Getting a ticket thrown out at arraignment

[snortle]

Police officer follows me around for 4 blocks , ten to 15 feet directly behind me. I then stop at a 4 way stop and turn left. He follows. About 40 feet from the intersection there is an entrance to a small convenience store. I turn into it , officer follows right behind me this time at 3 feet or less. Still no lights on.

I stop as its a busy Sunday. No parking spots and people mulling in front of me. After 10 seconds officer puts his lights on and the crowd scatters. He then directs me to pull in farther which now blocks other drivers from leaving their spots. He then directs me into a vacant spot which is not a parking spot but regardless had people mulling around in it.

He then says i was 'blocking the roadway and obstructing traffic'. However, after much wasted time, he cannot find the actual statute where its illegal. So he just gives me the ticket without a statute number with the wrong fine amount of $153 .

He then waits 4 days before submitting his ticket to the court (couldnt find it online) then it appears under section 316.1945 florida statute. Its now about stopping standing parking where signs prohibit. However, stopping in the roadway again has nothing to do with any of the subsections such as double parking, stopping on the train tracks or bike path or on the sidewalk blah blah.........



Let me quickly add that when i pulled in farther, people were not trying to get out of their spots, its part of the reason why i didnt want to pull in there as I would have had to back out of the lane to let people out eventually anyways. However, i couldnt back up regardless as the officer stuck his cruiser up my rear end.



Thank you for the reply. I have looked up every single statute there is and there is none relating to simply 'stopping in the roadway'. We do it every day. Since it was a 4 way stop 40 -60 feet from the incident , there was only the officer behind me and to the best of my knowledge nobody behind him in the 10-15 seconds that elapsed before he fired on his lights.

The statute he finally picked was one relating to illegal parking and standing , double parking etc. However we were both in our cars driving and it wasnt even on the roadway. There are virtually no laws designed to deal with a busy parking lot.

The reason that its so important is the fact the officer used this excuse to then try to search my car and i refused so he made me wait for an hour for these dogs to show up to sniff the car, which of course resulted in nothing. I want to show the court he simply made up the ticket as an excuse to detain me.

edit: I do disagree with one point. At arraignment, if i can show the ticket to be baseless regardless if i stipulate to everything the officer said happened, then there would be no point to trial and the judge would throw it out there.

In other words, if there is no actual law against stopping on the roadway then there is no point to trial. I doubt the State prosecutor is going to put up a fight for a zeo point ticket like this.



Thankyou. I googled 'arraignment' and found out that you can ask the judge to throw it out if the ticket is irrelevant on the face of it . I am not going to argue whether the officer said i was stopped on the roadway. I am arguing that its not against the law so there is no point in going to 'trial'. Lets keep our fingers crossed.


Thank you for your post. I appreciate it. Here is the link where the 'advise' suggests I could ask the judge for dismissal at arraignment......

Did they really go through with charging you with it? I bet they dropped it.


thankyou my friend. Here in florida, it is called an arraignment for some reason.











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Please stop posting in dead threads (older than fourteen days), thank you.

Please stop posting to increase your post count.

Thank you, your mod, AJ

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[army judge]

If you simply explain why you believe the citation was incorrect, that's all you need to do. In essence, you plead not guilty, demand a trial. It won't be done at the arraignment. You can also see if the store has the video of what went down in the parking lot. You can subpoena that. Why not make your life simpler? See if you can take traffic school.

 

[army judge]

Thank you for the reply. I have looked up every single statute there is and there is none relating to simply 'stopping in the roadway'. We do it every day. Since it was a 4 way stop 40 -60 feet from the incident , there was only the officer behind me and to the best of my knowledge nobody behind him in the 10-15 seconds that elapsed before he fired on his lights.

The statute he finally picked was one relating to illegal parking and standing , double parking etc. However we were both in our cars driving and it wasnt even on the roadway. There are virtually no laws designed to deal with a busy parking lot.

The reason that its so important is the fact the officer used this excuse to then try to search my car and i refused so he made me wait for an hour for these dogs to show up to sniff the car, which of course resulted in nothing. I want to show the court he simply made up the ticket as an excuse to detain me.

edit: I do disagree with one point. At arraignment, if i can show the ticket to be baseless regardless if i stipulate to everything the officer said happened, then there would be no point to trial and the judge would throw it out there.

In other words, if there is no actual law against stopping on the roadway then there is no point to trial. I doubt the State prosecutor is going to put up a fight for a zeo point ticket like this.

You can disagree all you wish. Traffic court arraignments are to plead not guilty and to request a trial. There is no discussion of the merits of the case during traffic court arraignments.

You are free to attempt to discuss your concerns with the prosecutor prior to the arraignment, and SOMETIMES the prosecutor will move to dismiss at arraignment.

 

[mightymoose]

If you want to argue your case in court (and it seems you may have a good point to make) just remember to keep calm and keep your focus.
The officer will have opportunity to explain the violation and then you will have opportunity to explain why the officer is incorrect.
Focus on the wording of statute and show that none of the various situations listed in that statute apply to what happened.
Don't worry about trying to explain everything else, including about being followed, unless you are asked to elaborate.

 

[Michael Wechsler]

At traffic court (at least most I have practiced) there are usually short meetings before the judge hears the cases so that the prosecutor can settle (or dismiss) as many of them as possible. Frequently people come in for serious traffic offenses and hope to reduce points and pay a fine, so that is one settlement that goes on. It's also possible that the prosecutor will see the location of the ticket, see the statute or section that you are alleged to have violated and decides to drop the case entirely. Circumstances also include the officer not showing up for one reason or another. As mighty moose says, just stay calm and appreciate that most prosecutors in traffic court don't want to waste time on bogus / bad tickets that are defective on their face. I'm not sure we are there but you can take the position that it's either a slam dunk pre-trial dismissal or that you shouldn't have a problem presenting your side to win on the merits during trial as a result of the judge deciding that the summons is defective or your case is more credible. Good luck.

 

[Michael Wechsler]

Thankyou. I googled 'arraignment' and found out that you can ask the judge to throw it out if the ticket is irrelevant on the face of it . I am not going to argue whether the officer said i was stopped on the roadway. I am arguing that its not against the law so there is no point in going to 'trial'. Lets keep our fingers crossed.

You're not arraigned in traffic court. The definition of "arraignment" is the court appearance where a criminal suspect is formally charged with a crime. You've received a citation and a summons to appear in court. You don't have a criminal charge and warrant out for your arrest. When you show up to traffic court you receive a hearing. Before the hearing you can request that the prosecutor drop the case because the citation is invalid on its face, citing law that can't even be applied to the location to where the offense allegedly occurred. If that's the end of the story, then you don't have a "hearing" (trial is actually the wrong word.) That's probably the best you can do, IMHO. You get it dismissed by the prosecutor and get to leave early.

 

[Michael Wechsler]

Thanks for explaining the context. Nothing changes regarding procedure except terminology. Get there early and keep your ears and eyes open. I've found that it is usually helpful to have an attorney unless you're extremely sure that you've got an ironclad defense.

So here is something that may help - the 2014 Florida Statute - 316.1945 Stopping, standing, or parking prohibited in specified places.
Look at the specific wording as to what seems to qualify as a "sign" that prohibits parking - although it may be in the PDF you referred to as well. If it refers to a sign, then you'll want to look for a department of transportation sign or traffic control device. I don't know where he claims you stopped so as to warrant the violation. As mighty moose says, the officer will probably have notes. You would do best by going back to the area and taking photos. You'll want to take panorama shots so that you can connect one photo to another with something recognizable within each photo. Having visible street signs and building numbers are good. I have impressed prosecutors before with this effort and the photos were sufficiently convincing in virtually all the times I presented in traffic court (not many but enough.) You'll want to print out photos and not rely upon a tablet or computer to show them, although a court may be understanding. Hope this helps and good luck with your defense.