Your Opinion
By Staff
Traffic court not best option
Editor:
Perhaps I am a bit too upset to be writing this letter, but writing it, I am.
I am a 36-year-old mother of two teenagers who just concluded my first visit to traffic court ever! My experience with traffic court happened to be in Priceville.
Now, before you get too upset, I have never disputed the fact that I was speeding. (It's hard to drive 45 going down the hill on Bethel Road into the Priceville jurisdiction and I definitely wasn't!) Nor, did I dispute the fact that I missed my first court date. (I had an emergency board meeting at work and had no choice but to attend…) I did not ask for a reduction in fines, or anything, and I am not upset about having to pay a penalty for my mistakes.
As a "virgin" traffic offender, I immediately called the Priceville Municipal building the morning after I missed court and asked to speak with the court clerk. I got her voicemail and promptly began to apologize profusely and ask for a return call so I could find out what steps I should take to redeem myself. A few days later, with no call back, I made another call and left another message, making sure to give all of the various phone numbers where I could be reached. About a week later I called again, and was again routed to a voicemail. I did not leave a message this time, but resolved to call back the next day. After more calls, I decided not to ask for the court clerk and spoke to the person who answered the phone. It just so happened that I was finally speaking to the court clerk who was quick to let me know that although she had gotten my voicemails, she did not have time to return all of the calls that she received in a day, but that she would be happy to set me a new court date.
This evening, however, while the judge was berating me and basically calling me a liar because I told him that I had left messages that had not been returned and that I called several times before finally talking to a person that could give me a new court date, the court clerk, sitting directly in front of me and directly to the right of the judge, never opened her mouth to offer any sort of word in my defense. She just sat there and smiled while the judge spoke to me as if I were some idiot.
When I received my ticket in the mail, I was just going to mail the payment into the court, but my husband suggested that since we have two teenagers, and I have nothing on my driving record, that perhaps
I should request driving school to help alleviate the rise we would have in our insurance rates.
Most courts will grant driving school, but unless you are under the age of 19, you might as well not ask in Priceville. You can, however, go to driving school more than once in the city of Priceville, they will send repeat offenders to "level 2" driving courses, but heaven forbid you have a clean driving record until you are almost 40 years old!
Those of you who might have been wondering how a city as small as Priceville could afford such a nice municipal building . . . keep driving through Priceville. Their police force is doing everything they can to insure that you too will be lucky enough to meet their esteemed judge and municipal workers.
I should have just mailed the payment, huh?
LM Griffin
Hartselle
