I was stopped by a police officer several miles outside of town, why?

This could be caused by a number of reasons.  Most of the time the officer is setting in town enforcing the speed limit.  If a vehicle comes threw town speeding, the officer has to take off from a stopped position, safely enter traffic, then catch up with the vehicle that was speeding.  This can take several miles to do, because of the traffic, and road conditions.  Once the officer catches up with the vehicle, he most likely will run the tag information before stopping the vehicle.