From [HERE] There you are, driving along the highway when you see a “Drug Checkpoint, 1 Mile” road sign. You decide you don’t want to deal with waiting in line at a police stop and need gas anyway. So you take the next exit. Next thing you know, a police cruiser comes out of nowhere and pulls you over for not using your turn signal long enough. This move is especially tricky because there was never a drug checkpoint: the Supreme Court ruled it illegal to set up a roadblock to search cars for drugs.

A Redditor asked the Kansas-specific forum, “What’s up with the fake ‘drug checkpoints’ on I-35?” They were referring to signs that said “Highway Patrol Checkpoint” and specified “Drug Dogs in Use.” These signs popped up right before an exit, and the OP noted multiple Kansas Highway Patrol cars hiding on the exit road. “Seems pretty shady and sketchy to me, using a fake checkpoint as a ruse to look for people driving off the freeway and stopping them for a warrantless search.”

One commenter said they narrowly avoided getting caught up in this old bait-and-switch. “My girlfriend was driving and we panicked for a second and I said ‘keep on going’ because it felt like a trap and sure enough it was exactly as you described.”

The kicker is that there was never a traffic stop to begin with. Another commenter revealed, “As others have said, the ‘checkpoints’ are a ruse; the police have vehicles posted at the next exit (usually leading to a remote road that regular travelers wouldn’t normally visit) and then pull people over if they see them ditching anything out the windows, failing to signal, etc.” [MORE]