I’m Starting To Worry About Abuse Of Power Around Here
So a man in Farmington gets stopped on a riding mower and gets arrested for driving on revoked license. Driving what?
Then, in the comments section, there’s a bunch of “hang ‘im”-type responses, calling the man a drunk and a menace. He may be those things, (his license was revoked for DUI), but on this day he wasn’t drinking. He’s feeling harassed. I can’t say I disagree, based solely on the comments of authorities in the story.
Here was my take from the comments section:
A lot of people are calling this guy a drunk and insinuating he was drunk/bar hopping when stopped.
Read the story again. The DA himself says there was no alcohol OR accident involved. Further, it would be hard for him to kill anyone at 5MPH if he was drunk OR stone sober. I can walk faster than this lawnmower can travel, I think I could get out of it’s way. Actually, the only person that could possibly get run over and killed by a riding lawnmower would be someone that was too drunk to get out of the way. How ironic.
I have a problem with the police work on this on a couple of levels, too.
1. You ARE NOT REQUIRED to have a driver’s license to drive a lawn mower. Kids can drive riding mowers long before they get a license…are they picked up for driving without a license? I think not.
2. There are no license plates or registration required on lawn mowers, so how does that make it a “vehicle”. You get a driver’s license to drive a vehicle that requires license plates and registration.
3. And then there’s this comment from the prosecutor: “It’s got a motor, it’s got wheels, it’s power-driven, yes,†Ummm, okay, so is my self-propelled push mower. If he’d have been pushing a mower down the street, would they have arrested him for that?
Whether the guy is a drunk is not the point. How they “caught” him is what I would question. Bottom line in this situation is that he wasn’t drunk. They had no reason to suspect he was drunk. So the appearance of harassment is definitely there.
2 comments.
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July 23rd, 2007 at 9:29 pm
I had many of the same thoughts when I read the article. It’s fairly common practice in certain Tazewell County communities for people w/ revoked/suspended licenses to ride their lawn tractor to the bar (I live in Tazewell, I see it. This is by no means a gross generalization, nor am I calling Tazewellians hicks). I was under the impression they did this for the sole reason that it wasn’t illegal to drive a mower w/o a license. However, if someone is drunk, they can TECHNICALLY be stopped for DUI, same as a person on a bicycle or even roller skates can. Also, if this man was impeding the flow of traffic, he could also be cited for that. However, the way the article was written, neither seemed to be the case.
July 23rd, 2007 at 10:24 pm
I agree.
I think when someone is stopped on a mower while drunk, the better arrest would be “public intoxication”, rather than DUI.
You can get arrested for being drunk in public and just staggering down a sidewalk, right?
Anyway, if I was this guy’s lawyer, I’d definitely stay with the “a lawn mower doesn’t require registration and/or plates, therefore you cannot be stopped for illegally operating an “unlicensed vehicle”, because there’s no such thing as a “licensed” riding mower, or at least it’s not required. Also, and not to be redundant, but if an 11-year old can drive from one house to the next, or cross the street to get home after mowing one yard on a riding mower, does that mean they can be arrested for driving without a license, as this man has? I guess what I’m saying is until the laws are re-written, I don’t think you can call a Cub Cadet or Yard Man a “vehicle”.
Another example…a radio-controlled minature car has a steering wheel (albeit remote), a motor, wheels, and it’s power driven…does this state’s attorney’s comment mean my kid can’t put his RC car on the street without a license?
Way too much grey area here. In this case he wasn’t drunk, wasn’t driving an “unlicensed vehicle” (according to any sane definition of “licensed vehicle” and he wasn’t bothering anyone (re: disturbing the peace). So yeah, from the appearance of the article alone (note: I wasn’t there, I’m just going off the written word), I think this guy was wrongly arrested when there are probably more important things to be policing.