We all break the law at least a little bit in life; a little speeding here, a little grand theft there. Most of the time we'd all get away with the tiny infractions if we'd use our brains first and just... SHUT UP!!! And not do the cops jobs for them. the tales some people weave (sober) are unreal.

Redditor _PinkIrrelephant reached out to the police to tell us their best tales of arrest. _

MAYBE HE WAS TALKING ABOUT THE SODA?!

My father was a cop for many years and one of his favorite arrest stories was when he pulled someone over for simple traffic violation, I think he didn't do a full stop for a stop sign. When my father asked "do you know why I pulled you over?" The gentleman responded "yea yea it's because of all the drugs in the trunk." After my father read him his rights and was putting him in the back of his car, my dad asked "just out of curiosity, how did you know I knew you had drugs in the back". The man ushered to the radar detector in the front and said "I saw the drug detector on the dash and I knew you had me". My father still laughs about this one 20 years later.

Not a police officer, but I got pulled over I thought it was because of the illegal u-turn I had done and as the usual goes "do you know why I pulled you over?" I sheepishly responded "because I did an illegal u-turn". He kinda just stared for a moment and switched on my headlights and said "your headlights are off and stop doing illegal u-turns".

I'm the idiot in this situation. Being apologetic by nature; when I got pulled over for rolling through a stop sign I said "I'm so sorry officer, I do it all the time".

Pulled a guy over on suspicion of drink driving. We didn't have an ESD (breathalyzer) but he was so drunk he was adamant that my radio was a breathalyzer.

Anyway whilst we were waiting he started to get really agitated as he thought we were up to something. He was begging to "have a go" on the breathalyzer (radio), eventually I let him blow into the radio antenna, told him it was faulty and we had to wait for another.

Unsurprisingly he failed and got arrested. Not quite what you asked for but it still makes me chuckle.

Man was beaten unconscious by three men. I caught one of them escaping on foot but he vigorously denied any knowledge of any incident.

Another officer had collared someone he thought might also be involved, but had little evidence other than the fact he was running away and couldn't really account for his presence.

The other prisoner was being taken to a cell just as I walked into custody with mine. My prisoner looked at him and immediately yelled "Matt, Matt! Matt has got nothing to do with this, you should let him go. He wasn't even there."

A+ for friend loyalty; C- for avoiding self-incrimination.

Once pulled a woman over for speeding, upon approaching the car I notice she has 4 young children in the car and that NONE of them are secured in their seats. Even though there were 3 car seats in the back. So I explain why she was stopped and inquire as to why none of the kids are belted in. Her response was "I DONT HAVE TIME FOR THAT CRAP!!!"

Yes ma'am, I'll be right back with you. Went back to my unit and ran her noting that she had received a ticket the previous year for the same thing, just one child. ROGER THAT! Wrote her for speeding, and 4 for the unsecured kids totaling ~$900 in fines. If she had said they had unlatched to see the police man or some other reasonable excuse and had them buckle up I probably would have let her go with a warning.

BUCKLE YOUR KIDS IN!

I had someone drunkenly confess to me that they witnessed a murder and knew where the murder weapon was ditched...

I have two. First, was a suspicious person behind a business that had been burglarized a bunch of times in the past.

Me: what's your name?

Suspect: Jonathan

Me: okay how do you spell it?

Suspect: ... J-O-T-H-N-A-T-H-A-N -sighs- my name is Robert ___and I have a warrant._

Second was a traffic stop. Driver is in tears begging me not to give him a speeding ticket since he was going to have his license suspended.

Me: tell you what, if you have any information about something more serious than this ticket, I'll give you a warning.

Driver: a couple buddies and I broke into a bunch of cars by Main Street

Me: you've got to be KIDDING me.

Driver: I swear! All the stuff we took is at my friends house.

Turns out the driver was part of a group that was going through car's that were unlocked. We ended up arresting 4 people, 2 adults (18yrs old) and 2 juveniles. They all went to jail for a few years, but I kept my promise and did not give the driver a ticket.

It's pretty common for people to openly admit to driving 10MPH over the speed limit because they think that 10 over is acceptable. It's also common that they don't know the speed limit. So they'll admit to going 45 in what they think is a 35 but it's actually a 25. Your best strategy is just to be polite and play dumb.

I knew a kid who was arrested after pointing a gun at the police after they stopped him because they got a call about car prowlers. When he tried to run away he slipped and fell, so they caught him. When the police officer was telling the other officers that the guy was trying to shoot at him, he said "I forgot to take the safety off". He basically just admitted to attempted murder of a police officer and was sentenced to 13 years in prison at the ripe old age of 17.

My friend apologized for not drinking after the cop asked her if she'd had anything that night.

My brother was caught with a decent amount of marijuana in middle school. Told the officer "I wasn't gonna smoke it I was just gonna sell it."

That was now a distribution charge instead of simple possession. He was never actually charged with anything though, officer felt bad for him I think.

As I was handcuffing a guy after a felony car stop for a stolen car, he looks around sees all the cop cars and the helicopter. Says to me "All this for a gta?" Why thank you sir, now i don't have to interview you.

I had pulled over a guy for some minor traffic offense who I knew had a twin brother. He gave me his name, let's say Jeff. I decided to check the other twin's name as well, boom, warrant. I knew he was bullshitting me but I couldn't prove it.

I chit chatted casually for a few minutes and then asked him "what's Jeff up to these days?" He answered and started telling me and I said "but I thought you were Jeff?!" He didn't even try to get out of it at that point. Admitted he wasn't Jeff and went to jail.

The annoying thing is that I later fell for this with another set of brothers and had to go back and arrest the kid the next day after he totally got the better of me!

Close enough...A friend of mine is a cop and the first time he pulled anyone over it was a couple of teenagers in the car. My buddy says to them jokingly, "alright guys, where are you hiding the pot?" They were instantly terrified so they opened the middle console and handed him an eighth ounce of weed. He couldn't believe it and said he honestly felt really bad because at that point he had no choice but to write them up.

My girlfriend was going through customs one time, and when the security guy asked her if she was carrying anything, she responded with "Just my explosive personality", followed by finger guns and a wink. This set of actions was immediately regretted.

I used to intern for a prosecutor, we had one case where we had the officer's report for the DUI. After completing (and passing) the field sobriety, the guy told the officer "Oh good, I thought you were going to ask me to say the alphabet backwards. I can't even do that sober!"

We kept a copy of the report in the office for later laughs.

Me after pulling over a 40+ year old man on a scooter: "Am i going to find anything illegal under the seat?"

Him: "Nothing that belongs to me...."

Hold my proverbial beer.

I was a mall cop for a time, and it was about as stupid a job as people expect it to be. however, I drew the graveyard shift as it was at least interesting. most of the time.

Picture the scene. 3 AM. Huge empty lot. One SUV parked crooked in the middle of this sea of concrete... and its the only car there.

I take the patrol truck over to look at it, and there are 4 young women in the truck.

Three are sleeping. When I knock on the window, two wake up.

Fast Forward through the obligatories "You okay, private property, suspicious vehicle, see your ID, blah blah etc etc."

Me: So what are you all doing here?

Driver: We just had dinner and were resting, it disagreed with us.

Me: What did you eat?

Front Passenger: Potatoes

Me: (pointing a passed out drunk chick in the back) Did she eat potatoes too?

Front Passenger: (giggle, hiccup) ((no shit)) Oh yeah, a LOOOOTTT.

They all giggle.

That is when I asked the county sheriffs to come remove these drunk asses from my sphere of liability. Which they did.

But when the radio call went out for 4 drunk teenage girls in a mall parking lot... well. The response was impressive.

State Cops

City Cops

County Cops

University Cops (which were equivalent to State Cops)

Fire

EMS

AND ONE GDMFSOB SECRETARY OF STATE COP

It was a freaking circus.

Pull over a car because I was 99% sure she was texting. I get to the window and her phone is on the passenger seat with iMessage open.

Me: Hi do you know what the speed limits are on this stretch of road?

Her: Yeah - 30mph

Me: How fast do you think you were going?

Her: I don't know I was on my phone