My brother lives in Ohio and has his drivers license hopelessly suspended. Mainly for piddly stuff like driving without insurance, and getting tickets for driving with a suspended license. He is thinking about moving to California permanently where he used to live and has a job offer in construction and a place to live for cheap with a friend. If he moved how long, if ever would it be before he could get a California drivers license? He thinks they would make him get his Ohio license back first, but would they make him move back to a state and remain there for the serveral years it would take to get his license back?
With the advent of CDLs, most states now have reciprocity, e.g. sharing of databases. So, your brother’s suspension period in Ohio would likely have to pass before he could apply for and obtain a California license. Check with Cali DMV to be sure.
I just went through this, now granted I’m in Massachusetts so it might be different. Here’s my story: Back in 2000 I got popped for driving w/o insurance in Colorado, my license is suspended for three years. Fast forward to 2005, I want to get my license back, I had to: 1) Get insurance on a vehicle (in my case my parents put me as a driver on one of their cars) 2)Get my Colorado license re-instated 3)Go back to Massachusetts. 4) Get new MA license I was fine as long as I got my old license re-instated. The insurance companies in Massachusetts would not even deal with me as long as I had a suspended license no matter what state is what in. Remember, my license in Colorado had officially been un-suspended for two years but not re-instated. I only had to be in COlorado for a day to do all this, and it could’ve been done by mail (takes 6-8 weeks in CO), if not for my parents I would’ve had to buy a non-driver poilcy from an insurance agent (I’m sure that would cost $$$$), so your brother’s milage may vary 
but he will have to deal with his old license in Ohio.
Hardly piddly given the risk this could pose to anyone injured in an accident caused by him.
His biggest problem is that there is no set time limit on his license suspension. He was driving a truck for a cable company. It was their truck, but he was paid as an independent contractor. Anyway, he thought that they were carrying insurance and they claim they thought he had the insurance. Well, it turns out that they were not and he was involved in an accident that totaled a new Toyota Landcruiser to the tune of about $30,000. The BMV has told him that until he pays off the judgement or shows proof that he has a payment plan (endorsed by the plantiff) that he cannot get his license back. They won’t take payments without at least $5,000 down. He has also racked up two additional driving on a suspended license/ no insurance violations since the accident last May 2004.
So, even if he had to wait two years, three years or more in California it would be an improvement since at least he would be able to look forward to some definitive time in the future when he would be able to get his license back. If not California is there some other state that would give him an all clear after some finite period of time passes?
With all the entanglements and extenuating circumstances here, most particularly the outstanding judgment against him, your brother needs a lawyer—and badly.
He definitely does but to get an attorney you need money, and for that you need a job. He was doing okay for a guy with only a highschool education at the cable company, maybe earning $800.00 per week. However, since he lost his license he’s basically been living with this couple that lets him live rent free in return for watching their kids while they play in poker games all over town most nights. This keeps food in his belly and a roof over his head, but doesn’t offer an opportunity for improvement. Now however he has a job offer in construction from an old friend in California who will let him live at his house for $150.00 per month if he works on his framing crew for about $10.00 per hour. Since he will also give him a ride to work it sounds like his best bet. His question is will he ever be able to get his license in California after enough time passes?
I should add that the courts most certainly do not consider driving under suspension a “piddly” matter. The reason for this is because it’s a common tactic of persons who’ve had their license suspended for DUI. Judges now, are compelled to treat all driving under suspension convictions identically; they’re unable to grant any relief for a particular individual’s circumstances and in fact, the additonal suspension he’s gonna get after clearing all this up will be imposed not by a judge, but it’ll be a bureaucratic suspension levied by the Ohio Department of Motor Vehicles. And at the end of that suspension, he’ll still have to pay a hefty fine (and I believe carry an SR-22 bond for several years) to re-establish his license.
http://www.bmv.ohio.gov/sus_rnst.html
http://www.bmv.ohio.gov/faq_srd.html
I guess, essentially what you are asking is will there be a point, some time in the future when all this bad stuff will be removed from the National Driver Register (NDR) Problem Driver Pointer System (PDPS). That, I don’t know. But if you follow the next link, all the way down at the bottom there’s something from the California DMV that would seem to indicate your brother might able to ask them, if he’s on the national registry.
Yea, I figured that some state basically had a program which said your situation is so screwed up that its beyond being untangled . So wait three years, and get high risk insurance and pay a $300.00 fee or something and we will give you a provisional license in our state. Obviously, they wouldn’t make such an offer available for those with tons of DUI’s ect. I just figure there has to be many people in my brothers situation who have basically lost their licenses due to money issues. I’m not saying he shouldn’t be punished but as the situation stands right now its almost like he is an excon or something. He was even told that he wasn’t eligable for a work only driving permit for some reason I don’t really understand.
Absolutely. I have a cop friend here in Toledo, Ohio who says that probably 1 in five people stopped for traffic violations do not have a valid driver’s license. And my father, who enjoys listening to a police scanner, has said that’s probably true.
I was thinking some more about this last night, and another very concerning issue came to mind. If your brother has skipped any court dates, and he’s almost certainly been ordered to appear following his additional driving under suspension charges, he’ll have bench warrants out. He’ll need to get those quashed. If I may suggest something else and he has a means of scraping together a few bucks, he might want to contact (he should contact them in writing, or via telephone; a personal appearance could quite possibly lead to an immediate arrest if indeed a bench warrant has been issued) the courts having jurisdiction over his outstanding violations, and seeing if he can appear before a judge to at least pay those fines. The courts will look much more favorably on him for appearing voluntarily rather than being hauled in again. He can almost certainly do this without a lawyer.
Well, here’s another opinion for the pile: I prosecute misdemeanors, which means I see a LOT of DWLI (driving while license invalid) cases. Some days it seems like a third of my cases are DWIs, another third are DWLI, and the last third are marijuana possession.
My state (Texas) is apparently especially unhappy with DWLI offenders. The minimum penalty for a first-time DWLI is a $100 fine and at least 72 hours in jail; the maximum is $500 and 180 days. If you have one DWLI conviction already and you get another, the potential penalty goes up to a $4000 fine and a year in jail. Not to mention that a conviction for DWLI means your suspension is extended, adding from 90 days to a year on to the end of your current suspension.
So, keep your license clean, y’hear?
I have no real answer for your brother, although he is clearly in a big mess. The original situation you described is interesting, though. You said he was driving a company truck which he assumed was insured by the corporation while they assumed he had his own insurance. I don’t know about you, but if I were given a company truck to drive, I’d make the same assumption he did. If the company expected him to have his own insurance (and what if he didn’t own a car?), they should have made that very clear to him when he was hired, including making him sign a document indicating that he understood that was the policy.
Perhaps your brother didn’t catch that requirement when he started the job. But if it wasn’t clear to him, perhaps he has a case against the company? Obviously I’m not a lawyer, but he should really spend the hundred dollars or so to talk to a lawyer in Ohio both about this problem and the subsequent mess with his driver’s license.
Sorry, but I thought of something else. If the company required him to carry his own auto insurance, they should have required him to provide proof of this when hiring him and verify that proof every six months. And I doubt that a standard auto insurance policy covers a company car, so he might need a rider adding that. They can’t just assume that he had his own insurance and that he knew whether a company car was covered.
So something about the original situation is suspicious. I hope that Inigo Montoya sees this thread; I think he’s either an insurance agent or an adjuster. He may have some useful advice.
When I worked at Legal Aid in Ohio, there were a couple of programs available for free or discount license restoration. The program requirements were pretty technical, but in some cases the grant money would actually pay some of the fees and costs associated with getting the license restored. He should contact Legal Aid before he leaves Ohio, just to see if he can get the license restored.
http://www.ohiolegalservices.org/OSLSA/PublicWeb
Probably not.
I actually told him that he should sue the cable company. Unfortunately “the cable company” was only a subcontractor that did installations and disconnects for a much larger national company and it went belly up not long after the accident. He contacted legal aide and they said that there is nothing he can do until he does something with the judgement. I suggested a chapter 7 BK, but he had one two years ago and he doesn’t have a stable job to qualify for a Chapter 13 filing. So there aren’t any states out there that might look the other way after a while? I think there are still states that don’t even require auto insurance. He told me yesterday that he was stopped by a cop (he lives in the hood, and the couple with whom he resides are seedy to say the least) for a bad tail light, but the officer chose not to write a ticket because he said it would mean that he might go to jail. With the increasing costs of insurance couldn’t we create a permanent class of those who can drive automobiles? I don’t remember this being such a big issue when I was growing up in the 1970’s.
The subcontractor to the cable company cheated your brother, that’s for sure. Again, I’m not a lawyer but it’s possible that he might have a case against the cable company itself. Even though he was working for the subcontractor, he was working on behalf of the cable company. Although you said he talked to Legal Aid, he may want to talk to a private attorney to see what his options are.