cowtowntaff

So I've been living in LA for a couple of weeks now. It's great and I love it. but something weird happened today. I'm driving the missus's car, she's Canadian and it has Alberta plates (or rather plate, since only the rear plate is required in Alberta), and I'm sitting in stationary traffic at some lights.

A motorcycle traffic cop pulls up alongside me, looks at me through the window, then backs up to check out the rear of the car (presumably to check the licence plate) after a minute or two he just rides off. At no point did he try to talk to me and he didn't have his lights on or anything. Would that be common for a cop to give an out of state car a quick inspection? Could it be possible I could get some kind of nasty surprise in the mail? I definitely wasn't doing anything wrong because I was just sitting there in traffic with everyone else?

Anyone put my mind at rest? Should I have acknowledged his presence? the whole thing has freaked me out a little

Manc

sleep easy Ronnie Biggs, you should be fine.

cowtowntaff

Thanks chief.

penguinsix

He was probably just doing a double check on your tags. If he looked inside and say you driving a car full of kids in say University of California t-shirts going to the beach (i.e. living in California) but driving with foreign tags he might have an excuse to pull you over for failure to properly re-register your car in that state.

This is something you might want to look into. If you have moved there, or your wife is there 'full time' now she's going to need to re-register and license the car in that state. Most states have 30-60 grace periods following a relocation, but it is something you might need to look into. There are exceptions for certain types of jobs (diplomat, some students, etc) and some other variations. It really varies by state, but I would check into the requirements if you have moved to California full time.

Poppy girl

If there was anything wrong he would of taken great pleasure in pulling you over.

Forget it

penguinsix

He's not going to get a ticket in the mail. He can relax about that.

But a tag out of state can be an excuse for a pull over, like a busted tail light or failing to use a turn signal. If the driver was kind of odd looking, like a stoner or three African Americans in gang colors, then the cop would have an excuse to pull over the car ('checking the tags') and then proceed with a few more things, like smelling to see if there is the presence of marijuana, or a protective 'pat down' search of the driver to make sure there are no weapons. I think the cop was probably sizing up the occupants to see if it might be worth it. Pulling over Mr. Goodie to tell him to fix his tags isn't a good use of time vs. pulling over some gang bangers and possibly getting a weapons bust.

I'd still recommend checking into the regulations when you get some time.

cowtowntaff

Yep, I know this is only a short term solution. I will be driving the car back up the Great White North for (Canadian) Thanksgiving by which time I'll have sorted us Californian wheels.

Bob

Yeah, you should have offered him some doughnuts

lapin_windstar

He probably saw Canadian tags and was on the lookout for Tim Horton's.

G77

Timbits and a double double

RoadWarriorFromLP

As is true in some but not all states, California requires front license plates. For years, these front plate laws were rarely enforced, but enforcement has increased as red light cameras have become more commonplace.

Once the cop saw that your plates were from out of state (he might have scratched his head wondering WTF an "Alberta" was), he realized that there was no violation, and drove off. Had you been driving a car with California registration but no front plate, he would surely stopped and cited you.