A New York State Police traffic stop on November 20 revealed something that looked straight out of a kids’ craft project inspection and registration stickers on a car’s windshield, crudely hand-drawn with crayons, markers, and pen. The original reason for the stop was suspicion of swapped license plates, but the trooper quickly noticed the vehicle’s official stickers were anything but official. Instead of printed barcodes and crisp lettering, the stickers featured scribbles, misspellings, and black crayon marks where barcodes should be. The phrases “New York State Safety Emissions” and expiration dates were scrawled with surprising confidence, yet utterly fake.
The driver, a 50-year-old man from Lafayette, was issued several citations including for the fake credentials, lack of a valid license plate, and further vehicle violations. His vehicle was impounded on the spot. Law enforcement want's to remind motorists that scribbles in crayon do not qualify as valid vehicle documentation. Fake sticker attempts like this one are not new in New York, where authorities have seen everything from cardboard plates to bizarre registration stickers that double as protest slogans. But none have been so painfully obvious as this.
This case shows just how far some will go to dodge the rules, opting for homemade documents that an elementary school art teacher would recognize as amateur hour. The stickers had no official QR codes or vehicle identification numbers, features required by the state to prove compliance. Police emphasized that these attempts risk public safety by allowing vehicles without proper inspection or registration to remain on the road.
The colors may have been bright but the outcome was not.