Dude, I only asked a question about your driving record and you bit my head off, accusing me of ‘abusing you’, etc. Odd and hostile, to say the least. But don’t worry, I will not be taking any more part in this or any of your future threads. I’ve been tipped off.
I’d be interested to hear more about the “statute of limitations” that applies after the ticket is issued.
If it’s not on your driving record, how did he know about it?
Dude…it’s on your driving record! Unpaid ticket and probably FTA.
Unless you told him about it, but that would be silly.
Get a lawyer. Traffic lawyers are good at sorting these things out. I have found them to be worth it.
You want serious advice? You need to get a lawyer. You apparently don’t even understand what your legal situation is.
I’m pretty sure you’re misunderstanding how the statute of limitations works. It sets a limit on when you can be charged with a crime. But you were charged in 2002. There’s no statute of limitations on the punishment - if you owed a fine in 2002, you still owe it in 2012.
Others have already pointed out that you might legally need a Virginia license, depending on how long you’ve been living in Virginia. Having a North Carolina license won’t clear you of this charge.
Once again, get yourself a lawyer. These are relatively minor charges that you can get cleared up if you do the right things. But if you show up in court armed with nothing but ignorance and an attitude, it might go poorly for you. You could have the judge decide that you ran out on your 2002 ticket and didn’t bother getting the license you needed so you need to face more serious consequences. You could end up getting your driving privileges suspended or even spending some time in jail.
I wonder if the Virginia DMV is going to have a record of that unpaid ticket…
I got a ticket in RI in 1992–horrible speed trap. Route 1, a 4 lane highway, goes to 35 mph limit outside Narragansett (or it did). 4 am, heading for the ferry back to the Vineyard for work, busted. 55 in a 35. I was about to move, and said the hell with it, I’ll just never go back to RI!
Fast forward: 2001, stopped for speeding in CO, LEO is very pleasant and asks me if I realize my license has been suspended for 2 years, since they nationalized the ticket registry? Actually let me off with a warning, although of course I couldn’t drive. Had to pay the RI ticket plus fees and take the full driving test again.
YMMV
Rt. 1 speed traps are a major industry here.
Yes, just because the NC driving record doesn’t have a record of the ticket doesn’t mean VA doesn’t- and VA might even have suspended or revoked his privilege to drive in VA even though the OP doesn’t yet have a Virginia license.
When you go to court, take a close look at the US flag. There are some subtle details that, if noticed and pointed out, are a sure fire way to a not guilty verdict. I hesitate to go into too much detail.
No, IANAL. No, IANAFML.
There’s a problem with your advice–when I’ve changed my license from one state to another, the DMV has kept the old license. I would expect that this is a universal requirement, in an effort to limit/prevent fraud (and possibly other things).
(I do think getting the VA license may be in the OP’s best interest).
It’s interesting how you think the full faith and credit clause would only work in your favor. Yes, states have to recognize others’ driver’s licenses. But don’t you think that they should also recognize others’ tickets too?
Here’s a surprisingly in depth article from AOL (:eek: ) that explains a bit of the situation.
And here’s another from Fox News:
You can wait for a journalist to verify my sources if need be since you believe only experts have access to resources.
I found the North Carolina “failure to pay ticket” statute. It says you have 60 days from the date the citation is delivered before they’ll revoke your license. So, technically, you’ve been driving on a suspended license for 10 years.
http://www.ncga.state.nc.us/EnactedLegislation/Statutes/HTML/BySection/Chapter_20/GS_20-24.1.html
from here: General Statute Chapters - North Carolina General Assembly
My “not a lawyer” verdict… you’re fucked and you need a real lawyer.
I agree. Thinking back to my incident, the cop obviously believed that I had no idea that my license had been revoked. The speeding ticket is paltry compared to driving with no license, which is big bucks, potentialyl big points, and a huge insurance hit.
I respectfully suggest that this should have been made clear in the OP. While you talked about this ticket in that post, I didn’t even see a hint that this might be the reason for the “driving without a license” charge, thus the off-topic discussion of the need to get a VA license within 60 days of moving there.
If you choose not to hire a lawyer to help you with this, my advice is to approach the court with an attitude of wanting to make everything right. Explain that you thought the old ticket had been forgiven since it didn’t seem to come up later, as you’ve described here, and that the “without a license” violation was wholly unintentional. Point out the lack of points on your record, and that though you’ve had a couple of speeding tickets you do not routinely violate the speed limit. Tell the judge you want to do the right thing, and ask for any appropriate mercy.
I’d give serious consideration to getting a lawyer, though.
So basically, you’re looking for free legal advice, because you’re too cheap to pay the lawyers you’ve already contacted? Doper lawyers generally will say “I am a lawyer, but I am not your lawyer, and any advice given can’t be construed as legal advice”.
When you put the OP out there, you invite the comments of the Teaming Millions. Suck it up. GO to court, pay your fines, and hope you don’t have any surprised from other states to ding you.
StG
If you go to the VA DMV and ask for a print of your driving record, the default history is 11 years, so that unpaid speeding ticket is definitely going to be there.
Under current statutes, 14 over is not reckless, but will still cost $132 per year for three years - just shy of $400 all together, which seems to be on the stiff side, but nowhere near as bad as what’s possible. It looks like felony reckless driving carries a penalty of nearly $3500 per year for three years plus jail time.
If you’re lucky, they’ll let you pay off the old ticket and the new one, and all will be resonably well.
As **Tride **said, states do share driving info, so this can be best summed up as “Boy, you’re in a heap of trouble.”
If you don’t hire a lawyer, all I can suggest is practicing this line from The Blues Brothers to use on the judge:“No, I didn’t. Honest… I ran out of gas. I… I had a flat tire. I didn’t have enough money for cab fare. My tux didn’t come back from the cleaners. An old friend came in from out of town. Someone stole my car. There was an earthquake. A terrible flood. Locusts! IT WASN’T MY FAULT, I SWEAR TO GOD!”
Except that the need to get a VA license is not off-topic.
If he’s really been living there over 90 days, there are two reasons for his license to be invalid:
- The unpaid speeding ticket.
- Not getting a VA license within 60 days of moving.
And he’ll need to take care of both of them. Getting a VA license next week won’t change the fact that he was driving without a valid license when he got pulled over.
Except “[the cop] said it was because I had the unpaid ticket from 2002.” So while the 60 day thing is a legitimate concern, it’s off-topic in that (from what we are told) it had no bearing on the driving without a license charge in this particular instance.
ETA: It may be that the same charge could have been made without the old ticket situation due to the 60-day requirement, but the salient point in this case seems to be that the old ticket is playing a prominent role, and needs to be addressed.
Perhaps you should read the f’ing law to find out whether your assumptions are correct.
The Virginia code states:
But there are exceptions, true. One of the exceptions is for new residents:
So, long story short, if you are a Virginia resident, the state does not recognize the validity of your North Carolina license for more than 60 days after you become a resident.
I’m not inclined to look up Virginia’s residency statutes for you. You should probably know if you are a resident or not.
Get a lawyer.
The other thing about the 60 day requirement is that it’s rather difficult to enforce. There is really no official “residence” database that we update when we move. We state our residence for tax purposes, mailing purposes, etc, but the DMV is usually going to have a hard time proving “you moved here 65 days ago” without running an expensive background investigation.