How can pacing be inaccurate?
There are many ways that pacing results can be proven to be inaccurate. The farther back the officer, the less accurate the pace for an accurate “pace.” The officer must keep an equal distance between her car and your car for the entire time you are being paced. The officer’s speedometer reading, after all, means nothing if she is driving faster than you are in an attempt to catch up with you. That’s why an officer is trained to “bumper pace” your car by keeping a constant distance between her front bumper and your rear bumper. Pacing correctly requires both training and good depth perception. Moreover, pacing becomes more difficult the farther behind the officer is from your car. The most accurate pace occurs where the officer is right behind you. However, patrol officers like to remain some distance behind a suspect, to avoid alerting a driver who periodically glances at his rear view and side view mirrors. Therefore, if you know an officer was close behind you for only a short dista
