Police check-points are common in Colombia, Ecuador, Perú, and Venezuela. We've never had a problem and found that the Peruvian police are excellent travel advisors - once the ice is broken they always told us the best restaurants, bars, and sights to visit.

I think having a good attitude is probably the best advice.

Playing dumb and pretending not to understand their language is also really good advice. The less you understand, the harder it is for them to get angry with you in my experience. When you start speaking to them in broken Spanish and they know that you understand, then the more angry they will become.

Some of this advice is country specific. For example, in Latin American countries I see no problem with showing them good color copies of your documents. If they ask to see your original passport then you can show them that. If they ask for originals of your title and registration just be confident and tell them that those copies are the originals. How can he be familiar with the exact titles and registrations of 50 different states?

If you are in China or Saudi Arabia then I would just stick to showing the original documents.

The more traveling that you do, the better spidey sense you get about how corrupt the police officer is. One thing I have learned is that corrupt police officers are often lazy. For example, they will be at the side of the road off their bike and finishing with a car they just pulled over. He will see you all of a sudden, realize you are a foreigner, and gesture for you to pull over. I have learned to just wave at these guys and ride off. So far I have never had one jump on his bike and try to chase me down. I think their thought process is, oh, I will just wait for an easier tourist to get.

If you have ever watched the discovery channel you will notice how the lion goes after the weakest animal in the herd. These corrupt officers are the same. They will look for a shiny bmw motorcycle, someone traveling alone, a younger person, new riding gear, red hair, etc, etc

A bad situation I had to deal with was a police checkpoint on a remote highway in Argentina. I had just removed the duck tape that had been covering my F650 the whole trip so it was all shiny and nice looking. For this checkpoint you had to come to a complete stop. I came to a stop and the guy waved me over to pull over. He asked me where the fire extinguisher was on my bike and told me it was a requirement to have on your motorcycle in Argentina. He made me go into the police shack with him, took my passport, and then told me the fine was $400 US in cash and that I could call my parents if I didn't have the money. After 2-3 hours of threatening to imprison me if I didn't pay. I finally just held my hands up like he could put the cuffs on and arrest me if he wanted to. At that point he had, had enough of me, gave me my passport back and told me to get out of there. I went back to my bike, geared up, noted the license plate of the police car in the garage and wrote it down on my hand. I guess my buddy had been closely monitoring my actions from 50 ft away and he ran out and made me go back in the building with him. He made me go to the bathroom and wash the writing off my hand and then closed the door of the bathroom, took his gun out and pointed it at my head and threatened me. I pretended to be really scared and then got out of there in a hurry.

I met some Brazilian friends who had a pretty good strategy for dealing with police officers. They were journalists and told me that whenever they got pulled over they would jump off their bike pretty quick, get their cameras out and start taking pictures of the officer and the bikes. The officer would come up and ask them what they were doing and they would tell them that they were writing an article for one of Brazil's largest papers about traveling in the country they were in. Then they would ask the police officer if he wanted to be featured in one of their articles. They said each time the police officer would politely refuse, give them a warning, and send them on their way.

Social media has probably helped to cut down on some of the police corruption in recent years.

btw: Another good note, if you are traveling in a group talk to everyone ahead of time about how if the police do try to pull you over, that only one in the group will pull over while the rest wait 5 miles down the road. It is better for one guy to take the hit and have to pay a possible bribe than 5 guys get extorted one by one.

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http://www.journeyrider.net Latin America blog (07-8)

Best advice I can give u is dont kiss arxe and dont be an arxe . If someone had started filming me on a traffic stop then the ticket book wouldve definitely come out . Certain offences will get a nicking no matter what u do , eg drink/drug driving , no insurance and bad driving .Speeding would depend on the situation and conditions . I can only speak for the UK and have long since retired but a good attitude generally helps but not always and producing photocopied documents would Not be a good idea as personally I would now be thinking Crime as opposed to traffic matters

I agree with Chris Gale. Maybe I have been lucky but I have never had a really bad time with cops anywhere on the planet and I have been around. I am not their pal and I only answer questions they ask, I don't play stupid, I try and be compliant. In addition, I carry a small wallet with little money-the real money is spread throughout and no, not where you are thinking. Agree with Chris and I wouldn't even look at copies of documents and I have been a government official and I would never accept copied documents, I used to see 'letters of recommendation' all the time, load of rubbish. Somebody's Granny saying they are a good guy, waste of my time. Sometimes people would give you too much documentation and my first thought was, a) what are they trying to hide? and b) they are trying to confuse me with all this rubbish. Thats just my experience.
Take care, be safe.

I think the big difference is cops in the UK and many other countries aren't looking for a bribe, in fact would react very negatively to being offered one. For those guys they are genuinely looking at traffic law violations and humility is the best course of action to try and avoid a ticket. However there are countries where bribery is not only possible but probable, and it's those where a strategy is worth having - they're playing a game, and if you know their rules you can beat them at it.

Exactly. Our experiences with law enforcement in Europe or North America don't necessarily apply elsewhere. In fact, the experiences of the ex-law enforcement folks above don't even apply across the board in our own countries--for example, I've personally witnessed bribes delivered to police in the US, and in some situations they're the norm.

Aside from all that, in a lot of countries the normal course of events is to use money, power or influence in all interactions with government officials, uniformed or otherwise. This is no mystery, and we've all seen it in various parts of the world. That "letter of recommendation" can be essential, as can payment of bogus "fees" or "taxes." Sometimes matters are going nowhere productive until the mention of one's friendship with a superior--real or imagined--or the presentation of their card, letter, phone number or even just their name. Particularly in rigid authoritarian hierarchies, everyone is justifiably afraid of offending anyone who outranks them, and they'd rather move on to the next victim.

On the other hand, I have no experience with filming encounters myself, so I'm not sure how this works to make things better or worse. And sometimes to appropriate goal is not "beating them at their own game," but rather "losing less badly."

The copies thing seems old advice to me. Back when the Moroccan Fuzz thought copying was a carbon sooted lino type on crinkly paper, shoulder pads were in fashion and Soviet made camera was a fast introduction to US customs officials, a laminated laser print probably passed. Now every man and his dog is permanently indebted to HP or Canon for RF chipped cartridges it won't fly.

Almost worth showing them a phone picture and saying your government went paperless.

Andy

Having said all that, my personal policy is not to give bribes except in truly dire situations. Even then, normal practice is to bargain hard, although with a lot of smiles, compliments, and praise. Demands for large sums of money are often satisfied by offers of bits of food, used batteries, or (in the case of my former self) cigarettes. Mostly, the demands eventually evaporate with patience, inquiries about their families, and exaggerated ignorance of language or customs.

Surprisingly often, the key is offering business cards with demands that they visit in your home country--no one has yet actually done this, although I had a brief scare related to an officer in the Malian army who turned out to be highly-placed and scheduled for anti-insurgency training in, I believe, North Carolina.

The expression we used to use was when someone had u by the balls please dont squeeze too tightly Which I guess could cover alot of lifes transactions.......

Cant say I would advise my approach to dealing with the law but after a very hot frustrating day in the Punjab and fixing 2 punctures and a broken foot rest I was stopped by 2 rural cops on a scooter.
They started with a very nasty attitude and taking the piss out of the way I look, (long haired old hippy style) and wanted to go through my luggage.

So I studied these two guys with their smart uniforms and fine coiffures, no guns and no radio.
Figured they would never catch me on their scoot so I just took of at high speed.
Not the best reaction but hey! I was having a bad day

I got half way thru your post and thought u were going to deck them both........
.

Hee hee.. felt like it. Had a little chuckle later over a cup of tea. Can still hear them blowing their whistles