The Annoyed Man wrote:IF I were going to write such a letter, I would start by couching it in terms of concern for officer safety. Mention the part about her asking your passenger to re-enter the vehicle, where the weapon was still stored in ready access. Mention the part about her asking you to stand between the vehicles while a truck pulling a trailer, traveling on the shoulder, was bearing down on both your vehicles. Suggest that her lack of recognition about the danger presented by that truck and trailer made for a potentially dangerous situation for both you, your passenger, and herself.
Once you've established that your initial concern was for everyone's safety, including that of the officer in question, then you can mention being irritated, not so much with the questioning itself, but the manner in which it was handled. You can mention that, if they care to run your driving record, they'll be able to see for themselves that this is not the complaint of a chronic bad driver, and that as a CHL holder, you are acutely aware of personal safety and are a practitioner of non-confrontational interactions with law-enforcement.
Close by saying something like.... you're sure that as she spends more time with the department, she'll be a fine officer, but that you thought she had a few things to learn that could have made the stop a better situation than it was.
Then, after you have written the letter, set it aside for a few days. Come back to it later; reread it; and decide if you really still want to send it, or do you want to just let it go and throw it away. Then, if you still want to send it, go ahead.
I don't think there was a legal issue with your passenger getting back in the car where the weapon is. That said, I can understand your concern about the officer's safety. She doesn't know a thing about your passenger. For all she knew, you were on your way to New Braunfels so he could turn himself in for a murder charge. But from a legal perspective, you had already established that you had a CHL, and that the gun was yours and that it was stored in the center console. You've already established by virtue of having a CHL to be a law-abiding person......which means you wouldn't be leaving a loaded handgun where a felon could get his hands on it. Maybe she was taking those suppositions for granted.
BTW, my answer to the question about what's happening in New Braunfels would be, "Nothing....just family stuff."
