Vandals Break Man's Windshield; Police Ticket Him Outside Repair Shop For Driving With Broken Window

by Deo Odolecki
Cop Block
Sep. 09, 2015

How many times has this happened to you? You are on the way to the garage to get your car fixed and you are pulled over for what you are going to get fixed. It happened to me in New Jersey. On my way to get a new tire, I was cited for having a bald tire. That’s also what happened to one Denver man on his way to get his broken windshield fixed. And as if having the police ticket you on the way to the shop wasn’t bad enough. It happened right outside the shop where he was going to get it fixed, while the staff watched.

“I got a ticket for something that I was close as I could be to resolving,” Nick Berlin said.

Nick Berlin was the victim of a vandal the night before he got his citation from the Adams County Sheriff’s department. Someone threw a rock breaking his windshield. The day after the vandal struck, Berlin made an appointment to get the window fixed but that was not quick enough for one deputy. Having no sympathy, or extending a grace period to the poor man (who was a victim of property damage), the officer wrote Berlin a ticket.

This plainly illustrates the problem with the police being out there fishing for citations. Rather than go catch the vandal the cop chose to make a criminal out of Berlin. What kind of policing system do we have in place when this can happen this way? The real crime is ignored in favor of generating revenue for the state? This is why memes say cops should be like firemen. Stay at the station unless you are called!

Shop owner, David Sprague, told 9 wants to know that he would cover Berlin’s $46 ticket if the judge doesn’t dismiss the citation, but that doesn’t solve the problem does it? The problem being that the citation was written in the first place, and making Berlin jump through hoops to prove his innocence. Of course, the police have no comment except to say the officer has discretion and exercised it accordingly. Court is set for Nov. 18.