turbos4audi

For the short term memory folks. I got a 80/55 reckless ticket in Norfolk, VA a while back and posted asking for advice. Ended up with an believable amount of responses.

So I went to the court house 3 weeks before my court date and sat in just to watch and learn. To my surprise they were quite lenient. First offense reckless, at the same speed I was at, were getting off with warnings or just speeding fines. No one got suspensions, jail or stuck with misdemeanor charges, unless they had other offenses with it. So I felt pretty confident. To help grease the judicial wheels I took a AAA Driver Improvement Course. While much of it was a total JOKE, it does sort of refocus you to even some of the obvious things that we just get complacent with. But it was mostly useless and people were passed that slept through the course.

So I went to court with my certificate and my fingers crossed. I did look into lawyers, but they were ridiculously priced and unnecessary from what I saw. I was sworn in, I plead guilty, The cop read his notes (LOTS of details), then I was asked if I had anything in my defense. I simply said exactly what I told the officer (which he already read to the court), "I am sorry, I was not paying attention like I should have been." I then said I took a driver improvement class and they would not see me in their court again. Then I handed them the certificate and the judge said, "How does 74/55 sound instead of reckless. I said, "Thank you your honor, I appreciate it". I got a speeding ticket on my record and a $170 fine.

Now here is the interesting part. My insurance went DOWN. The ticket was +3 points and the class was -4 points. Go figure! My insurance went down 1 point. Weird system.


Here were a few stand-out cases.

One guy was in for his fifth "driving with out a license" offense + "driving with an open container" (misdemeanor), the judge gave him an $85 fine and 3 days in jail, which he could serve on the weekends.

One guy was in for 50/25 reckless speeding (misdemeanor) school zone. He said he was following his wife in an ambulance to the hospital. The trooper confirmed that. The Judge gave him 2 months probation, 1 month suspended license, ~$300 fine and told him he is lucky he was not going to jail...ambulances have lights and sirens, YOU DON'T. Then yelled YOU NEVER SPEED THROUGH SCHOOL ZONES.

This was the funniest. A woman came in for speeding, just speeding AND she had a lawyer. The lawyer gave some shpeal and presented a notarized certificate saying her speedo was off. The judge looked it over and said "This is off +7 not -7. Council, did you even read this? Ma'am, if i were you, I would ask for your money back from your attorney". She paid full price for the ticket.

Cheers

bobster4

1) People like that just irritate the hell out of me. They will never learn.

2) Seem similar situations go leniently but you do have to know not to do that in a school zone. Slow down then speed back up.

3) Stupid people make me LOL. :P

kelbrig1

Too bad she was already on probation...

And then another girl actually said that she didn't realize how fast she was going because she was talking on her cell phone...

The most refreshing though, was the girl that simply said.."I got busted doin 85 and I'm just here hoping I don't get any points on my license"..

bobster4

LOL, they are super smart.

Giggles::Go 'cuse

watch it bucko.

bobster4

What? Are you one of them? Otherwise you would have to agree. :P

Jimax

they're not nearly as bad.

Those are definitely funny stories though.

dscottjr

Great. Glad it worked out!