Florida Cops Help Man Propose to Scared Girlfriend During Fake Traffic Stop

— -- One woman got quite a scare before she received the surprise of a lifetime from her longtime boyfriend.

Jason DePalma popped the question to his girlfriend Sarah Moody during a fake traffic stop, enlisting the help of several deputies with the St. Johns County Police Department in Florida to pull off the big moment.

“The officers were sitting on the side of the road waiting for us,” DePalma, 38, told ABC News of the planning process. “As we were walking down to the car I was in contact with them the whole time. They saw me and pulled up behind us and she was scared. You can see the response of how shocked she was.”

The excited groom-to-be had already planned to have the cops pull him over, but didn’t anticipate being so nervous that he actually drove through a stop sign, which he said he did get a warning for after the dust settled from the proposal.

“He really did run it and that wasn’t part of our planning cycle,” Cmdr. Chuck Mulligan, a spokesman for the police department, told ABC News. “We have to consider public safety before anything else. That was the one misstep.”

Upon pulling over into a parking lot, the police officers asked Moody, the passenger of the car, to step out of the vehicle.

“I was in total shock,” Moody, 31, said. “I couldn't imagine why we'd have to get out of the car for what felt like a routine traffic stop and when they asked me to move to the back of the vehicle, a million things were running through my mind. None of which were, this is a proposal.”

She added, “I honestly had no idea what was happening until he was literally down on one knee and even then, I think I was still a little confused."

Despite her initial shock, the bride-to-be said “Yes.”

But that’s exactly how DePalma wanted it. He wanted to create an elaborate proposal that somehow incorporated cars, a mutual passion of theirs.

“We run a nonprofit organization that puts on charity events that helps out military veterans,” he explained. “We do what’s called road rallies. We’re all about cars and everything so I wanted to do something dealing with cars. I ran into Cpl. Manning of the St. Johns Police Department and I walked up to him with the ring and opened up the box and I said, ‘Would you like to help me with this?’ He said ‘Yes,’ and then we basically started deriving a plan.”

DePalma said he was pleased the plan worked.

“She was just so happy,” he explained. “We’ve talked about it here and there, that’s why I wanted to do something over the top. I wanted to catch her off guard. I know it’s cliché but she is honestly my best friend.”

Although this wasn’t a “normal occurrence” for his fellow officers, Mulligan said his department “does try to pride itself on community outreach and tries to let people see the humanistic side of law enforcement.”

“We like to be seen as human beings,” he added. “When we do things like this and the community reaches out and they want to have contact with us, certainly we like to get involved.”

“The officers were so sweet to take a few minutes out of their day to help him,” said Moody. “I cannot thank them enough.”

The lovebirds do not have a wedding date set yet, as they’re “still trying to process everything that is happening from the proposal,” DePalma said.