hehehe...yea listen to this guy.

 

lemme guess... you all are under 21?

not a smart move "testing" a cop during a traffic stop...

you got off lucky not being arrested or your face on teh ground with a gun pointed at you.

i tell you from first hand accounts. traffic stops are the second worse things a cop does. first is a domestic dispute (well my source tells me...)

first and foremost, make the situation as calm and as assuring to the cop.

if you have tinted windows, roll them down.

have all passengers with their hands visible to the cop.

driver's hands on the wheel.

only when the cop asks for the usual paperwork do you actually get them.

ever wonder what a driver who is reaching over to the glove box looks like to a cop?

 

I gotta agree with this, my brother was thinking about becoming a cop and was taking all these cop training classes and he said the worst stop a cop can make is a traffic stop. Never know what one is gonna encounter.

Oh yeah bad move on your friend gettin out. But from what I was told if your friend has somewhere to go and they are not gonna arrest him he is free to leave. The cops cannot unlawfully detain him over a certain time. They pulled you over not him.

Also with all the talk about asking one to pop your hood, I know it's a little off topic, but just say no. There is no harm in saying no, don't give in to the cops scare tactics.

 

It is good for all your friends to have the same story.
It is not good for them to be screwing around while the cop is dealing with you all.

If the cop asks you to get out and tells your friend not to, you need to, and your friend needs not to.
If your friend does anyway, he could arrest your friend, or worse feel threatened by his sudden approach and shoot him when he laughs and points his finger at the officer. Not worth the trouble to screw around.
Cops make mistakes too, including shooting people. So just be calm and nice and tell your friends to behave. If they don't, don't let em back in your car, because they could make it worse for you.

Truth is, with four people in the car, even if they are all friends, if it came down to it and they were all willing to testify in court under oath that you weren't racing, it would be in your favor, unless there were several other witnesses claiming you were racing.

As for launching, you should be "Just accelerating to the speed limit officer, I don't believe there is anything wrong with that." which is far better than trying to "get ahead" of someone, or trying "beat" someone to a lane or turn. Read the laws on Contest of Speed. They are actually pretty specific about the type of behavior and vague about what constitutes proof of that behavior. So there is a good chance you getting screwed whatever was going on.
See here:
http://www.dmv.ca.gov/pubs/vctop/d11/vc23109.htm

Now, had you rev'd and just let the Camero pass you and cut you off, the cop might have gone after him, saving you all this trouble.

Your friends and others are right, admitting you broke the law, whether it is speeding or racing or whatever, is basically all the proof the officer needs if he is uncertain of what was really going on. You are guilty by your own admission. Technically, you were racing in the eyes of the law, and admitted it, so you did get lucky. This cop must not have seen you actually launch.

When one cop is playing bad cop "shall I call the tow truck" and the other is pretending to be more logical or sane "hold up", you have a great opportunity to say something like, "This guy is threatening to tow my car and you are claiming I was racing when I wasn't and telling me to admit I was. It feels to me like you are trying to coerce me into admitting to racing or you are gonna tow my car, which is dumb because you can only tow my car if I was racing, which I wasn't." That should get them thinking. When the cop then stated it outright "tell me the truth or else i'm going to call the tow truck and impound if for 30 days, lock you up, and make your friends walk home", you should say "I have told you the truth, but I do believe threatening to jail me in order to get me to admit to your version of the truth to avoid consequences is illegal." You don't want to make any threats back or push them, but letting them know you are aware of the laws should clue them in and help them realize their mistake. If any of your friends heard that part, you would have a swell point to make to the judge if things had gone bad and you had to go to court.

Overall the biggest thing to learn from this is that with four people in the car, and Camero next to you ready to take off, and zipping around some turns, not a single one of you noticed or thought to look for a cop around.
That means you should drive normally within the laws as you lack the necessary awareness to take risks.
One could also call into question the logic of trying to beat a Z28(which are easily modified) anywhere with the weight of 4 people in your car, plus you putting your friends at risk just because someone else was acting like a jerk.

The next time you are beside someone and are thinking about launching, think about how if a cop sees you take off from the line at the same time as the other guy, he could arrest you, and him, and impound your cars and let you spend the night in jail, leaving you with a case to fight and a big fine and tow/storage fees, even if the cop is *wrong* and you were just launching spiritedly.
To him he witnessed the Contest of Speed behavior, which is all it takes.