And the verdict is....

[randomtask37]

my lawyer speculated that the 2nd cop talked his buddy into giving me the reckless ticket for giving him such a hard time.

if thats true, that is such a load of shit. what is happening to our system.

[george graves]

Guilty untill you pay your way innocent....

You never should have gone thru that. If you wanted to be a dick you could send a message to the cop that gave you a ticket...That sould be good for a laugh, but if he see you even spit out your window in the furture, well you know...

Sorry you had to put up with that - But I think I'll go slow around airports!

George Graves

[lukasbmw]

I'm happy to hear you were able to get off with a minor violation, but it still angers me that you had to hire a lawyer to beat these absurd charges. I'd definitely file a formal complaint with the city and even contact local media stations as this never should have happened.

[Fred]

my lawyer speculated that the 2nd cop talked his buddy into giving me the reckless ticket for giving him such a hard time.

if thats true, that is such a load of shit. what is happening to our system.

Guilty untill you pay your way innocent....

That's the justice system. I believe everyone who has never been to court and experienced this kind of thing firsthand has an idealistic view of how things work, kinda like on TV: The bad guys go to jail, the innocent goes free, and the cops all do a great job figuring things out. In reality, you are guilty and must prove your innocence. The original DA assigned to my case told my lawyer that this was an easy case for him because it said in the police report that I almost ran over some pedestrians. That means that it was my lawyer's job to prove me innocent, not the other way around. And furthermore, money really does buy freedom. There were a few guys next to me with public defenders who advised them just to plead guilty to make things easier for everyone.

Eric, yeah it is bullshit but I did the math. Let's say that I got a public defender (free), who automatically assumes you're guilty and only tries to get a lesser charge or your sentence reduced. Let's say that they keep the reckless driving charge but wave jail time and drop the fine from $1000 to $100. That means I save $2 grand in lawyer fees, but I still have 2 points on my record with misdemeanor reckless. My insurance will then be dropped and I'll have to get one of those no-name companies and deal with a tripled or quadrupled rate for 6 years. That would come out to over $7,000 more that I would end up paying, so thinking long term, the lawyer was the best bet.

I'm waiting to get a copy of the state's evidence from my lawyer before I do anything. At the least, I'll put it on my website ;)