Strategies For Fighting A Traffic Ticket
If you are someone that has received a traffic ticket that you do not think is fair, there is a good chance that you are going to try to challenge it in court in order to avoid having to pay it. If you are going to take time off of work to go to court to challenge the ticket, you will likely want to give yourself the best chance possible to be successful. Here are some possible strategies that you can use in order to increase your chances of being successful as much as possible.
1. Challenge the Views of the Police Officer
This strategy is best used when you have a received a ticket for something that is relatively subjective. You want the police officer who pulled you over to have had to give an opinion about your actions. For instance, a police officer may have given you a ticket for making a turn that he or she deemed to be unsafe. However, unsafe is not necessarily an objective term and it should be relatively easy for you to challenge how fair his or her assertion was. Give your own version of the events and why you thought your actions were safe and responsible. This will bring the decision down to the judge's discretion. If you are persuasive enough, the judge will likely side with your version of events.
2. Challenge the Observations Made
You can bring in your own eyewitnesses, drawings of what occurred, and photographs of the intersection or area of the street where you were pulled over to help prove your point that you were actually acting within the bounds of the law, rather than having your actions be an offence that would merit being pulled over. If you can get access to a traffic camera, you can further increase how solid your case is. If you truly were not breaking the law, you need to gather as much information and evidence as possible to refute the observations of the police officer.
3. Show That You Mistook the Facts
Finally, you can try to show the judge that you mistook the facts. For example, you might have run a stop sign because you did not see it due to the fact that it was covered with plants to the point where it was impossible to see. You can take pictures of the stop sign in order to prove your point.
For more information, talk to a traffic lawyer.
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