Speeding and Muffler Ticket

[Brandon440]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Ohio

I was pulled over last month in cleveland ohio for speeding and a loud muffler ticket. Upon going to court the judge brought up my case and asked for my plea to speeding 55 in a 35 and a Mirror Violation? I never was informed i had a mirror violation i replied my ticket was for a muffler violation and speeding the judge insisted i had a mirror violation so i plead not guilty because this was untrue i have all the mirrors on my car and nothing is wrong with any of them. So the court has the wrong information for my ticket the officer must have gave them different information then he had gave me on my ticket. So now im going to trial on Wednesday a little unprepared due to the fact they only gave me a week to get ready for trial. Another thing to add the date on my ticket stated 2007 instead of 2009 as well the time said 2:30 when court was at 1:30 i was late due to this error. After talking to the judge she sent me to another court room then i talked to a prossecutor they were unhelpful after i stated i was not guilty he turned his back to me and walked away and refused to talk to me. I was'nt going to plea guilty to something i was not aware of and was not informed of. anyone have any advise for me i would greatly appreciate it.

 

[I_Got_Banned]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Ohio

I was pulled over last month in cleveland ohio for speeding and a loud muffler ticket. Upon going to court the judge brought up my case and asked for my plea to speeding 55 in a 35 and a Mirror Violation? I never was informed i had a mirror violation i replied my ticket was for a muffler violation and speeding the judge insisted i had a mirror violation

What vehicle code sections are listed on the citation that you received?
It might be that the officer wrote the wrong code section (used the one for a mirror violation) even though he wrote the correct description (as a muffler violation).

so i plead not guilty because this was untrue i have all the mirrors on my car and nothing is wrong with any of them.

I'm with you on that one... Why couldn't they make a mistake on the speeding violation, huh?

the officer must have gave them different information then he had gave me on my ticket.

Actually, the officer usually files a duplicate copy of the same citation that you receive. That's why I'm suspecting that the error is caused by a transposed number or a similar that occurred by whomever entered it into the court's system.

So now im going to trial on Wednesday a little unprepared due to the fact they only gave me a week to get ready for trial.

True... you are a little unprepared for the error on the citation but you had over a month to prepare for the speeding violation and he muffler violation. Right?

I doubt it...

Another thing to add the date on my ticket stated 2007 instead of 2009 as well the time said 2:30 when court was at 1:30 i was late due to this error. After talking to the judge she sent me to another court room then i talked to a prossecutor they were unhelpful after i stated i was not guilty he turned his back to me and walked away and refused to talk to me. I was'nt going to plea guilty to something i was not aware of and was not informed of. anyone have any advise for me i would greatly appreciate it.

The 2007 vs. 2009 error is not a biggie... It has not affected your ability to enter a timely plea nor has it impacted your guilt or innocence in any way. It seems that this officer has a special way of writing his numbers... Point is, if it can be corrected without infringing upon your rights as a defendant then it won't get you any closer to a dismissal than you would have been without the errors.

As far as the 2:30 VS. 1:30 time, the court still did hear your plea, they still schedulled your case for trial... so again, it has not affected you nor impacted your rights.

Not sure why the prosecutor "walked away" or "refused to talk to you" but I highly doubt that the date/time errors had anything to do with it.

You will get another opportunity to talk to him/her on Wednesday... Won't you?

In the meantime, try to figure out how the error occured and how to correct it.

 

[LSCAP]

The only time I’ve seen prosecutors “walk away” is when he’s expecting you to accept an offer of guilty to a lesser charge and you insist that you are not guilty. Ie. He makes the deals, not the judge.

 

[Brandon440]

ok so i got a print out of the information yesterday from the court and it turns out that the officer had put the wrong ordinance number in on my ticket he put the ordinance number for a mirror violation on my ticket instead of putting in the ordinance number for the muffler so it was his error not the clerk of courts or anybody elses. What can i do with this information? is this grounds for dismisal?

 

[Maestro64]

All the mistake do for you is allow you to case doubt on the officer ability to capture the facts. If he made all these kinds of mistake on simple thing like the date and the type of violation you supposedly had committed, what else did he get wrong or failed to do properly. Did he operate the radar correctly, maybe he never read the manual. In order to use radar you have to be able to pay attentions to details.

The easiest thing to do is asking what exactly was wrong with your mirrors, either he will make something up or say nothing it was a muffler issue, at that point you through doubt on his credibility for having conflicting facts. I assume your ticket has something on it about muffler violation because if your ticket says muffler violation and the court papers say mirror, those are the conflicting facts especially if the officer reads from the paperwork and states it was mirror violation.

On the muffler violation did he measure the sound, or did he kind of guess at it. Load is subjective the law most likely says it can not be louder then so many Decibel did he say what the measurement was.

 

[Brandon440]

he never measured the sound level he just assumed it was loud because i have a aftermarket exhaust on my car its not that loud though and i am sure it is under the level.. but as for the mirror violation i was going to take pictures of my mirrors for evidence that i have them and if he does read that i have a mirrror violation i will present this evidence against him and have the ticket with the muffler violation on it be presented as further evidence