I received a speeding ticket a couple of days ago. The officer stated that his laser equipment determined that I was traveling 72 MPH in a 60 zone.
When he handed me the ticket, he said that he only recorded the speed as 65 on the ticket. Why would he do this? Was he feeling benevolent, or was there a “conspiracy theory” reason? I’m leaning to the conspiracy, but only because of the details of how I was stopped (not terribly important to the main question) .
So, why would a ticketing office under-estimate my speed on the ticket?
Are the fines listed on the back of the ticket? Are they graduated… 0-10 mph above is one amount, 10-20 above is another, etc? It could be that he felt while he must ticket you, that the dollar amount should remain low.
He was being nice plain and simple. No conspiracy about it. Many times a ticket will have a mandatory court date on it if you are going over a certain limit. He docked that limit to let you go for whatever reason…
Alternatively, if he writes you a ticket at a certain amount, the ticket becomes reckless and you have to go to court which means he has to go to court. This way, you pay the ticket. and he doesn’t have to go to court.
I’ve gotten tickets like this. I was going 25 over the limit and he reduced it so I wouldn’t have to go to Court.
In my experience he is giving you a break. Not only does the fine and points go up as the speed goes up, you might not be able to plea bargain it down if the speed is too high. Some judges I know will not accept a plea bargain from a 4 point ticket to a no point ticket. They will accept a 2 point down to a no point.
I personally don’t do this. If I want to give someone a break I either won’t write them a ticket at all or I’ll write them for something minor that is wrong with the vehicle and give a verbal warning for the speeding.
I think you meant to say “…he reduced it so he wouldn’t have to go to Court.” B/c it’s a major pain in the butt for him, and if he doesn’t make it to court that day, you’ll often get off scot-free.
That happened to my friend–got a ticket, demanded a court date, officer was delayed, case was dismissed. When my friend drove out of the parking lot afterwards, the officer was racing in to try to make the court date.
I was written up for going 79 in a 60mph zone. The cop claimed I was doing 82. Doing 20mph over the speed limit is reckless driving, apparently. This carries a substantially more severe penalty. I was thankful for this. I never thought that my '84 4Runner could do over 75, but I’ve been watching those automated speed radar signs and it appears that my speedometer underestimates my speed by 10%.
Iggins, I demand a cite that there was actually an Oregonian who was driving over the speed limit. Christ, you guys are the slowest drivers on the planet.
I think every time I’ve ever gotten a ticket in Michigan (not in years, by the way), the officer’s always written it below the radar speed. The radar speed still shows up on the citation, but the charge speed has always been lower – usually 5 mph above the posted speed.
I have an alternative explanation, based on my one and only experience with being ticketed: he might have clocked you more than once, with 72 as the highest clocked speed and 65 as the lowest. My own officer told me that he’d clocked me at X and X different speeds, and ticketed me for the lowest.
This is kinda what I was thinking… I’m still planning on showing up at court at the appointed date, as I think that he made a judgment call about my speed, and was incorrect.
Word to that! Although we’re not as bad a Washingtonians that like to stay in the far left lane, oblivious to all signs to keep right and the huge line of people behind them.
This is just a guess but it may be that, because you were from out of state, if the ticket was for more than 5mph above the limit he would have had to take you in to make sure you paid the fine.
Again, this is just a guess. It used to be that all out-of-staters that were ticketed had to be taken to the courthouse or had to pay the fine immediately by mailing cash with the ticket while the officer watched (this happened to me years ago in Colorado). Now that states have reciprocal agreements this isn’t as much of an issue. Trying to stiff a state where you don’t reside will cause grief when you go to re-register in the state where you do reside. I would think that WA and OR would have a reciprocal agreement but I really don’t know.
I’m told that it is a myth. I don’t know if that’s a matter of semantics, though.
My sister (in the car with me for this ticket), told me that an officer she knew in OR was not given a target number of tickets to issue, but the number of tickets issued was part of their review process.
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