Hows it going fellow city members. I recently have come across a problem while driving a friend home. While driving i was pulled over to find that i had been driving with a suspended license (was for a fine i had paid earlier only courts somehow screwed up the paperwork). unfortunately i was placed under arrest immediately, when the officer searched the car he found a pipe. that night I was charged with drug pharaphernalia and driving with a suspended. Now what i need to ask the city, since my court date is in a month, is i was going to try my best to get the charge dropped or reduced. So far i have planned to do community service, 2 voluntary UAs, and attend a couple drug classes until my courtdate. My question to you is do you think this is sufficent to get the paraphernalia dropped and if not what do you recommend to get it dropped. I am fine with taking the driving with suspended i just dont want to have to go through a painstaking diversion. thanks city all comments are appreciated.
Personally i think its sick that you should have to explain yourself in front of a court room. I quess it all depends on what kinda mood the judge is in, and what area your from lol. I mean you didnt have any weed on you, it was just a pipe. I doubt punishment will be that seveare. First time youve been caught?
ive had my run ins with the law but yes this would be my first charge the problem im think of though is that im from the greater kansas city area at the time when i was pulled over it was more in a rural area so i am worried they may take a drug charge more seriously than in the city where its extremely common
Well i guess if you show up in nice clothes (not a suit, you know, dress shirt, nice pants ect.) and act really polite and everything you already know... i guess combined with all that extra stuff you're doing and the not so severe charge they'll prolly let you off with something minor and isn't this all on false pre-tenses? doesn't that mean that you should be exempt from all charges because it was the mistake of the court that you were pulled over in the first place? im super baked.... maybe none of that made sense... idk
well thats just it because i was at first furious knowing i had paid my fines i contacted the court officals and they told me that, even though they may have screwed my paperwork stating i had paid my fine for a non-moving violation, it was my responsibility to make sure they had correctly reinstated my license (this made me extremely pissed off but at this point i will be happy just paying the fine ifi can get my drug charge dropped) thanks for your insights
the only hard part would be proving that it was under false pretenses. do you have a receipt from the time you paid the fine?
No intent by the officer to defraud the OP. The court is going to tip-toe around this one into making the paraphenalia charge stick. They'll say that you were notified that your license was suspended, and even if they didn't they will say that you should have made sure the payment had gone through knowing you had an outstanding fine. After they make all of these excuse(well they really don't have to), they will say that the officer acted legally because he ran your ID and it said you were driving with a suspended license, which you, in fact, were. Thus, the officer made a legal arrest. A legal search of your ENTIRE vehicle is subsequent to a legal arrest. The officer did nothing wrong... I would get a decent lawyer to go after them on the paperwork thing. Maybe he can get all of your traffic issues dropped, and maybe a nice judge will throw out your little paraphernalia charge. However, if they do stick you with that charge, you'll probably just have to do first offenders or something minimal like community service anyway, and when that's done it will probably be taken off your record, just make sure you pay all your fines and make sure the paper work goes through. Good luck!