Got dinged on Hwy 11 NB at 7th Line of Oro-Medonte earlier today (would fall under Barrie Court).

The officer said I was doing 121 and reduced to 110 in a 90. Before I got dinged there was a couple of flat bed trucks ahead of me and other traffic in the right hand lane (I was on the left). Tried slowing down when I saw the cop, but he already had me (supposedly). I wonder if he had clear line of sight on me.

There was a minor error on the ticket, my address was written as 2553 Street Name, when its 3553. From his writing style, very easy to tell its a 2 not a 3. Now I know its not a fatal error, but I'm confused about something I read on a site about "Forcing Fatal Errors". It was under a heading of Improper Fine Amounts. Said the following:

In London (City) v. Young, 2008 the Ontario Court of Appeal ruled that if the set fine or the total payable amount is incorrect, then it is a fatal error.[1] But, and this is the important point, the error is only fatal if you do not respond to your traffic ticket. You must actually ignore all of your options and choose to be found guilty by default. Don't pay the fine. Don't request a trial. You must do nothing.

The court ruled that under section 9 of the Provincial Offences Act the justice must examine your traffic ticket and if there is any error on the face of it, it cannot be corrected. Theoretically errors that could be corrected at trial can become fatal errors if they prevent you from being convicted. These should include an incorrect fine amount, misspelled name, incorrect driver's licence, incorrect address or incorrect citation of the charging act. If the justice does not have sufficient information to convict you then he must quash the traffic ticket.

This is a very different situation than if you challenge the traffic ticket. At trial, the justice can amend these errors. But she can't if you default on the traffic ticket. The default provisions of the Provincial Offences Act do not allow amendments.

Sooooo... If I do nothing with the ticket, can this get tossed because of that (as the page stated, they can make changes AT TRIAL, but not if you ignore it)? Is this right? Should I try this? I'm a little hazy as to how this actually works - I get convicted, then appeal? If its just the address wrong, what are my chances.

And generally, if I fight, could they ding me for the actual speed I was going? Or good chance of getting it reduced further if the above doesn't work out.

As an aside opinion, I think it sucks it isn't easier to win on mistakes - if the cop can't write down information correctly in front of him, how can we be sure he did the speed trap properly and recorded the information properly?

Thanks a lot

wrong address is not a fatal error, you have no chance of having the ticket withdrawn because of it

I didn't think so. Any sense in trying to argue that if he didn't write down the address right, then he could be wrong about the the speed or that he dinged the wrong vehicle? I'm guessing not, but I might as well ask the question. Just trying to think of ways to approach this.

Any sense in asking for a trial and maybe making a better deal at least? Of course, there is always the hope the officer won't show up either. Or should I just suck up what I got?

Any suggestions, people?

estoguy wrote:

Any sense in asking for a trial and maybe making a better deal at least? Of course, there is always the hope the officer won't show up either. Or should I just suck up what I got?

There is always the possibility they can give you a reduced charged (example: 15km, 0 points). If they won't, they'll just continue to let you plead guilty to 20km over. You're not really losing anything unless you reject all offers and request a trial. In that case you'd go back up to 31 over.

Officers not showing up is something people talk about around the watercooler. It happens, but not as much as your friends make it seem.