Questions about the Notice of violation and hearing?

[kid090]

Jurisdiction

New York

Hello,

Few days ago I got a ticket for entered without payment on a bus (Select Bus Q44, Queens to Bronx ). Statute: 21 N.Y.C.R.R. PART 1050

The background of the ticket is yellow with most of the writing in black/grey fonts. Some of the headings are in red e.g last name, dob, date of offense, hearing date etc. I can pay the fine anytime before the final hearing date. If I choose to go for hearing, it will occur at Transit Adjudication Bureau.

I had a metro card at that time with around 20$ in it. It was first time I was traveling Queens to Bronx in public transportation. I have been living in NYC for well over a decade and almost always travelled in Queens and Manhattan only. Buses and trains in Queens and trains in Manhattan. I always used the regular metro card for all the rides. I never knew the bus going to Bronx requires a slip before riding the bus. The driver never told me anything when I got on the bus from Queens. It also happened to be the bus in which the card entry was blocked. I took my card out, was about to put it in the machine, came to know its blocked and took it back in my pocket.

It seems that on select bus service, proof of payment is not the driver's responsibility as later on I came to know one can ride the select bus from both the front and rear door.

Later on the security officers stopped the bus and because of not having the slip they gave me a 100$ ticket.

Now if people get these kinds of tickets dismissed by proving they did swipe the card inside the bus, then here is the problem: the card machine inside the bus was blocked. If we get the record of swipes, it won't show the swipe for the ride in question.

I have two questions in this regard.

It is civil or criminal?

If it is civil, should I just pay it and move on or dispute it?

I am looking forward to hearing from you soon.



Thanks

 

[army judge]

Our site owner, Michael, or another colleague, Highwayman know almost everything there is to know about those crooked citations. They'll be along shortly, I'm just alerting you to the fact they're here.

So before you do anything, give them a day or so to provide you with great insight about the busses and those crooked citations.

 

[Michael Wechsler]

V

Hello,

Few days ago I got a ticket for entered without payment on a bus (Select Bus Q44, Queens to Bronx ). Statute: 21 N.Y.C.R.R. PART 1050

I'm very sorry to hear about the ticket you received for the Select Bus Service route. I'm actually fighting one of these tickets pro bono and have done some research already on these cases. IMHO, you should absolutely not pay the ticket and you should have an excellent chance of it being dismissed for several reasons.

1. I was told that if you bring your Metro Card down to the hearing at the Transit Adjudication Bureau in Brooklyn, they will read the card to determine whether you had the fare and were entitled to ride. Routinely they dismiss the summons. My research also indicated that the MTA may still be handing out tickets like these that it doesn't expect riders to pay - even where riders don't have tickets because the Select Bus Service ticket machines are broken.

2. IMHO, most of these Select Bus Service tickets are unenforceable for exactly the issue you've described. The MTA (Metropolitan Transit Authority) didn't put up any signs that would remotely educate the average person possessing a PhD from a recognized university about how the Select Bus Service works. If you are near the bus stop, you should take photos of the bus stop pole which probably doesn't have any indication whatsoever that your standard Metro Card is not enough. They deliberately disable to machines on the bus so that people won't rely upon them.

I don't know when your court date is but I will report on my Select Bus Service hearing at the Transit Adjudication Bureau when it occurs in early June. Keep posted or send us a support ticket to be in touch and we'll let you know how it goes. I'm hoping that there will be a dismissal by mail process that I'll be able to discover so that thousands of New Yorkers aren't inconvenienced any further by what many might consider a very shady, unfair and highly questionable practice - especially after years of knowing about the problem. Good luck.