PICAYUNE — I fought the law and the law won. Alas, my 37-year perfect driving streak has come to an end. I didn’t go down without a fight. My “move over” violation had a gray area, but in the end, the judge sided with the police officer. One reason I contested the ticket was to go through the whole process first-hand, which I figured would make an interesting column. I hadn’t been in a municipal court since since 1980 as a cub reporter in Greenwood. The good news is that the system works. I got my day in court. I was given all the time I wanted to present my case. I got to cross-examine the police officer. I even got to give an impassioned closing argument. Now how cool is that? I live in a country where I can have my day in court even over a $50 traffic ticket. Most people live in a world where they could never get a fair trial even over the most major of issues. I’m not saying there aren’t injustices in the American criminal justice system. I’m just saying that for the most part it works as advertised. I was done in my the “dash cam”— a dash mounted video recorder which protects both police and citizens. The dash cam clearly showed an empty lane to my left as I passed the police car on the side of the road. Pearl municipal judge Richard Redfern kept it simple: Empty lane equals guilty verdict. My argument was that the Department of Public Safety signs posted on the highways state: “State law: Move or slow down for emergency vehicles.” Emphasis on the word “or.” If the state law gives me the option to slow down, how can I get a ticket for not moving over? The officer admitted that he did not clock my speed, but he said he could tell “by his experience” that I had not slowed down, even though he was sitting in his car, windows closed, facing forward. Timing is everything. The officer had just finished writing another ticket when I passed by. I was a sitting duck. There was a reason I didn’t move over. It was at night on I-20 south of Pearl. The entire interstate was in a state of massive construction with barrels and concrete barricades intermittenly on both sides of the road. The barricades on the left side of the road were so close, a driver only had inches of buffer zone. In addition, a tailgater was right on my rear, so close that I felt threatened. No sooner had I gotten the chance to get over in the right hand lane, then I saw the police car. I felt a sudden move back to the left lane was inappropriate so I slowed down further and passed the policeman. Therein lies the problem with the “move over” law. There are certain circumstances of limited visibility when a sudden lane change could be dangerous, especially if someone is in your blind spot. Sooner or later, the move over law will cause a bad wreck. Even a five-foot difference in elevation can hide a police car on the other side. Headlight visibility at night is 150 feet. And then there is fog. Only the driver — not the judge — s in a position to determine when and when not a sudden lane change is “safe.” Or so I argued. I have never been in a serious accident. I am an extremely defensive driver. Picking a lane and staying in it is the single most important factor behind my safe driving record. No doubt, on the particular night, I could have changed lanes. It was empty. But suppose someone had been in my blind spot and concrete barricades had been in that particular spot of the road. A changle of lane could have caused a fatality. As a pilot, I learned long ago about managing risk. You can get away with taking many risks. The question is what level of risk acceptance will keep you alive in the long run. A 99-percent safe maneuver is perfectly safe 99 times. But it kills you on the 100th. Only the driver is privy to all the circumstances necessary to make the safety call of a particular driving maneuver. A judge sitting on his bench four months later is just Monday morning quarterbacking. Don’t get me wrong., I like the “move over” law. This is a workplace safety law for police officers. It may save lives. But some discretion must be employed. I further pointed out to the judtge that Mississippi has a law that slower traffic must keep to the right lane. There are three exceptions to this law and the move over law isn’t one of them. So not matter which lane I was in that night, I was in violation of a law. I wanted my day in court, for which the city would bill me. Pearl city prosecutor Jim Bobo gave me my money’s worth and showed me how little I knew about lawyering. When I tried to submit a photo of the state move over law into evidence, he objected. “That’s hearsay!” He proceeded to object to everything I tried to do, using lawyer language that was total alien to me. A crowd of police and others gathered to watch the amusing massacre. I could have hired a lawyer, but that seemed a bit indulgent for a $50 traffic ticket. I have three main complaints: First, the waiting around was ridiculous. Extrapolating from the 150 people waiting all day in Pearl, Miss. wastes $30 million a year in poeple’s time because municipal courts don’t make any attempt to stagger and schedule court appearances. It’s a big cattle call. Everybody shows up all at once and waits around all day. Second, traffic ticket revenue should go to the state and not the local entity. There is too much potential for abuse. Writing more tickets can mean new police cars and raises. That would be okay as a “reverse lottery” way of funding local government except for one huge thing: Each ticket raises insurance rates a $1,000. Mississippi police wrote 200,000 tickets last year — fifth most per capita in the nation. Third, tickets are double and triple the face amount because of “add-on” fees funding the pension plans of the police, prosecutors and judges, giving them a vested interest in more and more tickets. Talk about stacking the deck! Although I didn’t succeed, citizens do sometimes prevail in traffic court. Stats show that half the time, the officers never show up to testify, often leading to dismissal. Just rest assured they will try to trip you up prior to bringing out the dash cam. The less you say the better. All and all, it was an interesting civics lesson. The only real thing you have to lose is your time. Bring a good book.
Opinion
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Not your mother’s Ladies’ Home Journal
By Rheta Grimsely Johnson/Syndicated columnist
I haven’t seen the Ladies’ Home Journal in about a million years, except maybe in the dentist’s office when I was trying to avoid a television permanently set on Fox News.
Somebody’s grandchild was selling magazines for a school project, and Ladies’ Home Journal was the only one on the list I recognized. Now it comes to the house.
Let’s just say: It’s not my mother’s Ladies’ Home Journal. This month, right behind a feature called “A Country of People Who Never Stop Eating” is one called “Nice Girls Do Get Tattoos.” -
Health care market needs oversight
By Gene Lyons/Syndicated columnist
Sometimes the best journalism explains what’s right under our noses. In Steven Brill’s exhaustive Time magazine cover article, “Bitter Pill: Why Medical Bills Are Killing Us,” it’s the staggeringly expensive, grotesquely inefficient and inhumane way Americans pay for medical care.
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VA’s appalling failures not recent
By Sid Salter/Syndicated columnist
While recent national press attention to ongoing problems at Mississippi’s G.V. (Sonny) Montgomery Veterans Administration Medical Center in Jackson is welcome and needed, the failures of the overall VA service apparatus in Mississippi are not recent problems.
In short, former U.S. Rep. Sonny Montgomery — Mississippi’s “Mr. Veteran” and author of the modern G.I. Bill that bears his name — must be spinning in his grave. There have been significant failures and poor service to veterans documented by state and local media since 2008. -
Dolley Madison politically savvy
By Cokie and Steven V. Roberts/Syndicated columnists
When Dolley Payne Madison became first lady in 1809, she instituted Wednesday evening gatherings at the White House where political rivals could meet and talk. They were called “squeezes” because so many people showed up and crowded the room. As Cokie wrote in her book “Ladies of Liberty": “All were welcome as long as they were appropriately dressed. And all went — skipping a Wednesday night might mean missing a vital piece of political information or being left out of a crucial deal.”
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Mississippi isn’t immune from national college tuition trends
By Sid Salter/Syndicated columnist
Higher education in Mississippi has not been immune from national trends cited in a recent Center on Budget and Policy Priorities report which concludes that over the last five years, the global economic downturn and a “no new taxes” political climate have increasingly shifted the burden of higher education finance to students and parents at a time when enrollment is increasing and the percentage of state support is decreasing. -
Right to vote not ‘racial entitlement
By Donna Brazile/Syndicated columnist
The Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case of Shelby County v. Holder — a challenge to the Voting Rights Act of 1965, specifically Section 5, which requires states and localities with a history of voting discrimination against racial and language minorities to get “pre-approved” by the federal government before changing how elections are conducted or voters are registered. -
1st day of spring brings memories
By Wyatt Emmerich/Southside Sun
The first day of spring! My favorite month, April, is just around the corner. Now we just need one big gullywasher to get rid of the pine pollen.
Normally, spring gives me a strong sense of rebirth and renewal, but this spring I seem surrounded by moments crystallizing the passage of time.
It was a year ago, I walked up the porch to my mother’s home to box up her possessions following her funeral. -
Soaking up in tiger paw-shaped hot tub
By Rheta Grimsely Johnson/Syndicated columnist
No springtime ritual was better at Auburn than sitting on hard rocks at a nearby state park to let cold water rush over your feet. You wore cut-off blue jeans and Dr. Scholl’s sandals, the unofficial uniform for coeds in the 1970s, and when you left, you felt ready to tackle tests, term papers and blind dates.
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Medicaid or not, costs will be paid
By Sid Salter/Syndicated columnist
While the battle continues between state Republicans and other fiscal conservatives intent on focusing on the long-terms costs of Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act and Democrats, health care advocates and state hospitals intent on focusing on the short-term benefits, the fact remains that one way or another, the costs of providing health care for the poor, the blind, the aged and the disabled will be paid by the taxpayers one way or another.
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Multiculturalism is not rational
By Thomas Sowell/Syndicated columnist
Among the many irrational ideas about racial and ethnic groups that have polarized societies over the centuries and around the world, few have been more irrational and counterproductive than the current dogmas of multiculturalism.
Intellectuals who imagine that they are helping racial or ethnic groups that lag behind by redefining their lags out of existence with multicultural rhetoric are in fact leading them into a blind alley. - More Opinion Headlines
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Not your mother’s Ladies’ Home Journal
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