The System

Several weeks ago on a sunny afternoon, a friend of mine was riding his Harley Davidson along the beach through the small town of Juno. He wasn't speeding, in spite a the low 25 mph speed limit. He wasn't driving wrecklessly. He was simply cruising along the beautiful beachfront road when he was pulled over by an officer of the law. The offense: his pipes were excessively loud. Now, as a biker I'd be the first to admit that some pipes may be excessively loud and don't belong in a residential neighborhood at 3:00 AM, but these were dealer installed pipes that had baffles. They aren't "excessively" loud, but they have that enhanced rugged sound. Needless to say, this went to court. He was prepared to ask the difficult questions of "how the volume was measured" and "what standards are in placed to define excessively loud", but he also learned how the court system works. There are three pleas one can go with: guilty, not guilty, and no contest. In the first scenario it is a waste of time to be there for a traffic violation. The second allows you to ask questions and challenge your accuser. The third gets an immediate decision from the judge. Well, the beauty of this is the result. The judge asked my friend to produce any one of three results. The first being that the defective part had been identified and corrected. The second was that the motorcycle pipes were too loud and the situation had been corrected. The third is that there was no problem. In all three situations it required nothing more than a letter from the local motorcycle expert (the dealership) to this effect. It seems there is no problem with the motorcycle pipes. Hell, I could have told them that! There may be readers that say this was not justice. The fact is that the traffic stop was an injustice. That isn't to say that there are not those that may abuse motorcycle exhaust systems by putting on loud pipes. The problem was in the fact that this officer in this situation cited that problem on pipes with baffles that were not excessively loud unless he happened to be suffering from a migraine headache. I feel confident that a realignment of police priorities will focus on those traffic incidents that can actually cause harm to innocent bystanders and remove the responsibility of officers to cast opinions on the volume level of exhaust pipes.