Motodisiac

I received this traffic citation earlier this year. The ticket was completely bogus if not absurd. And that day I decided I was going to fight it. One important step of the process is sending the money to the traffic court. Traffic courts require to submit the payment even if you plea not guilty. Once your ticket is dismissed the court will send you the money back. In case of LA traffic court it takes approximately 8 weeks.

One of the things traffic courts ask you to do is write “not guilty” on the check. And that is your way of letting them know that you are requesting a court hearing. In my case I went online to the LA Superior Court’s website and requested the court hearing even before sending the money. Then I printed the confirmation page that stated my scheduled court date, put the check in an envelope along with that confirmation page and mailed it in. In the world that actually makes sense the fact that there is a confirmed court date included with the check would mean that I would like to have a trial. However in the world of traffic court bureaucracy it meant that I am pleading guilty.

I had mailed the payment about a week ago. Luckily I went on the court’s website yesterday and found that out. Caught this problem early as my scheduled court date is still a good couple of month from now. I decided to take actions as soon as possible and called the LA traffic court earlier today. After spending about 20 minutes on hold a very helpful court clerk had explained to me that REGARDLESS of what is the current status of your traffic citation and REGARDLESS of what else you include in the envelope the check that does not explicitly say “NOT GUILTY” is accepted as admission of guilt and will effectively supersede any previous actions. Such as requesting a trial in my case. However the good news was that I have an option of going to court and reopening my case. And per her I have one month to do so. Obviously I will not wait that long and will go sometime next week.

Lesson learned - ALWAYS write “not guilty” on your check. Unless of course you don’t want to fight the system. In case of my bogus ticket I definitely want to give it a shot.