Coopertown City Judge Earl Porter has dismissed outstanding traffic citations issued by Coopertown Police on Interstate-24 or its exits for all of 2008.

Legal issues with traffic tickets issued by Coopertown Police — infamous among local commuters and national groups alike — first arose last summer, when Jeff Davis successfully fought a ticket because the Coopertown Police Department had not obtained the proper permitting the patrol the interstate for 2008.


Coopertown police stopped patrolling the interstate for one day in June, but after applying for the permit, resumed their presence and ticketing practices between Exits 19 and 30.


Robertson County Circuit Court Judge Michael R. Jones ruled in January, however, that Coopertown did not follow the proper procedure to regain their patrolling rights.


Specifically, the Coopertown Police Department did not train its officers on the Tennessee Department of Safety’s General Orders — essentially the rules of engagement for patrolling the interstate — before applying for their permit. On the department’s application, however, it indicated such a review had been done.


Moreover, Jones noted in a January order — in the case State of Tennessee v. Brandi Anne Rose —that a copy of the General Orders was not even requested by the police department until after it had resumed its patrols.


“Further,” Jones wrote, “Coopertown admitted having officers which were not full-time employees ... patrol the interstate in direct contradiction of their agreement set forth in the application ... to patrol the interstate.”


For more on this story, see tomorrow's Leaf-Chronicle.

Thats good news! How do those of us that paid tickets apply for a refund?

And people who support Crosby have come on here to complain that they WERE following the law and HOW DARE WE question Coopertown?!?!? It appears that some people in that crowd either just got of the pumkin truck or erroniously think we just did.

In the end it is how dare they doubt there own stupidity and willingness to say anything to make the truthful people looking for answers leave them alone so they can do their business as usual. This sounds like an instance where our TBI should have acted in the safety of motorist subject to some of these reported antics. I realize with Memphis politicians to fry for their crimes ours were deemed petty but safety and fair play were abandon if this ruling proves to be true. How can they put improperely trained people out and bald face lie about it then get mad at me or you for noticing? But they did. It is like they are from another reality whereby whatever they dreamed up to say was the (paraphrasing)"God's honest truth and those loud mouthed citizens are just all, everyone of them, liars. Why don't you believe me when I say I know what I am doing?".

Well for one thing it was not believable that they were doing things right from the word GO. The lemming affect ensued by that bunch followed their isbelief that the majority of Coopertown citizens had seen and heard enough. They just could not understand why we did not believe their version of the story. Surprise, surprise we carried out on election day too! Wheuu, thank goodness!

Thats all good, but where do I go to get my fine back? I think I should get the money I paid for the driving class back too. What did the judge say about that?

Most likely, since your ticket/case has been adjudicated(sp?) you essentially have no legal domain to reclaim any monies you paid to a fine or retraining course ordered by the court. Your case is considered closed in the presence of this ruling and this ruling does not affect your situation unfortunately. This ruling also states "outstanding citations" whereas adjudicated is no longer "outstanding" it is resolved.



I hope that clears up some muddy water a little bit. This adjudication applies to any form of decision rendered by the judicial system for any type of hearing.

Try this, whch is in the Tennessean today;

Local attorney Greg Smith, who helped defendants fight their tickets pro bono, said the town is down to three or four police officers after having up to 20 during the speed trap days.

Unpaid 2008 tickets should be automatically dismissed, Smith said, but he recommended those with court dates go to court.

Smith said defendants should be prepared to cite the case that sets the grounds for Coopertown's lack of jurisdiction.

Smith said there also could be recourse for anyone who paid a ticket from Coopertown police in 2008. If the ticket was adjudicated in Coopertown City Court, Smith said, the motorist can "file a motion to set aside," which can be done without an attorney.

A similar process can be done in Robertson County General Sessions Court for cases that were heard there.

Would spending the money to file a "motion to set aside" be worth the end result of reclaiming your $200 traffic citation and $200 for retraining? The court dockets are OVERFULL and the time to get your case in front of a judge is enough to tell me to drop it.

A similar situation the Town of Coopertown decided to do. The Board of Mayor and Alderman voted not to file suit against Crosby for the purpose of reclaiming the monies paid to his attorney by the city.

Let bygones be bygones....police are off I-24...Danny Crosby is no longer the mayor....let's move this town forward and quit the bickering.

I did not realize that answering someone's question was "bickering".

I will probably "bicker" again in the future when someone asks a question that I might be able to help with.

I wasn't referring to your answering of a question as bickering, but can see where my comments led to that confusion....sorry for that! I am referring to the "bickering" amongst Crosbyites and Childites. This town needs to move forward and leave the petty stuff behind.

Ma,
For those of us with more time than money in this economy it may show to be worthwhile to file for the reconsideration. I would think the written motion could be filed and then responded to by the Court without need of an appearance/verbal arguement. Can we get an opinion from the esteemed R. Lamey, our in house legal guru, on this issue?

I would like to think that the people who, like me challenged the authenticity of their facts, were not considered bickering but instead finding the truth and reacting appropriately to the situations as they arose. Be they deemed unfair or not, I saw the clear pattern of mistakes by the Crosbyites and felt compelled to confront them in some form of fashion with their own poor judgement. From where I sit the bickering did occur but it was fairly done on one side while the other deployed tactics that make one proclaim "the good old boy network was trying to keep itself alive in Coopertown".


This day and time most honest folks have had enough of that crowd and the cronyism that goes along with it. Some of us spoke out with the blessing of the others who felt like they could not articulate their feelings very well when they were about to blow their top over the latest shenanigans from city hall that week. I think the town quites down from here on in. Notice the newsworthy stuff still revolves around the same old characters from that crowd but that will end too. If they had not had legal issues virtually every week, they would not have to deal with the consequences while dragging our whole community through the mud to keep Danny in power. They saw it as us being flat wrong about Danny and we keep getting proof we were right all along. No more bickering from the Crosby side and this will end now.


I think we proved our case even if the judge put him back in with those "he is guilty of but" phrases. That was the craziest ruling I have ever read. Guilty of such and such but since his officers did not carry out the criminal order........ That left them some bickering room and left the rest of us wondering how this could happen with all he was proven to actually do. What a guaranteed mess that resulted in with no clear winner but a sitting mayor going "see I told you I was innocent". When I could not tell that one bit from that ruling. Nor could I deny that he was actuallly REQUIRED to pay his own court costs either as the ruling clearly explained why he was supposed to pay up. Yet he got free money from the town coffers courtesy of three nodding heads who think we were fools for going against him. It is safe to say they understand now we were not . Now they might feel they were fooled by their own lack of attention to those, hard for them to be willing to swallow, facts. Sometimes you need to look at why something is happening and they did not want to believe what people felt was true so they called us names like liars. People stood up and took notice of them and here we are today. They should apologize for their boorish behaviour, but going home and deciding to permanently leaving this town alone will work for me. I will gladly let them go in peace. We can forgive but it is not smart to forget. Forgetting history keeps getting mankind into trouble.

Go get a RC Times from Wednesday, Feb 18th and read the article in which Judge Porter was interviewed....another twist to the story...