Getting to church on time was an appearance that my TBM mom had to pull off every Sunday. If the meeting started at 10 am and it was a 20 minute drive for a sane driver, then my mom would try to pull it off in 12 minutes. She was always late. My father always took his time even though he missed a good chunk of Sacrament. He never was pulled over while driving to church.

One year was really bad. I was with her when she was pulled over 3 times within the same month. Twice she was caught speeding going home from church by the same sheriff deputy. I still remember her speeds of 52 and 47 in a school zone of 25. She was irked because the officer wouldn't buy her wacky interpretation of why flashing yellow lights didn't apply to a public school zone on Sundays. Her other excuse centered around the crockpot that was left on without water. She tried to convince him that our house was in danger of burning down. The officer ignored the excuses and issued citations. Both of these tickets (and another one by the State Highway Patrol on the freeway~ She told him that we were late to church.) caused her insurance premiums to rise. Of course, I was told not to tell dad. Dad found out anyways.

I have always felt strongly that the reason Utah is known for some of the worst speeders is that so many mormons are late to this or that meeting.

That right there is bald faced discrimination of the lards serpents...couldn't even order up a quick mctrance so they could drive by undetected...was your mom speaking I'll of the lards anointed...or maybe looking at chippendales pics??...hard to keep the good spirit wrangling kids that don't wanna go to church

1977. I was 17, it was the summer between my junior & senior years in high school. A local mormon family, whose son was my best friend (and who had a cute sister) had just moved to Utah, and my cousins there had been bugging me to come visit, so I took a few days off work, jumped in my '67 Mustang, and headed to Utah from SoCal.

The trip was uneventful until I hit Fillmore. I got off the 15 there to get gas, filled up, and got back on the freeway. A local cop was sitting under the overpass where I got on, but I was just getting on and wasn't worried. I should have been.

His lights go on, and he comes after me. I pull over, wondering what I did wrong (I wasn't speeding). The mormon cop tells me I was going 80 in a 55 zone. I tried to protest, telling him I had just gotten back on the freeway, but he wasn't interested. So he writes me a ticket. Before handing it to me, he comments on my out-of-state plates...I ask if I can mail in the fine from California, and he says no. I have to go into town and see the local judge. Right now. My only other option is to go sit in jail while he calls my parents.

So I follow him into town. The judge's "office" is an open area above the local hardware store. The cop leads me in, tells the judge I was "speeding like a banshee, going 80," and hands him my ticket.

I get a very mormon-like lecture about breaking the law, endangering others, how they don't put up with that in Utah, especially from out-of-staters. He waves off my protest of innocence. Tells me I can either pay an $80 fine right then and there, or I can sit in jail for 3 days to "pay my debt."

Now, remember, this was 1977 -- the days before ATM cards and such. I had about $50 cash, which I needed for gas to get up to SLC and back home, but no more. And I had my checkbook.

So I tell him I'll pay the fine, and get out my checkbook. "No checks, son," he says, "just cash." I tell him I only have $50 cash, and if I give that to him, I won't be able to get home.

He looks me over for a second, then asks, "Are you LDS?" Yes, I say, I am. I'm the priest quorum president. I'm BIC. My uncle is the official church spokesman (yeah, I name-dropped). "I'm the stake president here," he says, "so I guess if you're LDS I can take your check. But I'm not supposed to, so make it out to me, not the court." Um...ok. I write him a check for $80, for something I didn't do. The two of them warn me again to be an "honest priesthood holder" and not break the law, and they let me go.

When I get to SLC, the dad of the family I'm visiting tells me it's all a scam. A known one. The cops and judge there pull over almost all out-of-state cars, and pull the same thing, and keep all the "fines." And they play the "are you LDS" thing all the time, too.

So...I call my bank. Tell them to stop payment on the check. And I get off the freeway at the first Fillmore exit on the way home, drive slowly through town, and get back on at the far end of town (at night), so they don't see me.

Nobody ever came after me for the bum check. I heard later on their scam got them busted by the state cops. A bit of justice done :)

edit: looks like Utah local cops are still pulling this scam:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702304441404577480621531645182



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/09/2018 04:25PM by ificouldhietokolob.

It revolves around MORMON STANDARD TIME

I hit a deer going 120 in Prove Canyon while LDS [if only on paper] (the deer wasn't going that fast... or lds), in the eighties.

My roommate ALWAYS drove fast (and had told me he had 30+tickets-already). He wanted to drive up the canyon and see some land, and asked if I'd come along.

Sure, I said, as long as I drove. I did, and on the way home, dimmng the lights for an incoming vehicle, it happened, right before we passed one another. In Utah(mounains), mountain roads are banked in the curves and have wide shoulders.

I got the car manageable, in my lane, after the accident, by slowing down about 40 mph, to around 80, whereby I then turned around to go back and look. The deer was gone. Poor thing. Good thing we were going that fast. At 80, it may have been the windshield, and us!... and rolled...

It just hurt the left front lighting and overall pretty minor. Clipped the back end of the animal, I suppose, which had no idea how fast we were going... or how good I could drive (fast).

I usually stay between 55 and 95, depending on the roads, vehicle, passengers, conditions, laws, etc., etc., etc.

I am not Mormon [anymore]. I never really was but I tried my best, and it still wasn't good enough [the 'church'].

M@t

I remember being a newly minted driver and going to Utah (from Arizona) for a wedding. Parents let me drive on the highway. I hit 70 mph and cruised for a long time...although the speed was 55 at the time.

Parents didn't say anything. Looking back they seemed a little uncomfortable, but didn't say anything because I was just doing what Dad did, lol. That really was the reason--I thought it was OK!

My brothers and I were riding in Elder Jane's car. He liked telling elephant jokes. That was maybe his most redeeming quality. He was driving us up to the Sierra Mountains for some kind of Mormon youth retreat. "I don't like driving under eighty MPH," he said, "the car wants to go faster." We white-knuckled it up the freeway at about ninety. "Why do elephants have red toenails?" he asked us. We didn't know. "From stomping on pygmies," he said, and he laughed and laughed.

plenty of stories!

We had (early 70's) a rather new tool called VASCAR, which stood for (memory) Visual Auto Speed Calculation & Ranging...

it involved inputing a certain distance (two points) & then clicking in the start/stop times of vehicles; it was a stop-watch on steroids! We could wait at funny places where drivers didn't see us.

Speeders ALWAYS asked us: "Where's the radar beam? My radar detector didn't go off!"

When I conversed with a Mormon-looking speeder (SE Idaho) 'suspect' that is, ha ha.... I used the 'obey & sustain' line from the A of Faith!!

Ask any traffic cop in Utah. Will a speeding TBM show their drivers license before they first show their temple recommend?

This isn't a speeding story per se: I was working on the family farm one summer and heard that terrible thump-crunch-thump of a car rolling over; we run out to the road and here is a Honda Civic (back when they were tiny) and a bunch of my Mormon friends were in it, all unhurt, while the car is in the ditch. I guess they were all packed in so tight that no one flew around and got injured.

Probably driving too fast, but the fact that they were OK? We called it "Mormon luck"--yeah, I believe it's a thing.

OK; How bad was the crash? Was the car totaled?

Not a funny or even a particularly interesting story but a story.

I was driving to church (I was a green convert and senior in high school) and wasn’t paying attention to my speed. I was driving 42 in a 30 mph zone. I got pulled over. The officer asked me why I was going so fast. I said, “to church.” He let me off with a written warning. I think the three piece suit helped sell my explanation.

This was in Illinois and there weren’t many Mormons around.

Missionaries used to (still do?) drive backwards because it apparently/ supposedly didn't/ doesn't cause the odometer to advance to the same degree as say going forward might, or does. They could still ride their bikes but they were lazy (and it's less safe-fun-comfortable).

Missionaries have always been on a leash. It just keeps tighter and tighter and they keep getting looser and looser.

TightROLES
TightWAYS
TightWADS

LOOSE Lies
LOOSE Lips
LOOSE Love

The grounds they are sniffing on and laying to waste are their own 'spoils of war'. They are the weapons - and the targets. Do they still drive (you crazy) - BACKWARD?

Did you ever stay home, skip appointments, fudge rules, DRIVE BACKWARD, bum rides, hitchhike, guilt-trip, or con members for rides.

This was in...
The Rural South
Rural Mississippi
Rural America

M@t

Any time driving down the I-15 is a speeding story. And i don't think they know how to drive in the snow either, they still speed and crash. Mormon IQ is lower than badass IQ unfortunately and that is pretty f#cking low as we all know. I can't even write a proper sentence or paragraph without mistakes.