absolute but justice should rarely be so. A good officer, and there are some, should be capable of making a determination as to whether escalation of the justice system's involvement in an incident is warranted. I'm not going to make a list of cases where it is correct to do so and where it is not, but I will point out that a lack of discrimination (the proper kind) or an inability to apply it because of legal restraints leads to things like three strikes laws or zero tolerance policies, and you don't have to be a long time reader of this site or its predecessor to know how wrong that can be.
(Score: 1) by Leebert on Tuesday April 15 2014, @01:50AM
Fair enough; and as I noted elsewhere I was being somewhat hyperbolic in my reply. The big thing is that I'm talking largely in the context of traffic enforcement.