Hello all,

Well, my seven year stretch was broken yesterday. I was taking a drive up to Ceaser's Head on 276, following another car and a motorcycle. When we got to the first passing zone (there is a dedicated passing lane), I pulled to the left lane and accelerated pretty quickly (2nd gear into 3rd). I gave it a little extra effort because it looked like the motorcyle was going to pass too, so I wanted to quickly get by to give him the opportunity. Anway, two motorcyle cops were on the side of the road and flashed their lights. I quickly pulled over so that the one cop could walk over to my car without having to ride his bike. He tells me the speed limit is 40 mph and he got me doing 72. The offense on the ticket is for speeding and not reckless driving if it makes a difference. The officer was actually pretty cool about it and tells me that if I show up to court on 9/5, he'll help me out, whatever that means.

So, I realize that the internet is probably not the best place to get legal advice, but I'm wondering if anyone else has experience with a ticket like this in the upstate. Most of the things that I have read on here pertain to people in NC, which may have different traffic laws.

It seems like my two options now are:

1. Hire an attorney to try to get the ticket reduced.
2. Show up to the hearing on the summons date and try to plead guilty to a lesser charge and then take a defensive driving course to eliminate any points.

Any opinions?

 

Hire a lawyer!!! I had a "nice" cop pull me over once and gave me the "if you are good between now and the court day, I will do what I can for you in court" . So when that day came I showed he didnt!! The ticket stayed with me for 3 years!! So play it safe and get the lawyer.

 

Hire an attorney and try and get the ticket changed to any non-moving violation. Tell the lawyer you were in a passing zone and were accelerating to pass - if two cops were right there, it sounds like a speed trap.

By "help you out", the officer just means let you keep your license. Never, never, NEVER plead guilty. Never. No contest if you have to, but always plead not guilty. There's a difference between being found guilty and pleading guilty.

Tyler, if the cop didn't show you should have pleaded not guilty and had the ticket thrown out.

 

Hmm... I've never received a ticket in that area. My lawyer got an "81 in a 55" ticket dismissed on I-85, though. The only other time I received a ticket was from a fender-bender and the officer dropped it down to court costs when I showed up.

 

Nope turns out, that the cop had written me up for Careless & wreckless (but told me it was for speeding and not using my blinker) but on the ticket he wrote out the code for it, not the actually description of the code, so I didnt know until I was in front of the judge that it wasnt just a speeding ticket. So the judge was like I'll lower ot from C&W to just a speeding and only paying court costs

 

RWD: That's a pretty rotten trick! I actually checked out the statute code on the ticket, and it is indeed for speeding.

Highlander: Was your lawyer from Greenville? Would you recommend him?

 

My ticket was in Spartanburg, and my lawyer is now a judge, so I'm afraid I can't help.

 

damn that sucks. i was just up at caesar's head with a buddy 4 days ago!!! i saw no cops, but some construction which we obviously slowed down for but that sucks they are up there now. i know a lot of my friends have had points disappear bc of defensive driving but we are all relatively young too, i don't know how old you are but most of us can't afford a lawyer lol

 

What do folks typically pay for a lawyer for a speeding ticket, just out of curiosity?

 

Obviously, I'm curious as well.

Andy: I don't usually see many police up there either, although I haven't been there in a while. Like Saki said, this was clearly a speed trap. Hell, the place they were waiting is one of the few places where you can really get any speed. I'm generally not a big speed demon in the mountains anyway because you never know when something is going to be in your lane going around a blind turn

Anyone else have any recommendations for a good attorney in Greenville? It beats playing Yellow Pages roulette.