How did I Get a $625 Ticket Dismissed?

On December 30, 2008, I received a traffic ticket on my way from Houston Bush airport to home when I returned from our skiing trip to Utah. The traffic cited three violations including speeding (74 mph in a 65 mph zone), failing to signal while changing lanes, and no seat belt on a child in the backseat. The total fine was $625.

This was the first time that I received such a large fine from any traffic ticket. I normally take a defensive driving course, but this time a defensive driving course would take care only one of the violations but not all of them. So I had to be creative in handling this ticket. Eventually I got the entire ticket with all three citations dismissed, spending only $300 on a lawyer. Here is how I did it.

Within a week following the citation, I started receiving flyers from law firms offering help to resolve the ticket. The cost ranged from $30 per citation to about $50 (or $90 to $150 for all three citations). Once a ticket is issued, the entire ticket becomes public information. That is how these law firms can send me solicitation letters. I do wonder if these law firms actually download such information electronically or they had to copy them manually from a city computer.

I consulted with a police friend. He suggested me to hire a lawyer. Since there were three citations, it’d be much better to fight it in the court. There is a good chance that the police may not show up so that the ticket would get dismissed. He gave me a lawyer’s name that specializes in traffic cases. I called that lawyer and checked his website. He charges $100 per violation. I felt comfortable with him because of the reference and didn’t know much about those unsolicited, but lower-cost lawyers.

After paying the lawyer $300 and signing an agreement, his office reset the court date from March to August 27, 2009. That was eight months after the citation. I can’t miss that court date. If I do, the court may issue a warrant for my arrest. The court does not allow resetting this court date unless it’s for emergency reasons. Therefore, I have to remember this date. I put the date on all my calendars – online, at home, in the office, on PDA phone, and watch. The lawyer’s office called me the day before to remind me. Luckily I didn’t forget and made it to the court.

On Thursday, August 27, 2009, I drove to downtown Houston’s municipal court. I arrived at about 7:20am for my 7:45am court appointment. After parking my car I paid $3 for two-hour parking. I was hoping that my case would finish within two hours. After going through the security, I went upstairs to Court No. 12.

As I sit in the court for about one hour, gradually it was filled with people. A security guard asked people with lawyers to sit on the left side and those who didn’t have lawyers to sit on the right side. It turned out that the majority of people had lawyers. I noticed that my lawyer was representing only two people in the room. Two of the law firms who sent me letters were representing more than 10 each. So the solicitation letters do get more business.

Once the judge came in, we all rose to show our respect. She is a Hispanic judge, who spoke both English and Spanish. She explained what may be expected to happen on her court today.

She called every one’s name one by one. There were a total of 188 cases in her court that day. She said that was a normal day. On a busy day, she may have up to 250 cases. 20-40% of the cases would get dismissed right away because the police may not be present as a witness for whatever reason. Those whose cases are dismissed can leave right away after receiving the dismissal paperwork. Policeman who cited the tickets would show up as witnesses in about 60-70% of the cases. These cases would be negotiated with the prosecutor throughout the day. Most of them would probably be settled with a lesser charge or lesser fine. They will most likely stay until about 12 or 1pm. By 1pm, there should be about 7 cases left. Only three cases go to trial. The rest of the seven that does not go to trial gets a reset for another court date in six months.

She reminded everyone to bring allot of patience during the process.

She started calling those names whose cases were dismissed. My name was the fifth one she called. I was all smiles after I heard my name. After sitting in the front row for a few minutes to wait for my paper, I left the court at 9am – in less than two hours, which was amazing to me.

Here is a summary of the lessons I learned from this experience:

(1) Try to avoid speeding at the first place. I don’t receive traffic citation that often.  I normally try to stay on the right side of the freeway to keep in a slower pace with the traffic. The cars driving on the left side are often faster.

(2) Try to avoid City of Houston driving if I can. Use the Sam Houston toll road or the 610 loop instead of 45 or 59 to go through the city. There are much less cops on the toll ways.

(3) If there is only one citation, it’s probably better to go through defensive driving if that is available. However, if there are more than one citations and the total fine is more than $200, it’s probably better to fight it at the court and take the chances on the policeman not showing up at the court.

(4) It’s now my opinion, I don’t need to hire an expensive lawyer for traffic violations. It’s true it’s a good idea to hire a lawyer who specializes in the traffic cases. However, the quality of the lawyer did not matter to my case at all. Judging by what I saw at the court, a lawyer that charges much less, say, only $30 or $50 per citation, would be just fine in comparison with the one I paid ($100 per citation). I could have saved $200 with the same result. Hopefully, I won’t have a chance to try one for a long time.

(5) Finally, I am very impressed with the democratic and fair process to handle a ticket by the local government in the US. About 10 years ago, when I did much traveling in China, I heard that over there, traffic cameras were set up to automatically issue tickets. However the tickets were not sent to the car owners. They were instead published on newspaper’s classified sections. It was the driver’s responsibility to read the newspaper if their license plate number received a ticket or not. As a result, all the tax drivers had to read the newspaper carefully. I asked why the government couldn’t mail a ticket to the car owners. No one seems to know the answer .One jokingly said that would make it too easy. I hope that such a strange ticket system is no longer being practiced in China and Chinese government would give the drivers who receive the tickets a chance to defend these citations through the proper channel.