Michigan Woman Gets Ticket for Flipping the Bird
Road rage is a national problem, and at Service King Broadway in San Antonio we read news stories all the time about people doing wild and crazy things out on the road, so we really were not surprised when we saw this news piece recently online.
Rather than an act of protest and defiance from a Michigan woman, Debra Cruise-Gulyas decided to flip off a cop after she got pulled over for speeding. The policeman Matthew Minard wrote her a ticket for a lesser, non-moving offense, and she responded to what the officer believed was a greater offense when she flipped the bird in his general direction.
After getting the citation, Cruise-Gulyas, of Taylor, Michigan was pulling away from the traffic stop when "unhappy about the citation, she made an all-too-familiar motion at Minard with the middle finger extended" according to a decision made by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit. "That did not please Minard," the statement said. So he stopped her again and added the ticket for speeding.
Cruise-Gulyas sued, saying, among other things, that the officer had violated her First Amendment rights by retaliating against an act of free speech.
A lower court, followed by the appeals court, agreed with Cruise-Gulyas, based on the fact that these were two separate stops, which was a factor in the decision. Initially, he stopped her for speeding and cited her as a result, at which point "any police authority to seize her in connection with that infraction ended when the initial stop concluded," the appeals court ruled. When Minard stopped her again, based on the "aggressive" one-fingered salute, it was completely unjustified.
Sure, she was vulgar, the court admitted, but they also claimed it was her right. The 3-0 court's ruling on a motion to dismiss means Cruise-Gulyas' lawsuit can proceed, the court stated. The cop's part of the ticket was dismissed, which didn't surely make his day, he said.
"I guess it's rude and surely disrespectful, but according to the law, she had a right to flip me the bird," Minard explained. "All I would like to tell her is that I was only doing my job."
So flipping off a cop is considered acceptable behavior? Sure, feel free, it is your constitutional right, but keep in mind that the case asserting your right may end you costing you an arm and a leg defending yourself. In the end, the advice here is that maybe it's just much easier not to poke the bear--or the officer in this case.
Service King Broadway in San Antonio, TX 78217
Sources: Reuters and CNN
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