At the end of November 2014 I received a traffic citation while driving in Carrollton, Texas. It’s like a road tax for working (employment), buying all my lunches, making purchases in local stores, servicing my car and in other words spending most of my time and money in this fair city.
The city is a well know speed trap with many well-traveled roads posted at 30 MPH and strictly enforced. Four years ago I was cited for speeding while accelerating my approach to an extremely short (30 yard long) on-ramp to blend into 70 MPH freeway traffic. The access road was posted 35 MPH. I was literally chased up the ramp and had to pull over to the side of I35E. I was cited 55 in a 35 zone.
This time it was a 40 MPH zone and I sped up to pass a very slow car that had just pulled out into the center of a four lane doing about 25 and not accelerating. I lost my head and decided to go around quickly to get back into the lane while approaching a traffic signal about a quarter mile ahead. As I sped up to do that, two cops on motorcycles were waiting. No doubt a staged event. Several other drivers we already in the ticket queue. Ha! But I was traveling faster than the limit. Dumb me again, right?
Other than these two events I am a law abiding safe driver. So I decided like last time, to take the safe driver course, pay 1/2 the fine and get the ticket dismissed.
There is 5 steps of paperwork to the process and a six hour computer “safe driver” training course to plod through. All kinds of mailing back and forth between the city traffic court, state records, training web site, and back to city traffic court. A very meticulous process.
The only uncertainty was the use of the USPS for the hard copy paper shuffling four times. I finished all the paperwork and passed the training course. I bundled all the paperwork together on December 30, with all the T’s crossed and I’s dotted. Come on USPS, do your duty.
I waited 15 days for a return response from the city traffic court. Uh-oh, where is my citation cancelation notice?
I occasionally eat my lunch two city blocks from the Carrollton City Court. I ate quickly today and visited the court to check my status. Thankfully it was not busy, I was 4th in line to be served with my take-a-ticket number. No lines, I could sit down to wait. It was very easy (and interesting) to hear what the other “customers” were talking about at the windows. Some had serious problems to fix…
About ten minutes later it was my turn. I showed my driver’s license to the clerk at the window and explained I was there to check the status of my traffic citation after completing all the requirements for dismissal.
“Oh yeah, here it is on January 5th. We received your material and the citation was dismissed that day.”
I said, “Oh good, I was getting concerned that perhaps you hadn’t received it or I missed your notice.”
The clerk said, “Oh no, we never send a notice out!” as she handed me a just printed copy of the cancelation (dated Jan 5th). Today is January 14th.
It must be some nefarious plan to induce that last bit of mental torture before you are certain all sins are forgiven. Ha! I am not crying. I was pretty sure all was well. Just another experience to post in my blog…
I think it was a setup too! 😉
It was a no-win situation… 😉