Smokey and the Bandit - Part I

While my sister was in town and I was acting as her tour guide, we made a trip to San Francisco for some exploring / picture taking. Much like Gilligan and the Skipper (I was and remain a Mary-Ann-ite).. this was a three hour tour gone bad. Much to the excitement of my children I was ticketed for speeding.

I am going to rely on my sister's sense of propriety in securing the comments I made in the moments just after i realized i was bound for trouble from public disclosure. But, let's just say in broad, general terms that there's a story out there my kids love to tell... (for which they will likely suffer the wrath of the almighty).. and this would be considered a 'companion piece' to that story. But, i'll never tell.

Anyways - this whole drama stems from what happened next.. which was that the police wrote my ticket for 90 MPH. 90! I was speeding. Let me be completely clear on that. This is not a tale about innocence.. but justice. Because, there is no way I was traveling 90 miles per hour that morning (or any morning). I hope Lurinda will back me up on that (or at least not contradict me in writing.. before the trial!).

Of course I was in a foul mood after receiving the ticket.. but allowing my family and friends to laugh at me for a few days took some of the edge off of it. Life goes on; even when you've been egregiously abused by the man.

But then I received a double whammy in the mail. When the actual citation appeared from the court I found out that my offense made me ineligible for traffic school. That means I get to help California reduce it's massive debt by paying a crazy fine.. as well as having the bonus gift of my insurance going up. All for something i didn't do (drive excessively fast). I was just driving too fast :)

Well, i've never had a speeding ticket before that my Alzheimer's riddled mind can remember. So, i've never dealt with this crap before and it can be annoying to say the least. You see, I have this slight mental defect that i cramp up a bit emotionally when i think i've been wronged. Let's just say i have a mostly 'black and white' view of things and i was feeling very black about being accused of doing something i didn't do (go 90!) with the accompanying consequences (higher fines and impacts on insurance rates). I was becoming very indignant.

So, being the engineer i am .. i started digging. And here's what i found out: the whole court process is structured to coerce you to paying the fine and not defending yourself! Shocking! Government wants you to simply take it and give them whatever they want.. when they want it.

Well... then there's the actual law of the State of California.

So.. having done some reading of the California Traffic Code I headed for the court yesterday for some fact finding. First and foremost - I needed to get the option for traffic school put back on the table.. here's what I did.

Tod: hey, i have a question. can you please explain why i was not offered traffic school for this offense.

Clerk: you don't qualify.

Tod: well, actually I do unless I've missed something. could you please explain exactly why you believe i do not qualify.

Clerk: you were going more than 20 miles over the speed limit - so you don't qualify.

Tod: what's 20 miles over the speed limit have to do with it? i was ticketed for a 22349.. and there is no further distinction between how fast i was going in the law.

Clerk: that's not how it works.

Tod: what? it works that you read the law and you enforce it. there is no distinction in the law between 66 and 99.999 (there is one when you go 100+).

Clerk: let me check.

Tod: please do.

Clerk: what you need to do is to talk to the judge; traffic school is at their discretion.

Tod: well, that's not exactly true. as it turns out the Legislature makes the laws in California and the police and courts simply enforce them. so - you really need to follow the laws. i have a right to traffic school. would you please indicate that on my citation so that I can consider that when deciding how to proceed?

Clerk: let me check. (at this point she walks to the lead clerk of the court and they have a several minute discussion .. she returns..). Yeah, sure. We can do that.

Tod: so tell me.. now that you actually figured out what the law is.. are you going to stop jerking people around and denying them their legal right to traffic school?

Clerk: the judges here set their own rules.

Tod: unbelievable!!! The judges here are supposed to simply FOLLOW the law.

Clerk: they have a lot of latitude.

Tod: well.. that sucks.. because they shouldn't.


I was pleased that they agreed with me and corrected my citation to allow me to attend traffic school to keep the infraction off my official record. That is.. unless I fight the ticket.

This is just the beginning. More later.