Officer pens open letter to 18-year-old he stopped for speeding: 'You are not invincible'
An Ohio police officer wrote an open letter to an 18-year-old boy he pulled over for driving 100 miles per hour to tell him that he is “not invincible” — and his memorable message is going viral on Facebook.
The unnamed officer from North Ridgeville Police Department took to the department’s Facebook page to share some intimate words aimed toward a teen who he pulled over on State Route 10 for going 100 mph in a 65 mph zone. “You’re welcome,” he wrote in the opening of the letter, before expressing that the boy put his life, and everyone else’s on the road, in danger by being so reckless.
“I’d like to believe that you were minutes away from creating an unspeakable Christmas tragedy when I stopped you,” the officer wrote. “If not only killing yourself, you were well on your way to killing some innocent person who was minding their own business doing nothing else wrong but being in front of you.”
The officer wrote about the difficulty of dealing with the many tragedies that come from car accidents, even detailing the “unrecognizable bodies” that he’s pulled out of cars.
He went on to write about his interaction with the teen and acknowledged that the boy was “visibly shaking and breathing hard” once he was pulled over. However, the officer writes, it was too late to panic, as the boy should have been more concerned about what could have resulted from his reckless driving other than a speeding ticket — especially if it meant that the officer would be paying a visit to the teen’s parents.
“I don’t KNOW your parents, but I know them. I know that when you leave every day they say ‘Be careful. Drive safe.’ Those aren’t just words. That is the very last act of them pleading with you to come home safe,” he continued. “When you leave the house they know that, far and away, the best chance you have of dying that day is in that car.”
Thousands of people, including parents who fear for their own children, have commented on the message since it was posted on Sunday. Many are even sharing their experiences of having a child who either died as a reckless driver or was killed by one.
“My son was one of those people, who was doing nothing wrong, minding his own business riding his moped in front of someone. I was the mom who went looking for her son, and on my way to look, my phone rings saying it’s my son. Only is wasn’t Kaiden, it was Officer McCreedy from the Fayette County Sheriff’s department. My son was laying on the side of the highway,” one mother wrote.
“As a mom who lost her 17 year old son this past January I can only hope and pray that others will read this and slow down,” wrote a mother who lost her son when he drove recklessly.
While some made an argument against the cop, suggesting that he was exaggerating the risk in speeding, most of the commenters thanked the officer for the preemptive warning.
“Some people act like the police are the enemy. I promise you that I see the police as being there to PREVENT tragedies, and to protect those innocent people FROM stupid, senseless tragedies,” someone wrote.
The North Ridgeville Police Department didn’t immediately reply to Yahoo Lifestyle’s request for comment. However, the office is confident that the officer did the right thing by issuing the teen a ticket.
“You seemed like a really nice kid who made a bad decision. I don’t feel bad about this ticket at all. In fact, I’m proud of it,” the officer concluded. “I hope you slow down. I hope that when your mom tells you to ‘drive safe’ you make a promise to her, and yourself, that you will. I hope you can envision me sitting in your kitchen telling your screaming mother that you have been killed.”
Read more from Yahoo Lifestyle:
Follow us on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter for nonstop inspiration delivered fresh to your feed, every day.