Reported by Pedestrian With Failure To Stop

Hey anyone reading,

Today i was out driving with my friends during lunch at school. We were cruising around in a subdivision going down different streets and such. I drove down one street and saw an older lady with a kid along with a younger lady and her dog, they were both together the whole time. During my first pass down the street she was grilling(death stare) me really hard after i had not even done anything wrong. We looped around the block, went down another street then ended up passing her again. She was grilling even harder this time and seemed mad over nothing. She at some point wrote down my license plate number and contacted the authorities. It was not until i was back in class when i got called to the office and there was an officer waiting to give me a ticket for failure to stop. The officer said that she reported me doing this four times in total, i have no idea where she got that number from as i did not fail to stop at a single stop sign. I will be taking this case into court clearly as i did not commit these actions. Is there any specific way i should be fighting this since no officer actually saw me do anything wrong? Also the place that the officer marked me for my infraction was far away and out of sight from the lady at the time. I think she was just mad because a car of teens with loud music was going down her street and she did not like it, hence her coming up with a fake infraction to say i committed. I always check before going out from stop signs and i am always a well aware and cautious driver. I will be doing the classic procedures such as getting my full disclosure from the police before my court date and such. I have a friend that was in the vehicle with me during the drive that said he is willing to be a witness. My parents say i have to represent myself and that they will not be helping me out with this so I'm looking for any help i can get. I do not have the full disclosure yet so i can not provide what proof they have to be able to further help my case as of right now. If anyone could let me know an easy way to get out of it from the fact that it was reported by a pedestrian and there is no physical proof that would be great!

Thanks for your time!

Unfortunately there is no quick way out of this one. The best way to proceed will be to wait for disclosure then see what they have. Since the officer didn't see the offence the lady who witnessed it is going to have to show up in court and testify. This can be an advantage as civilian witnesses are more prone to not show up in court then police officers, also even when they do show up they are not as experienced at testifying so can be easier to trip up when they are on the stand. However none of that is guaranteed, she might show up and be a rock solid witness. So for now wait for the disclosure then when you get it post it here, then we can see what lines of defence are available.

I don't think your friend counts as a witness since he was in your car. I know when it comes to an accident your passengers cannot be a witness so I can't see it being any different in this case.

I can't believe that you could be given a ticket for a pedestrians word, this is the first I've heard of such a thing. It really doesn't make sense because as you say just any person for whatever motive can call you in and hurt your driving record and wallet. It just doesn't seem right, I would like to see one of the police officers on the forum elaborate on this.

12345 wrote:

I know when it comes to an accident your passengers cannot be a witness so I can't see it being any different in this case.

I can't believe that you could be given a ticket for a pedestrians word, this is the first I've heard of such a thing. It really doesn't make sense because as you say just any person for whatever motive can call you in and hurt your driving record and wallet. It just doesn't seem right, I would like to see one of the police officers on the forum elaborate on this.

Anyone can be a witness or a complainant to an offence. It's up to the Court to asses their credibility and potential bias. Most offences, criminal or otherwise, are not actually witnessed by a police officer. Sometimes there is physical evidence to corroborate the allegations, sometimes there isn't. Offences can range from relatively minor (failing to stop for a school bus) to major (historical sexual assaults).

Thanks for your time and effort I tried to research speeding fines on my own but with so many conflicting numbers being thrown around, some from government documents, I didn't know what was the right figure until Stanton said so.

Thanks