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posted by n1 on Monday April 14 2014, @09:56PM   Printer-friendly
from the rules-are-made-to-be-broken dept.

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"

 
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  • (Score: 1) by Drew617 on Tuesday April 15 2014, @01:53AM

    by Drew617 (1876) on Tuesday April 15 2014, @01:53AM (#31618)

    Can, should, yet some people don't.

    This is not a binary decision between donating $2500 and getting tickets every day. There's a lot of room in between those extremes to avoid or mitigate tickets in the first place, like speeding only at +10, etc.

    I'm not arguing that it's fair, only that it's clearly not the same thing as buying off a judge or slipping that $2500 directly to a cop. It's not directly corrupt, and how do you reasonably correct the problem anyway? Outlaw the local PBA? Outlaw stickers on cars? Require 100% enforcement of all moving violations? Prove that a group of officers systematically DIDN'T ticket people, knowing records don't exist of the drivers they didn't ticket?

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 15 2014, @03:24PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 15 2014, @03:24PM (#31836)

    "Outlaw the local PBA? Outlaw stickers on cars?"

    Absolutely! What's unreasonable about outlawing something whose sole purpose is to abet corruption of public servants?

    Hey nice Friends of Meat Inspectors sticker ya got there. Hey is that an SEC Christmas Club emblem on your broker terminal?

  • (Score: 2) by sjames on Wednesday April 16 2014, @04:11AM

    by sjames (2882) on Wednesday April 16 2014, @04:11AM (#32173) Journal

    That depends on how surely a nice donation gets you out of the ticket. If it's nearly a sure thing, it *IS* a bribe. Collecting it at arms length through what is effectively a bribe clearinghouse for legal reasons doesn't actually change that.

    Not all bribery transactions involve a lot of throat clearing and winking.