Calif traffic speedy trial?
I received a ticket in March 2010 which was not filed in LA Superior Court on my appearance date on the citation in May 2010.
I checked the court website several times or a few months with the same results, and lost sight of the issue.
The issuing agency sent a notice of correction of appearance date in Aug 2010 to the court and to an address I had moved away from after the ticket was issued, and I didn't find out about this until I checked several months after the new court date.
Since I did not appear I beleive I was convicted in abstentia and fine set was forwarded to GC Services for collections. ($875 from what would have been a $108 fine) The court also sent notice to DMV and my license was suspended.
I went to court to get an arraignment date, and a clerk cleared the FTA enabling me to pay a fee to get my license back.
I suspect that I will likely have to answer for an FTA 40508a charge in addition to the original reason.
If I represent myself at arraignment, do I have a good chance at dismissal of the FTA if I present a paper stamped by the clerk stating I appeared as promised.
Also I have read that I can have the whole thing dismissed based on 'Rost v Municipal Court' because my arraignment was not done is a timely manner from the time a complaint was made (the citation), with four months being cited as too long a delay without cause, with the delay being seven months in my situation.
Thanks for any imput/
Comments
It looks like you've done your homework.
When you moved, did you notify DMV of your new address soon enough? If not, you can't say that the missed notice and resulting failure to appear was not your fault.
See also
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=200807...
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_the_statute_of_l...
http://www.keithbrunolaw.com/lawyer-attorney-13583...
http://law.justia.com/cases/california/calapp2d/18... (Rost)
http://scocal.stanford.edu/opinion/barker-v-munici...
http://scocal.stanford.edu/opinion/jones-v-superio...
http://law.justia.com/cases/california/calapp3d/16... (Ibarra)
http://www.expertlaw.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3...
Good luck.
If you have proof that you appeared as required, then the 40508 charge will surely be dismissed. Note that you were NOT "convicted in absentia," the only time that can happen is if you have posted bail and then fail to appear. Rost is a very old case, and is not followed now. You can ask for a dismissal on constitutional grounds, but generally you are not going to get a dismissal these days unless the delay was over a year (under a case named "Serna v Superior Court") unless you can show that the delay somehow made it more difficult for you to defend against the charge.