I decided to go to traffic court a couple of days ago, mostly for the experience. I learned a lot so I thought I'd share a couple of observations in case someone else cared. Though the short version is that it really wasn’t even remotely worth the time.

I got stopped doing 15 over on a road that could easily and safely handle that speed. I was not knowingly or intentionally speeding nor was I going faster then anyone else on the road. (it happened near an army base and I have a DOD sticker so I wondered if that was how I was picked out - why else have a speed trap at the gate of a base?)

There are all these articles on the internet that say get your date moved because the cop may forget to show up. yea right. I had to move mine so I could go to a wedding, plus it was on a Friday which is a bad day. I called and requested some dates but was told it wasn't my choice I had to take the officers next open court date - and they were all on Fridays. If you couldn’t do the very next open date, you needed the judge’s permission.

I showed up for court to find out that my name was not on the docket. It turns out that the officer realized he could not make it so he had the date changed the day before the trial. I got the notification in the mail after I got home.

I went back a week later with a court time of 930. I assumed that was when you were to see the judge. No, that's when the judge shows up and starts seeing everyone. I told work I would be there somewhere after 10. Around noon I was still waiting. It took a long time because for some reason they called all the people who were not licensed first. Then most of them couldn’t speak English so they had to get called up over and over as the interpreter went from one court room to the next and back. A large majority of these for going around 30 mph over, speeding with an accident or some connection to a DUI – in addition to having either lost a license or having never been licensed. However, only one of the over 30 people were represented.

I also did not know that you had to be approved for a court appointed attorney. One guy got turned down and showed up to represent himself with a DWI charge! But it turned out to be a court mistake. The $600/week they thought he made did not qualify him for representation but the $100/week he actually made did so he got a continuance.

I also did not know that you had to pay for the court appointed attorney. The judge warned the one guy that his fine would be higher then he would expect because he had to pay legal costs. It looked like the interpreter was free.

One officer did not show up for court. I thought the ticket would be thrown out but the judge simply dropped the citation from 25 mph over (at least $1000) to failure to follow a traffic sign.

The judge was getting irate (but not at all too bad) because she had say the same thing over and over to almost every single person who came up and every person seemed surprised when she told it to them; Im not sure how you go to court and decide to not follow directions that get repeated every 5 minutes.

I had a few things in my back pocket to say but by the time it was my turn I just made it go quickly. I pleaded no contest before I even got out of my seat (The judge kept complaining that everyone was wasting her time (not following directions)). The cop said there were no significant extra details, traffic was not affected, and that I had a completely clean driving record. She then asked me if I had anything to say and I just replied no ma'am.

She knocked it down to from 15mph over to failure to obey a traffic sign, said next, and I walked out. The worst part of it was that the cost of the fines at court were almost double what they were if you just pleaded guilty by mail. The court costs were also much more than the processing fees of simply mailing in the 'I'm guilty' notice so in the end, with the reduced citation, I saved about $5 and lost 4 hours of work. But I did loose one less point.