My wife stumbled upon a case recently in which the DC Superior Court ruled that paying a civil fine for a traffic ticket by mail is inadmissiable in a related civil action. This is different in than a formal plea of guilty to a traffic offence, which is admissable. (See Frost v. Hays, 146 A.2d 907, 908 (D.C.1958)).
They further point out that
Many courts have considered the precise issue whether payment of a traffic fine may be admitted as evidence in a related civil case. Virtually without exception, such evidence has been deemed inadmissible. Within the past decade or so, the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, in ruling on the issue, cited, merely as examples, no less than nine such holdings and stated that it had found “no case to the contrary.”
They also note that the fact that one is ticketed is also inadmissable. It constitutes the opinion of the police officer making it hearsay. The officer would need to come to the trial and be available for cross-examination for mention of the ticket to be admissable.
So if you get a ticket from a cop and they're wrong, it doesn't screw you in a civil case, even if you pay the ticket.
You're probably dealing with an insurance company and you're unlikely to get to a courtroom. The existence of the ticket will screw you. (The assumption shouldn't be that the ticket is meaningless, the assumption should be that the cop will be there. In the unlikely event that you pursue your case all the way to a courtroom and then manage to convince the judge that the cop is wrong based on your cross examination, then you're not screwed. Seems a fairly unlikely chain of events.)
Posted by: Mike | June 05, 2014 at 03:37 PM
I remember reading of a similar case with the opposite outcome. A driver was arrested for DWI and ticketed for a lesser offense, something like reckless driving. The lesser offense had a statutory fine; eg you could just admit guilt and pay the set fine without going before a judge. When he was out on bail his lawyer advised him to run to the clerk of the court's office and enter a written plea to the lesser offense and pay the fine immediately in cash.
His lawyer was then able to argue successfully that the prosecution for DWI was double jeopardy. The two charges stemmed from the same act, and when the court accepted his guilty plea jeopardy attached for that act.
Case dismissed.
Posted by: contrarian | June 05, 2014 at 05:02 PM
That may have been in Virginia, Contrarian. I know the Hall v Commonwealth case in 1992 that said you cannot be convicted of both DUI and reckless if they stem from the same act(s), which they essentially have to be from the same act. As VA does have a double jeopardy.
Now as to paying the one fine and not the other, that's the trickier part. I think reckless can carry jail time and license suspension in VA. Then again, it's much better than a DUI and a wise way to avoid it. Part of the issue is that they consider anything you do illegal while above the per se limit to be by default reckless.
Posted by: T | June 06, 2014 at 09:34 AM