So, the latest in my saga with traffic tickets is I got a letter in the mail the other day from a lawyer here in town who wants to help me with the speeding ticket I got a couple of weeks ago (me personally - it says he trolls Austin Municipal Court dockets looking for people with tickets, but I think he saw my ticket pop up and understood immediately the injustice that's been perpetrated upon me in recent months by Austin P.D. and felt moved to offer his assistance in a personal and direct way).
This guy says that if I pay him to handle it, I basically don't have to do anything. I don't have to go to court and may not even have to go to his office. Presumably I just write a check and let him do everything.
Normally, I might ask why I should pay a lawyer to handle it when I could fight the battle myself for free. BUT I have a couple of hurdles with that. First, my appearance date is Nov. 30 - that's the deadline for either paying the fine or requesting a court date. Preumably, if I request a court date to fight the ticket, that date would be set for December. My employer isn't terribly generous with time off, and I'm already scheduled to take a bunch of hours off in December, so the prospect of requesting even more hours to sit in court isn't terribly appealing.
Second, while I feel there are arguments to be made in my case, I don't know which ones would be most effective - I haven't had a speeding ticket in about 5 years, so I'm a little rusty with the whole process. I don't want to go in and try to argue the thing and make things worse. Traffic tickets are what this guy does all day everyday. So, why not let him have a crack at it?
Yes, it would cost me to have him handle it (I'm not sure how much yet - I haven't talked to him yet). But it'll also cost me if the ticket goes on my record. Tickets raise your insurance. I'm about to buy a new car, which will raise my insurance as it is, so the last thing I need is something to jack it up even more. I might be money ahead to pay this guy and save the hit on my insurance.
So, I'm going to talk to the guy and see how it works, and I'll let you know if I decide to use him and how it all turns out. If anyone has any experience letting a lawyer take care of their ticket for them, I'd love to hear how it worked out for you.
2 comments:
I say Lawyers suck! Cause they do, they are notorious for how much they suck. But honestly, in your situation I don't think you have too much to loose. Sept the cash he's gonna take on top of the ticket you'll still probably end up having to pay... But do it, let those officers know you mean business, maybe it will get through the APD that it's not worth writing the ticket out on Ms Suzy Q!
I'll be interested to see how this pans out for you. I would probably protest it myself, but I'm not working any jobs that I can't get out of for a bit, and I have tons of time to prepare for stuff like that. I'll be looking for the update!
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