Victory!!

Okay, it’s not official yet, but it looks like I’m going to get my traffic ticket dismissed.  Ever since I sent in my Trial By Written Declaration form, I’ve been visiting the court’s web site daily to check the docket for any updates.  I’ve even gone so far as to keep track of the progress of other people who have submitted TBD’s at the same time as me, just out of curiosity, to see how many do and don’t get dismissed.  It’s about half and half, but the good news is that out of all the police officers from the city my police officer is from, only one actually turned in their Officer’s Declaration.  It’s become an obsession for me and Felicity both.  She’s just as curious as I am to see who does and doesn’t get their ticket dismissed.  I figure I’m also teaching her an important lesson, to stick up for herself when she doesn’t think she’s done anything wrong.  And while there are quite a number of people who do TBD’s, I wonder how many more don’t, or have never heard of it and just pay the fine.  That adds up to a lot of money! 

According to the docket, the officer who issued me my ticket had to have her response turned into the court this past Friday at 8:00 am.  I checked the web site again yesterday, and it shows that she did not turn it in.  According to everything I’ve read about TBD’s online, if the officer fails to turn in his/her declaration, the ticket has to be dismissed.  Basically, since I said I was not guilty in my declaration, and there was no statement provided to say that I was guilty, then it’s the same as if you showed up at court but the officer didn’t.  I’ll still be checking daily until I get the “official” dismissed status, but it looks like the biggest hurdle has been successfully crossed.  Talk about a big weight being lifted off of my shoulders.  Tickets are expensive, and considering I don’t think I did anything wrong, $350 is a lot of money to shell out (that would have been my cost to pay the ticket and go to traffic school).  Not to mention the weekend I would have ended up wasting to go to traffic school. 

So keep your fingers crossed.  I should get the official word soon!