Quote:
Originally Posted by 01WS6
. . The main point is its all about MONEY and thats ALL its about . .
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Safer roads and lousy drivers not withstanding, it is about the money and it can be particularly harsh on a CDL holder and especially harsh if you're not local to the ticket. It's lose time and money to show up, lose money to hire a lawyer or to simply pay the fine or, as is the case with the OP, lose all the way around. It's a system that I try to avoid at all costs because, once you get caught up in it, there's really no way to win.
My father was a lawyer and his advice was, if you want to keep your license, drive like you don't have one.
You, OP, could and should have beat the ticket. The "highest court in the land" relatively speaking, interpreted that law to mean your only duty was to proceed with caution. That's akin to telling all the lower court judges and all the lawyers who argue before them that there's no reason to squabble over this, here's what the statute means. Your judge may have been completely unaware of that ruling. It was up to your lawyer to make him aware. It didn't happen because either your lawyer didn't know enough or wasn't being paid enough to make it happen.
GH . . as to your fledgling legal career, there's generally only one thing that can trigger an appeal and that's an unresolved issue raised at trial . . kind of like a lawyer says "But judge, you can't do that!" and the judge says "Yes I can and I'm going to!". Then the lawyer goes to the next higher court and says "Look what the rotten judge did!" If, as is the case here, everyone agrees to a plea bargain, there is no basis for an appeal, no matter how absurd it might appear. Of course, as I'm typing this it occurs to me that the OP could file an appeal on the basis of ineffective counsel. (Not me; the paid counsel!)