You got off cheap, Harry. I got fined that amount a few years ago when crossing the road on a pedestrian crossing when the light was red - completely empty road.
I got the same ;-)
Empty road, 100 PLN :-(
My wife nearly got one too, but charmed the policeman ;-)
I wonder how the courts would see a situation like that, when the police rigidly adhere to the letter of the law instead of the spirit of the law. Don't Poles say that laws are made for people, not people made for laws? I have witnessed similar acts of cops not wisely using their discretion and acting like brats. I'd be tempted to test this but I've had my fingers badly burnt once already this year.
Play nice with the cops. In every country I lived, and drove so. I played nice - because when you get caught, no way of denying it - and it worked most of the time. Beside this pedestrian **** here in Poland. In 25 years of driving, I got 2 speeding tickets and 2 parking tickets. I managed to pay less for 3 of them. I managed to avoid one in Poland, just playing low profile, smile, and talk nice (okay, being a foreigner without any official polish papers helped, even with my PESEL they didn't want to fine me - too much work for them).
If a cop wants to be a brat, he will be a brat. Believe me. My father was a cop, I did my army in the Police in France, some friends are cops. All the same. If you play nice, they can be nice. And if you're blond with big tits. You won ;-)