The best of the worst excuses Canadian drivers have given cops

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People will say just about anything to get out of a ticket. And police have heard it all! Yet they never stop asking: ‘why were you ( insert crime here) ?’ 

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Maybe it’s because the lines they hear are often hilarious. It seems that in-the-moment pressure of an inquisitive police officer leaning in through your car window can be a powerful catalyst for creativity.  

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The best of the worst excuses Canadian drivers have given cops Back to video

Just the other week, police on Vancouver Island were fed a line by a driver caught speeding through a school zone. It was a basic plea of ignorance, but one so unlikely as to be noteworthy. The individual claimed they didn’t know it was a school zone or that school was in. The problem with their story? They lived nearby and were at that very moment driving to pick up their child to take them to school. 

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Here are some other unreal excuses law breakers have given Canadian authorities over the last few years. 

‘I was checking to see if my rim was rattling’

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A Brampton Dodge Charger driver who was pulled over for doing 152 km/h in an 80 km/h zone tried to reason his way out of an instant impound by saying he was performing some sort of mechanical inspection. For crying out loud, man! If you’re going to play ‘What’s That Noise!?’ as a way to diagnose your vehicle’s ailments, do so at legal speeds. It was the man’s second stunt driving charge this year.  

‘I am not geographically good’

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Blaming your speeding habit on your high school geography teacher isn’t going to earn you any pity points with the police. At 43 km/h over the limit , there probably wasn’t any reason police would’ve accepted in this case, short of the classic mother-giving-birth-in-the-back or other such medical emergency.  

‘I was trying to get home to my air conditioning’

This PEI driver is probably kicking themselves for not springing for the AC repairs on their car because the heat seems to have gotten to their head. They told police they were in a rush to get home to their air conditioned house after a long, hot day at work, and that’s why they were doing 47 km/h over the legal speed. And how do you think the patrolling officer felt standing outside the car on the side of the road? 

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‘Police targeted me for my flashy car’ 

It’s called The Bright Green Porsche Defence, and so far it has not worked. There are more case details here , but basically a Vancouver driver charged with excessive speeding tried to argue that police singled him out amongst other speeders due to the fact that he had an expensive and eye-catching vehicle. And then the judge was like, ‘fine, but you were still speeding, right?’ Case closed. 

‘I realized I was drunk, turned around, and crashed on my way home’ 

If you’re too drunk to drive, you’re too drunk to drive anywhere — even home. Police in PEI responded to an incident involving a 30-year-old graduate of the Atlantic Police Academy who failed to execute a U-turn and backed into a ditch upon realizing he was drunk and shouldn’t be driving. He was suspended from his job at a nearby correctional institute as a result.  

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‘But you’ve already charged me with this!’

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The ‘double jeopardy’ rule that prevents courts from trying someone for the same charge on a federal and state level does not apply to speeding infractions. If you repeatedly offend, you’ll be repeatedly punished — and often exponentially. But one entitled Burlington driver who was caught stunt driving twice in one year couldn’t believe these rules also applied to them. “I can’t believe you’re doing this!” he allegedly told police as they towed his Rover . It probably sunk in on the walk home. 

‘I was holding up traffic because I wanted to photograph the crash site’ 

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Slowing down while passing the scene of an accident for safety’s sake is appropriate at times, but it’s never OK to hold up traffic so that you can get a few photographs of the carnage for your Facebook page. A driver from Port Moody, B.C. was fined $368 for driving while holding a handheld device, after police noticed traffic queuing up behind him at the scene of an accident . He figured his amateur photography purposes should make him an exception. It didn’t.  

‘I drink too much’

In late summer 2020, employees at a Beer Store denied service to a heavily intoxicated individual who then tried to get in his car and drive away. When police pulled him over and he blew at three times the legal blood-alcohol limit, he said that he “figured [his arrest] would happen as he drank too much.” Maybe it’s more of an admission than an excuse — either way, it’s sad. This was his third such conviction in 15 years. 

And the only excuse that matters: none at all

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A 19-year-old Brampton man wasted no time or energy with a story that would justify him travelling at 221 km/h on Highway 400 this spring. When police asked him why he was going so fast, “ he didn’t provide any excuse .” Well said, young man. Maybe the courts dealing with your stunt driving charge will take your frank honesty into consideration when deciding how far up to the $10,000 fine maximum you should be taken.