Long Island Expressway, Window Tint and the HOV Lane

Ok so to my surprise I found out my old car has 20% tint in it.. I had told the dealer I wanted "the darkest I could go without getting pulled over", he told me what he was putting in was 70% but looks dark.. so I just took his word for it.. Now that I'm shopping for tint on my new Prius I find out what I have is actually 20%. I'm surprised I was never pulled over for it let alone ticketed when I was pulled over for other things in the past.

I brought my car to get tinted tonight (had to reschedule due to an emergency with the tinter) but before he had to run he informed me that since I'll be riding in the HOV lane with clean pass stickers my car will be focused on more and I'll probably wind up getting pulled over for illegal tint if I put 20% on.

I'm curious.. Has anyone here had any experiences with Clean Pass, the HOV Lane, and dark tint? The consensus from people I've spoken to is that the cops generally leave you alone with the tint unless you're driving a sports car, look very young, are driving recklessly, or are just in a bad mood. I've been driving my 2004 Path for 10 years with 20% tint and never had a problem.. and even did the HOV lane with it often too.. I'm curious if any prius owners in the HOV lane had any issues with their dark tint?
-Keith

 

Good to know.. I'm trying to decide whether to do 35% or 20%. Did you do every window? My guy is advising me not to do the strip on the bottom of the hatch to allow light in and make the tint appear lighter if I get pulled over as well as not to do a 6" strip on my dash. (I wasn't the strip since sunlight comes in and kills my eyes in this car)
-Keith

 

Which way do you prefer? With or without the strip? Do you have a pic of your car with the 35% on it?
-Keith

 

I got my tint done on the Prius... It's 20%.. It seems like it's darker than my Pathfinder though.. but the tinter swears my Path is 20% also.. I'm curious what you guys think.. both pics are below. Not sure why the Path keeps uploading up-side-down.. it's right-side-up on my machine.. odd..

 

My Prius tint is definitely darker, just by a little bit.. I like it a lot but I'm afraid I'm going to be a target.. I guess time will tell.
FYI for anyone who cares, I got my cleanpass stickers yesterday.. the total time it took to receive them from the day I was approved was 4 business days. I put them on but screwed one of them up and when I peeled it back off to re-apply it, it stretched the vinyl sticker and now it has wrinkles and bumps.. I'm so annoyed.. I might try a hair dryer to it later.. not sure if it'll help since it's already adhered to the car.
-Keith