“First Ticket,130 In 80 Reduced To 129 + 2 More Tickets”

Officer claims to have me clocked on laser at 130, I was traveling 145, threatened impound car and suspend license and asked me to start making phone calls for pickup arrangements. He comes back 2 minutes later, tells me to hang up the phone and says he is reducing my ticket to 129 and issuing me 2 additional tickets for a tinted bubbled license plate cover (obstruction of plate) as well as an expired validation sticker expired 4 days. What is my best option to fight this ticket, as I believe that the officer did not actually use a laser gun and only guessed my speed, or clocked the guy beside me going slower. should i meet early or go to trial and plead not guilty?

Request a trial and when you get a court date request disclosure to see what the evidence against you is. From there you can plan a defense strategy.

The sticker and plate obstruction are going to be difficult if not impossible to win. The officer is allowed to estimate your speed by a variety of methods (his notes will say how and that is what he will say at trial). Please note that if you admit at trial to going 1 km over the limit you will be found guilty.

For insurance purposes, 130 in 80 is 50 over and is stunt driving which is a much much much more serious offence than 49 over speeding. And the officer could have charged you with stunt, had your vehicle towed/impounded and suspended your license for 7 days.

Obviously you can not testify and give your side of the story because you have to tell the truth and you would be admitting that you were going 65 over and that would be much much worse again.

You can plead not guilty and request officers notes for disclosure and see if there if something in them that you can use to fight it.

Why were you driving 145 in an 80? You need to slow down before you hurt somebody.

This road is a regional highway, the flow of traffic on a regular day is 110-120, the road is straight, smooth, and 3 lanes across divided from the other side with a barrier. I was in a hurry after a 15 hour workday, sportscar got to me and my foot got heavy. The officer gave me a break and bumped me down by 1 from what he read on his radar, to avoid the stunt, impound and suspension. If I request disclosure can he say that he clocked me at 130 and the charge gets bigger? Even if I plead not guilty what is my defense? Would my best bet to be to go meet with a prosecutor for early resolution and get a deal, or go straight to trial and hope officer doesn't show up, would they offer me a deal at this point?

You already got a deal so there is slim to none chance that prosecutor will offer you anything else.

If you plead not guilty, we do not know what the defense would be until we see the disclosure... need officers notes before we can decide if there is a way to fight it or not.

Yes it is possible that if you plead not guilty and request disclosure that the officer could withdraw this charge and re-issue a new charge at 50 over speeding and/or stunt driving. But they only have 6 months from the date of the offence to issue new ticket, so i would do this:

- Plead not guilty and request your trial date.

- Once you get the trial date, if it is set for MORE than 6 months from the offence date, then wait until 6 month mark to request the disclosure and then they can not issue a new ticket.

- If however the trial date is less than 6 months from the offence date, then you have to decide if you want to chance the higher charge being laid versus viewing the disclosure.

Once you get the disclosure you can then review it and decide if you want to fight it. If you take it to trial and lose the trial, the charge will be amended up to the Speeding 50 over instead of the 49 over, so that is something to consider. But you should view disclosure before you decide because you can pay 49 over charge anytime up to the trial date.

It would be EXTREMELY unlikely that a new charge would be laid just because you asked for disclosure. Firstly it could be viewed as an abuse of process as you are entitle to take all steps to defend yourself, secondly the officer will have others things on his mind.

If I wrote a stunt (and that's a full stunt with tow and everything), by the time the next shift came around it is far in the distance and the last thing I would want to do is try and track someone down to give them a piece of paper.

Yes it's possible but so unlikely it verges on the impossible.

You did get a break but I wouldn't be surprised if the prosecutor would deal away the other two tickets for a guilty please on the 49 over. At the end of the day it's tickets that count for insurance and I'd rather have one speeding ticket than two other ones.

Thank you for the advice guys, I went to court today and requested trial for the speeding and early resolutions for the other two tickets, when I get a court date in 3-4 months I will request disclosure and update this thread, I'm assuming it will bump back up to get viewed.

I think you'll find the crown will want to discuss all three tickets.