Quote:
Originally Posted by NoahSD
This guy is operating under the assumption that you're guaranteed to end up in court. If a cop pulls you over because you were speeding or whatever and you just refuse to talk to him, he's almost definitely going to give you a ticket, and he's much more likely to look for reasons to search the car, arrest you, etc. both because they're humans and they get mad at people being douches to them and because it's totally reasonable for them to assume that you're hiding something if you won't talk to them. If you do talk to him, you very very often end up getting no ticket.
He's not operating under the assumption you'll always go to court when you talk to the police at all. The argument is that the risks of speaking to officers nearly always outweigh the benefits. The only assumption that he's operating on, which you seem to disagree with, is that it is very unlikely that you will talk a police officer out of giving you a ticket or charging you with a crime in a situation where the evidence, or lack thereof, will not exonerate you on its own merits.
During traffic stops, the police officer will ask you questions for several reasons. It's generally not to be provided with a reasonable excuse for whatever you've been pulled over for that will persuade him into not giving you a ticket, but instead to elicit verbal responses that can be recorded on the deposition line of the ticket as evidence for court purposes, to either assist in proving a charge, or to justify police action (e.g. probable cause for search).
Officers don't ask just any old questions during traffic stops. They often ask questions whose responses are intended to incriminate you, whether a traffic violation or a more serious crime is in question.
You could argue that because another reason behind some traffic stop interrogations is investigatory that you could try and explain why whatever you're doing that appears suspicious is actually innocent, but the professor explains exactly why this is a terrible idea.
(lay opinion)