“Fail To Stop - Need Advice”

I am fighting a violation for Fail to Stop - Disobey sign. My court date is Feb 3, 2011.

First the violation written by the officer lists my Given name as one of my last names and my Family name as my second last name. My true Given and middle name were omitted by the officer. I am going to attempt to have the proceeding quashed on the ground that the information bears a fatal flaw -- no Defendant's name.

I know that the ticket can be amended and I have to be prepared to proceed.

Truth is, the officer who wrote the ticket claims he followed me from near my home and observed my supposed failure to stop at a stop sign. I believe he was not behind me at all....I know his vehicle was parked 4 blocks away (no where near the interesection where he claims I failed to stop and where he couldn't even see the particular intersection). I passed his vehicle on a different street where the intersection he claims I avoided a sign is not in site. I think he pulled my vehicle over without cause - simply because of the neighborhood; took a look at my record and saw previous traffic violations (none for failing to stop)...was hoping to nail me for something big like no insurance and when he couldn't he wrote this fictious charge -- knowing the area and my address because of all of the one way streets it wouldn't have been hard to assume I travelled the route and had crossed the intersection in question.

How do you call out an officer of the law in court? The fact that he didn't write the ticket properly is one thing....but to accuse him of lying???? I don't know if it is best to just try to get him to agree that it is possible he blinked while I stopped and missed it....I am just so frustrated because I KNOW he wasn't behind me when he claims he was and that all of this is bogus. Any suggestions????

ram1224 wrote:First the violation written by the officer lists my Given name as one of my last names and my Family name as my second last name. My true Given and middle name were omitted by the officer. I am going to attempt to have the proceeding quashed on the ground that the information bears a fatal flaw -- no Defendant's name.

I don't think most JP's consider that a fatal flaw. I would anticipate it being amended. And it's not that there's "no name" it's that the officer switched the order of the name - that's different.

With regards to accusing the officer of lying, I'd suggest it probably will not be successful unless you have some way to prove it. There's no super sneaky question(s) you can ask that are going to trip him up and make him say, "you're right, I wasn't actually behind you." If that's his evidence in his notes, it's HIGHLY unlikely his evidence on the stand will be any different.

Usually what these cases come down to, as I've said in other threads, is: you give your evidence, the officer gives his, and the JP makes an assessment of whether there is reasonable doubt, based on the evidence before him.

Thank you for the reply.

My mother was in the vehicle with me at the time. I've been told that JP most likely will not give much weight to her testimony as she was a passenger in my vehicle and is considered biased. With her testimony do you think we should still bring up the fact that the officer was not behind me where\when he claims he was or should we just stick to the stop itself?