park police ticket in VA

[hkornfeld]

What is the name of your state?
Virginia

I got a 50/40 ticket on the George Washington Memorial Parkway in Virginia from a US Park Police officer. I have to appear in US District Court to fight it. Has anyone had experience in this regard? Namely, how different is it from regular traffic court? Do the cops show up, is the procedure the same, ...

Also, I keep seeing messages about traffic school reducing your point count, but I haven't found any information on the VA DMV web pages. Is this something I have to ask the judge about? Can I take the course online?

Thanks in advance.

 

[fedcop110]

You will be going in front of a federal magistrate judge. The procedure is equivalent to traffic court. With the park police you can pretty much bet that they will show up for court. It has been my experience that most federal magistrates do not take traffic as seriously as state traffic court judges, this is due to the fact that these magistrates hear all sorts of federal cases. Traffic (50/40) is not on the top of the radar screen for most of them. I'm not saying that this is the case all of the time, but if you have a clean drivers history you have a good chance at getting the charge reduced to defective equipment. The traffic school will help with a point balance if you are convicted. Call the US Courthouse that you will be going to and ask the clerk.