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He may have got a 'break' but he didn't get off scott free as the cow who sits on the city council in the corner office did.

Need help here. Letter claims simply paying the fine on a 9mph or less speeding infraction means no insurance points. Doesn't that have to got through and be approved by the court?

I had a 44 in a 35 back in the fall and my insurance agent told me to "make it go away", or else I'd be assessed insurance points. Since I had no prior infractions in the past 3 years my attorney had the charge reduced to "inoperable equipment", I paid the fine and that was that, no points end of story.

Hugh,

You are correct. I had the same experience. I was ticketed for 39 in a 35. The officer told me to send in the ticket and pay $100 and there would be no points. Instead I called a lawyer who told me paying the $100 was an admission of guilt and would put points on my driving record. He had the charge reduced to faulty equipment and I paid that fine and received no points. The lesson here is to take legal advice only from a lawyer, not from the police, or your friend, or your neighbor.

I had the opposite experience. Yes, there were points on the driving record but no insurance points.

I received advice from a lawyer to not worry about it. I think they did mention something about if you got another ticket that was your fault, the insurance company would check your driving record points and it might count against you then.

Here's what is interesting to me. In my case I was clearly going 15 miles of the speed limit. I just wasn't paying attention.

So, why are police officers LYING and saying that people are going 9 miles over the speed limit?

This happens ALL THE TIME. So, we've basically got lying built into police procedure. I guess they just want their pay-off and don't care about the insurance companies.

Actually here is a pretty good explanation of how the Drivers License Points vs. Insurance Points works in North Carolina.

http://www.mosheramillslaw.com/hhhhhh.shtml

I would agree to be careful about taking legal advice, but I wouldn't be so cavalier as saying listen to a lawyer. Listen to somebody who knows what they are talking about.

As to the Nitpicker, you are absolutely right, so the next time you get stopped by the police, insist, no, demand you get the full amount that you believe you were going and, if it is 16 miles or more over the posted speed limit again require he or she arrest you for this misdemeanor, tow your car, and take you directly to the magistrate's office. Only through this action can you be fully protected from such abuses of power.

From the link provided:

"*Points are not assigned for these violations unless the same driver has been convicted of at least one other moving violation during the experience period (the last three years)."

I can still remember a few things.

Passing Thru:

Can you imagine their response if I did demand my true sentence? As you can tell, I didn't do that because I'm not dumb.

Here's a novel idea: If you really aren't going to enforce the law, how about changing it?

If 15 miles over the speed limit doesn't really warrant losing your license, going to jail, etc, then why is it on the lawbooks?

I know it sounds silly but does it make sense for the folks who are supposed to uphold our laws to actually lie and circumvent the law they are supposed to be upholding?

And it's subjective isn't it? So, the cop might knock me down to 9 mph or less but maybe he doesn't like the black guy with the green mohawk, so he treats him fairly. Do we really want cops making these judgement calls every day?

This really is directed at you Nitpicker, you just kind of cracked open the door and generalizations are my pet peeve. I usually enjoy your objective ideas and thoughts, I just felt the need to vent.

Actually, I love that they have discretion which is actually part of a written Directive that they follow. It goes something like, Infractions you have discretion, Misdemeanors less discretion (Traffic vs. Criminal), and Felonies almost zero discretion. Any citation written for 16 miles or more over the speed limit requires your mandatory appearance in court. I am 100% in agreeance for a change in the law, let's start a petition. In most states you can be fined for almost limitless amounts of speed where tickets can go into the hundereds of dollars, turn the cops loose here with the ability to write tickets for the full amount without clogging up the court system and maybe that will slow some of these maniacs in our area down if they can attack their wallet. The members of the general assembly know how the game is played and they don't want to change the rules.

Others here have said how they pled guilty to a lesser charge or something like faulty equipment. If that is the case, and I would find it highly suspicious if I was a speedometer manufacturer, then fine. If the speedometer is not faulty, then the defendant is guilty of lying, the D.A. is guilty of lying, the defendant's attorny is guilty of lying, and the judge sanctions the whole ordeal. Unfortunately, this is the world in which we live.

Everyone here has the same discretion in your job, no matter what you do. Simple issues are glazed over, more serious ones aren't. I would think everyone would take it very personally if I were to question as to whether your occupation changed its actions towards people based on their race, sex, gender, ethnicity, orientation, etc. in such blanket terms as normally gets tossed onto law enforcement. There are bad cops, bad doctors, bad teachers, bad business executives, bad councilmembers, bad pastors, bad (fill-in-the-blank) in the world. Does society want doctors making decisions on people's care based on race? Does society want teachers assigning grades based on race? Does society want business executives assigning daily tasks and accounts based on race? The answer is, of course, no, but we have to trust those people to act accordingly with the discretion that their profession grants them. But, because police work in an arena that few people understand and the fact that it carries the ability the remove your freedom of movement, make life changing decisions based on minutes of knowledge; they are generally attacked as all being card carrying members of the KKK. I think the generalizations have always been a little much.

If I was to do the same based on a small sampling of society, I would be called a bigot, but with the last unprotected societal group, caucasians, it is accepted and encouraged, and heaven help them if they were to work in law enforcement.

In short, we shouldn't lay this all of this on the police officer, he or she is doing his or her job. The simple answer is to slow down for the citizenry (or council); do your job fairly and justly for the law enforcement officers (which I would dare say 99% do);, for everybody to be more tolerant of other people, accept you can be wrong, and learn to say "I'm sorry".

Again, not a personal attack on anyone in particular (I'm just as guilty as everyone else is), let's just work on making our little corner of the world a little better. I could only imagine what that would do for our world.