A sorta-friend of mine claims she caught pulled over for going 130 mph in a 65 zone, but just got a speeding ticket. I wasn’t in the mood to call her on it at the time, but now I’m curious. I’ve looked at the Florida statutes, and all I can find is that 15 mph over the limit is considered reckless driving. It seems to me that 4 times that is a whole 'nother scale entirely (like lose your license entirely scale), but can’t find anything concrete.
So my question is, are there anything like degrees of reckless driving? Any anecdotal experience with anyone caught that far over the limit? Thanks in advance.
And yes, I can see (now) that you are from South Florida. :smack: Wondering where your friend was speeding because the repercussions will vary depending on the location of the infraction.
So that would be a regular ol’ ticket - with a fine of $250.
The reckless driving statute is 316.192 which provides that “Any person who drives any vehicle in willful or wanton disregard for the safety of persons or property is guilty of reckless driving.” So there’s certainly an argument that going 65 over the speed limit presents a willful or wanton disregard for safety.
Section (a) says that:
So it’s possible that your friend got pulled over going 65 over and only got a speeding ticket (if the ticketing officer decided not to cite her for reckless driving). Or, if she did get cited for reckless driving, that she got off with merely a fine. I would probably let the story go and not call her on it next time (unless the mph over the limit has increased - always look for inconsistencies!)
As for your question about degrees of reckless driving - if you look at that same statute (316.192) it provides different penalties for who cause a certain amount of damage or bodily harm through their reckless driving, or have alcohol or drugs involved.
Now for my anecdote: My brother got pulled over speeding when he was late to high school. He was going 80 (in order to try to get to school on time) and flew through a school zone which had dropped to 25 mph. The policeman let him off with a “Don’t do this again and get up on time, son.” /anecdote.
And FlyingDragonFan, a personal apology to you for dominating your thread with my insanity. That’s what I get for trying to post and watch reruns of Top Chef. Hopefully, I ended up being somewhat helpful.
Get this man a cup of coffee, stat.
Are there any states where you can lose your license for speeding, if the speeding is done without causing any risk or danger to others?
In california, however, you lose your license after you’ve accumulated, IIRC, 4.5 points or something like that. Reckless driving (which in california is automatic if you’re driving over 100 mph) is a 2 point offense. So if you have a regular ticket, for example for a stop sign, and then get reckless driving twice, you get your license suspended.
I managed to dig up a little bit of that info when I was looking, too. If I remember correctly, it was 4 points for the speeding, and 4 points for the reckless driving (for this situation). What I could not find for sure was how many points we have on our licenses here, but I think it’s 12.
Hmmmm…caught at 130 mph…that must be one damn fine car she? was driving.
ALthough it doesn’t help at all, I once got caught at 103 km / h in a 50 kn / h zone, which is automatic dangeours driving (court appearance, loss of license) as I was more than 50 over the limit. Nice officer wrote me up for 99 though…
Speeders over 100mph has been in the local news lately. There was one guy who was clocked at something over 100 on I-205, the eastern bypass around Portland. This was late night. The next day a TV reporter caught him for an interview and he was bragging that he’d actually been doing about 10-15 more than the OSP had said. He also bragged that they couldn’t prove it, some BS about the trooper not getting close enough for a good fix. Guess he didn’t think about the newstape being used as evidence. I think it was the same guy that was ticketed a few weeks later on I-5, south of Portland, doing over a hundred on a motorcycle. This time in fairly heavy traffic. They had him on the troopers dash cam and showed it on the news.
They report that the OSP gave out over 500 tickets for speeding over a hundred in 2005. That’s despite the fact that the OSP is well understaffed due to a budget crunch.
Here’s a link to other aspects: http://www.katu.com/team2/story.asp?ID=84769
Late, late one night he was taking home a new bike and decided to test it out on my hometown’s suburban streets.
He blows by a local cop doing a hundred and god knows what in a thirty-five mile zone.
Cop hits his lights, and my friend slows down, pulls over and stops. Couple of minutes later, the cop gets to him. Cop says to him: “I never could have caught you, why the hell did you stop.” Friend says “I’m a law-abiding guy, cop pulls me over, I stop.” Cop tells him to just get the hell out of there – but more slowly.
Assuming she was on a flat surface, it’s possible in one Focus model available in the US. The Focus SVT has a high-revving 170 HP engine, the best you can get in that car in the US, and a 6-speed manual. Wikipedia lists its top end at 133 MPH, which I find credible.
If she doesn’t drive a stick, she’s either lying or was going downhill.
Or it was modded. I got beat by a Focus at the strip in my AMX with 450 horses. The Focus was stripped out and had some slight engine/exhaust mods done to it, probably some bolt on stuff and a chip swap. Maybe a turbo, but I didn’t get to see under the hood and I didn’t hear a whistle.
I ran a 14.2 at a 104 and the focus came in around 13.9 at right around 100.
Took me off the line something fierce. I could never get the AMX to hook up in first gear otherwise I’d have got that thing in the 13’s easy.
Anyway, if the Focus had some mods done I could see the thing going over 130.
Actually, if it wasn’t the SVT, to get to those speeds, it would HAVE to at least be chipped. Various models of Focus have various electronic speed limits set in them. I found a cite for an '05 ZX4 with the 2.3L having a limiter at 120.
As far as a turbo goes, there is an RS available in Europe that appears to have a factory turbo, so it would NOT be impossible to retrofit a domestic Focus in such fashion.
