OHTA.ca

Hey Guys!

Just wanted to seek some help regarding a pair of tickets I recently got.

Location: Highway 115, Cavan-Monaghan Township (Bend) in Peterborough County

Time: 11am

Car: Honda Odyssey Minivan (Though was not marked on my ticket, just plate number)

Tickets:

- 134k in a posted 100k zone

- Failure to surrender license

No other information regarding speedometer etc.

I was asked last minute by my boss if I could drive to do a site visit in my vehicle from Vaughn to Peterborough. Unfortunately being in the process of getting my license renewed I forgot my current one. It was a sunny day, open road, and unfortunately I just had to be the one going faster than the rest (everyone else was maybe 25k over).

Going around the bend me and my coworker noticed the OPP officer just a bit too late, I pulled over to the right lane, slowed down. Once we were near the cop pointed at me as he pulled out and I promptly pulled over after he turned the lights on. He was blunt, but straightforward, asked me why I was going so fast to which I nervously babbled something about our site visit to Peterborough (did not explicitly say I was speeding, or admit fault but I suppose I did in a way). Gave me a bit of a hard time when I was scrambling to find ownership, but nonetheless I had ownership/insurance. Gave both tickets to me straight up with, no going easy on me (I didnt personally think I was going 134 but I was definitely over 130 either way) and gave me a warning about being slow on finding ownership and how he could charge me for it apparently. No fatal errors with fines etc as far as I can see but I could post a censored version. I was in a Hondo minivan if that makes a difference haha.

To give a little context, Im a young driver (21 years old), only have one previous ticket (15-20k over I believe on a country road, exactly 3 years ago). Im a competent guy and definitely not a jackass, especially on the road. I have a good driving record and have done a fair bit of driving in the past. Past summer jobs that require to me to do an extended amount of driving daily where I have had no issues:

- Sanitation worker, driving a garbage truck daily

- Pool Tech, driving all around Burlington/Hamilton/GTA daily etc

I was just looking for any advice / if its worthwhile to fight the ticket (on my own /hire a paralegal etc)? Any help is super appreciated as Im new to this. From what I understand having 2 tickets on your abstract is a lot bigger of a deal than just one, and being a young driver and all I do want to try my best to avoid insurance hikes even if I have to put in work // shell out for a paralegal.

From what I've read I would hope to get the "Fail to Surrender" dropped as a priority and my speeding ticket reduced to under 30km for extra credit to have the least amount of impact on Insurance. I was wondering if this is reasonable despite not having much going for me?

Thanks in advance for any advice! I really do appreciate it! Sorry for extended details, just didn't want to miss anything that may help me.

If you don't ask, you don't get. Any crown I've worked with would drop the fail to surrender to save the hassle of a trial. In regards to the speeding the speed doesn't actually matter to insurance companies so it's just a matter of saving a few bucks on the fine.

Also, if you have a G2 license, it's worth a shot to ask the prosecutor to reduce the speeding to a 29 over, because the 4 points will result in an immediate 30 day license suspension.

Awesome thanks for the advice guys! How would you recommend I go about asking the Officer? (Aka do I still request for trial, send a letter, etc)