So I was on my way to work on my normal route. It's one single road pretty much all the way from my house to my job. It goes through a relatively small but very populated college town and then away from it. To get home I take almost the same road but one that is parallel because that has a right turn at the end and not a left(one less light to sit at).

As Im driving through the town I pass the first of two police stations on the road. I notice two cops in the opposite lane who turn into my lane a car behind me. About a mile further along the car behind me is gone and the two cops are now behind me. Another 1/4 of a mile and their lights go on.

I pull over and there are now 3 cop cars behind me with lights on. I turn off the bike and put my hazards on really feeling confused. One of the officers comes up to me and asks for my license and registration then tells me that an undercover officer saw me passing multiple cars on a double yellow road.

I responded with "thats not my style of riding/driving, and I wasnt even on that road". He asked how I got here and I said the same road all the way from my house. He looked confused for a bit.

Then the undercover officer rolled up along side and one of the other cops went up to his window. I could see the cop inside the car shaking his head. Then the cop who went up to the window said "yeah, this isnt the guy, but it looked like him to a "T"".

Officer who took my license and registration handed them back to me and then asked me where I was headed. I said to work and he asked where and I told him(hoping it would give me a little cred for next time they saw me(the owner of the place I work at donates to the police big time)).

The officer actually apologized and said it was a case of wrong place wrong time and to have a good day.

The thing is, I saw not one other bike on my ride today to work(I sometimes see one or two). And Ive never seen another bike that looked like mine(is any Harley exactly the same?).

So my question is, to a cop, do all motorcyclists look the same? Do we just blend in without any distinguishing characteristics? Is every black bike just another black bike?

 

Probly some one on a rice rocket. They tend to ride like ideats and they look a lot like a harley lol

 

Interesting that a reckless driver would be cause for all that attention, but yeah, I can see them mistaking you for the other guy from what they probably relayed to each other over the radio if they were that motivated to get the guy.

 

Wow that stinks! At least they were nice about it.

 

Yep, motorcyclist north bound on 59th street and you are on it will get you stopped every time. Now if you was black you could add racial profiling and get Al Sharpton to yell racism!

 

The funny thing was my boss had passed me while I was stopped. When I got to work he asked me what I did wrong. I told him the story and he laughed, said they should have given me a ticket for future reference.

 

I think it’s a bit ridiculous that they always wanna know where you are going. What does that have to do with anything (especially since they conceded you were the wrong guy). Next time, inform him that since he is at work, you are going to his house to meet up with his wife in order to knock the cobwebs off of that thing....

 

I had a case of mistaken identity about 10 years ago, was removed from an airplane in handcuffs by 5 sheriffs and then we met up with 3 TSA agents outside the airplane, then did the perp walk through the airport to a small office.

I sat there, handcuffed, for over an hour while they tried to figure out why none of my I/D matched up with the guy they were looking for. They were about 2 minutes away from taking me downtown to be fingerprinted. I told them that had already been done, for my concealed carry permit. That seemed to shed a whole new light on the situation and shortly thereafter they let me go. No apology.

 

Hyper ..being that you are in Lawrenceville, I am guessing the small college town is Princeton. Also I guess you are taking 206 and/or 130. If that is the case, most of the cops up there are clueless. A bike is a bike to them. If they can't read a nameplate I don't think most of them could tell you what brand of bike they saw.

 

Of course no apology...in their mind they did nothing wrong. I am guessing you missed your flight. I also bet the officers involved did nothing to help you get another flight.