The driver then pulled his fist back to punch me in the face. He was about 4 inches taller than me, aggressive and half full. Before he could hit me, I grabbed hold of him, pulled him out of the car, squeezed his head under my arm until he quietened down a bit, threw him onto the ground, dropped on him with my knees and held him there. He suffered a sore neck and a couple of broken ribs, but, under the circumstances, I felt justified.

When the first police officer arrived, I was sitting on my assailant, to stop him from getting up. They were on first name terms, in fact the first thing the officer said was "Hello Andy". Sounds ludicrous, doesn't it? Then he told me that Andy was a nice guy when he hadn't been drinking. I told him to check his blood alcohol level and charge him. The officer then said that if Andy was charged with drink driving, his insurance wouldn't pay for my car damage. [As if that were of any consequence.]

Then two more officers arrived [apparently more senior than the first one] and asked me to walk back up the street with them to inspect my car. Whilst we were up the street, Andy and his car disappeared. He was not charged. I contacted the officer in charge of the local police station and was told that I was in the wrong for getting into Andy's car and assaulting him. I gave my client, who had seen Andy sideswipe my car, as a witness and was told that she had seen nothing. Obviously she had been got at.

I went to the CIB and reported the lot of them. Fortunately, I knew the house where one of the other witnesses [who the police didn't know about] used the phone. Subsequently, these two men, who had also been threatened with violence, were able to speak on my behalf. But no-one was ever charged over this incident.

In retrospect, I should have gone to the media.

I'm sure we'd all like to think that my experience was just an isolated exception. But it apparently involved an officer-in-charge of a large suburban station and possibly his entire staff. And what's the usual suspected reason when a well-off person receives preferential treatment?

A while later, the son of a well known and well liked Fremantle business couple was arrested on a minor nuisance charge and allegedly roughed up. He was a slightly built young man, possibly not an angel, but didn't look big enough to cause much trouble to a number of arresting officers.

His parents called a public meeting, which got a very large turnout. We were asked to speak out if we'd been treated inappropriately by police officers. A significant number of people had stories to tell. None of this is proof of course, but no-one there could not have at least had doubts about some police conduct.

Back to tail-gating. A recent WA survey showed that a large proportion of people find this a major problem. Just think about the consequences of a large, fast moving vehicle driving too close behind you and being unable to stop in time. You, through no fault of your own, could be dead. Isn't this serious enough to expect some effective police action?

Very interesting Rex.

I think that police misbehaviour is actually very widespread and that some officers, if not many, have no qualms about making it glaringly obvious. Two of my above examples (Yeppoon and Lakes Entrance) were just the most blatant displays of abject misbehaviour (in fact all of my examples were to unacceptable extents).

But again I say here, that I support an efficient, effective and accountable police force, and I acknowledge that most of their efforts are commendable.

I just wish we could deal effectively with the rogue element.

.
Re: tailgating.

It confounds me as to why the police give it the complete miss.

I reckon that drivers who just put up with chronic tailgaiters don’t deserve to have a drivers licence to the same extent as the bloody tailgaters….because they are basically condoning themselves being placed under ongoing (not just momentary) added risk, or more likely just blithely ignoring this risk or not worrying about it (which is irresponsible)….and they are encouraging the turds to keep on driving like that.
But if they pull over or change lanes to let the mongrels through, it would just encourage them as well. So that leaves few options – flashing brakelights, gently slowing down in front of them, throwing their arm out the window and making their discontent obvious or reporting them to police.

In my experience the last option will get you nowhere. The police, RACQ and Dept of Transport have all recommended to me that flashing brakelights or giving other signals or slowing down is not good. Therefore they suggest by default that you should just put up with it! Well I say crap to that! It is obvious that neither the RACQ nor the Dept of Transport have given this matter sufficient consideration, needless to say along with the police…. which is bizarre given the RACQ surveys that have shown tailgating to be such a major concern.

Pffffffff…… what do you do??!!

Re: tailgating.

"...But if they pull over or change lanes to let the mongrels through, it would just encourage them as well."

You obviously feel strongly about the tailgating but I presume you would concede that the situation would be different on a multilane freeway. It would be pretty unproductive if someone was illegally sitting in the right hand lane and some vigilante driver got worked up by the law breaking / dangerous driving and tailgated them then the original driver decided to be a vigilante by not changing lanes as it would "let the mongrels through" / encourage the second type of dangerous driving / law breaking (tailgating). The likely corollary would be both vigilantes became increasingly worked up and perpetuating an extremely dangerous interaction at high speed with innocent members of the public in the area who could be killed if anything goes wrong.

Yes well, there are all sorts of scenarios where people can get worked up and end up in a much more dangerous situation.

Of course, your safety comes first, so if you are subjected to ridiculous driving behaviour, you do whatever you can to legally reduce or alleviate that risk. And if after signalling your discontent, the driver imposing it upon you continues to do so in defiance of your obvious concerns, then you just give them the road if you can…. and take their number and report them…. and then demand that the police act on it.

If you feel that you have been forced to give the road to a dangerous driver due to real concern for your own safety and that of your passengers, then by goodness you should feel that it is worth pursuing with the police.

We’ve all got to find our own balance on these things. Sticking to the principle of law and upholding your rights is important. But your safety is importanter (:>|.

In fact, if you do it to the extent that you stay under unsafe circumstances or heightened risk, then you are really going against the principle that you are trying to uphold

There are regular articles in our local paper quoting police officers asking the public to report dangerous drivers and being prepared to give evidence in court against them if required.

A few years ago, I was chronically tailgated by a car, on a street which was not wide enough for me to pull over and let him pass. There were no side streets for me to turn into and no suitable verges for me to temporally stop on. This is a fully built up suburban street in an area where residents regularly complain about speeding motorists. He obviously wanted to go much faster than the posted limit, but I was in his way. But I couldn't get out of his way anyway.

Eventually he illegally overtook me on a bend and almost collided with a vehicle coming in the opposite direction. The driver of the other vehicle was fortunately able to take evasive action.

He sped off, but was obliged to stop at the next intersection where I caught up with him. I let him see me checking his number plate and writing it down.

I phoned the police, gave them the details, told them I had a passenger who would corroborate my account and said I was prepared to give evidence in court. Shortly afterwards, the officer I spoke to phoned me back and said this driver had a list of traffic offense convictions a mile long, some of them serious, thanked me for my public spirited action and said they'd be in touch.

I heard nothing from them again!