What excuse have you used to get out of a speeding ticket?

Keep a bottle of stage blood in your glove compartment and you’ll never have another speeding ticket. If you’re stopped, squirt it on your lap before the officer comes over, and say “Officer, I’m so glad to see you, I’m trying to get to the hospital, I think I’m going to pass out.”

I can honestly say I have never tried to excuse my way out of a ticket because I was always caught speeding. I never liked getting a ticket (past tense, because i haven’t had one in almost four years) but never felt it was anybody’s fault but my own.

Never successfully talked my way out of a ticket.

On the three occasions I’ve purposely broken traffic laws and had with a really good excuse – driving my wife to the hospital to deliver a baby – I never got pulled over. :-\

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BTW, laser radar, like any other measuring device, must be calibrated properly and on a certain schedule. Same is true for the calibration equipment. On up the line. Law enforcement can be subpoenaed to provide those certification records and if any are missing, you might get the case dismissed.

In some states, they’ll even let you off if your car’s speedometer is off.

But typically, your best bet is to simply show up on the appointed court date, by yourself, sans lawyer. In my experience, traffic court is heavily weighted towards levying the most minor penalties on those first-time or infrequent traffic violators.

Not really an excuse, but I once said to the cop: “Officer, I sure would appreciate it if you didn’t give me a ticket”—and it worked!

@gasman, good for you!

We were having a gathering at our house after my wife’s grandmother’s funeral. I was running late and was headed home. I had just picked up a huge bouquet of flowers that sat in the front seat next to me. A cop pulled me over for going 47 in a 25. I told him that I knew it sounded like the most made-up story ever, but I was late to the wake for my wife’s grandma, and I just picked up the flowers and such. He said “I can’t give you a ticket when you’re on the way to a wake. Have a nice day”.

I’ve never gotten a ticket, though I was once pulled over for driving too slowly.

In suburban and rural Missouri, most nocturnal police activity is focused on apprehending drunk drivers; as such, you may get some leeway with your speed.

I got off twice on the same out-of-town road trip, because I didn’t have proof of insurance with me, which would have required a court appearance had I been issued a ticket. In both cases, the speed limits for the segments of road were deceptively low (one had lots of different speed limits and I plain didn’t see the sign on the other). Anyway, since I had a clean record they elected not to write the tickets because of the court appearance factor and, I suppose, my cooperative nature.

Sometimes, they will let you go if you don’t admit to doing anything wrong. I rolled through a stop sign once right in front of a cop and pulled into a parking lot (where I had intended to go in the first place) before the cop could pull me over. He asked if I knew why he pulled me over and I said “I don’t know. I was going slow.” He said something like “alright, have a nice day” and left.

I had a firefighter sticker on my back window so the cop was cool enough to let me go, However I wasn’t going 90. I don’t think I have ever driven that fast in my life.

I met a woman once who had NERSES (a Turkish last name, apparently) on her license plate. She said that it had gotten her out of all kinds of parking tickets.
Not the same, I know, but you at least earn most of your speeding tickets.

I got caught in the draft!