Oklahoma Officers Sue Over Police Ticket Quotas
TY MCMAHAN
The Daily Oklahoman



Two veteran Oklahoma City police officers alleged in a lawsuit Tuesday they have been forced to operate under an illegal quota system.

Officers are required to write 20 traffic tickets each month if not operating with a radar, and 25 tickets if they have radar, according to the lawsuit.

If you're in a situation where you haven't met your quota you're going to be subjected to discipline,? said Mike Gassaway, the plaintiffs attorney. It creates a predatory system.

Capt. Jeffrey Becker released a statement about the lawsuit.

Oklahoma City Police use an activity tracking system to monitor employee performance in over 20 different law enforcement duties, the statement said. Police officers are expected to enforce traffic laws, but there is no quota on traffic citations or any other category monitored by our tracking system.

The plaintiffs, Jim Duncan and Floyd Sonny Bradford, have been with the Oklahoma City Police Department for more than 20 years, Gassaway said.

If you buck the system, you become the target of the system, Gassaway said. These guys have had the courage to stand up and say subjecting citizens to a quota system is wrong.

According to the lawsuit, filed in Oklahoma County, the quota system has caused each plaintiff to be perceived as a slacker, incompetent and lazy, yet to the general public it makes officers appear to be predators on the citizenry, giving out tickets for ludicrous violations in order to get money from the citizens using the city streets.

Gassaway said his clients want a judicial declaration that quotas are inappropriate.

They're just trying to benefit everyone involved,? Gassaway said. It's not about money. It's about doing right.

Becker said he could not comment further because of the pending litigation.

Hell I dont think I have ever wrote 20 tickets in a month.  But I dont work traffic. I think there is more to this story. I'll bet if the officers involved were out hunting for bad guys every night making DUI, stolen property, and dope arrests the bossess wouldnt care at all how many traffic tickets they wrote. At least thats how it is where i work. The only guys expected to write traffic tickets are the motors.

IBTJBTAs...

Yup, that's a quota,  are they legal in Oklahoma?

I thought quotas were a myth...

It may come to a surprise to many of you, but most policemen HATE writing tickets.

I KNOW a lot of you guys think that LEOs stay up nights trying to find excuses to make life hell for us, and maybe about 1/2 of 1% of them do, but the overwhelming majority of them detest writing tickets.

Yep, just another reason that I'm proud to be from Tulsa.

so they get rid of quotas but now they have productivity goals...

Quoted: I KNOW a lot of you guys think that LEOs stay up nights trying to find excuses to make life hell for us, and maybe about 1/2 of 1% of them do, but the overwhelming majority of them detest writing tickets.

Hmmmm...by that logic, one would only have to worry about such cops in a town with at least 200 cops. I wonder how small town Ohio has such a reputation for speed traps then?...

And now time for a joke.

A cop, wanting to meet his quota early decides to go to a long stretch of highway known for good, healthy bank-breaking sized ticket opportunities.

Cop gets into position and waits.

3 hours go by and nothing. Cop decides to take lunch and wait things out.

About 4p.m., right as the cop starts to get so discouraged he thinks about leaving, he hears the joyous sound of a speeding car approaching.

Car passes doing 100 and not a care in the world.

Cop pulls out and eventually catches up and pulls the guy over.

Cop walks up to the car, guy rolls his window down, and the cop says "Boy, I have been waiting for you all day long."

Guy says " Officer, i got here as fast as i could."

Quoted: Quoted: I KNOW a lot of you guys think that LEOs stay up nights trying to find excuses to make life hell for us, and maybe about 1/2 of 1% of them do, but the overwhelming majority of them detest writing tickets. Hmmmm...by that logic, one would only have to worry about such cops in a town with at least 200 cops. I wonder how small town Ohio has such a reputation for speed traps then?...

Think a second. To you think the individual LEOs like this?

Probably not.

My bet is that Ctiy Council or a CLEO trying to make a name for himself is at the bottom of this shit.
NOT the basic working cop.

Quoted: so they get rid of quotas but now they have productivity goals...

The concepts found in "Office Space" invade yet another profession...

We don't have quotas,  

we can write as many tickets as we want.

Quotas/tax are a great way to get a negative attitude towards cops and with petty tickets.

As if 75 in a 65 mph zone was dangerous, given the right conditions.  Or 80 mph.  Or 90mph given the right flow of traffic.

There was a time in this country where there wasn't so much of an emphasis on speeding tickets, and the law of the land was "reasonable and proper."

quotas are bad for citizens all around. They are both good and bad for the officers, a quota makes the cops look like assholes to the people, but makes them seem necessary to the .gov. If the crime went down, so would the amount of cops. They are really fucked either way

Most do hate quotas. They should be illegal but are not. We are told that we have no quota BUT you better have an average of a certain number of tickets every day. Crazy."They" will make you totally miserable if you dont produce

Quoted: so they get rid of quotas but now they have productivity goals...

The new term is (performance objectives)......

In my neck of the woods, they are called performance goals.

Having said that, I've been pulled over a whole lot in my Wasted Youth, and deserved it. Only on two of those occasions did I get the full monty for my crimes, and the few instances where I was written a ticket (motorcycle in all instances, I drive a car like a granny) I was let off with a minimal fine.

Dave