Eff the man!

One of the reasons I have a video camera in my car.  No matter what the truth is, the courts will always take the word of the Po Po over you.  If you truly did no wrong but can't prove it, then you will lose.  
I fortunately don't get tickets very often, but I do always go to court because 3 out of the 4 times I've gone the citing officer never showed and I won by default.  haha

Yeah traffic court sucks. The prosecutors for traffic court are right out of law school and looking to move up in the office, they do that by winning. The judges are peeved they have to be there in the first place for "trivial" matters. So if the cop shows up, you are basically screwed.

In Nebraska they have the whole "points" thing where you can lose your license if you have so many points deducted.  Whenever you get a ticket they give you the option to not only pay your ticket (and admit guilt), but you can also sign up for a safety class to remove the points.  It's just another mechanism to extort more money out of you and prevent you from going to court.  If you're found guilty in court you don't have the option to take the class.

Do you have a constantly running dash cam? Or is it just something you turn on if you get pulled over?

Full time dashcam runs day and night, even when I'm not driving.  Wife has one in her truck as well.  I've caught a couple accidents and even identified a burglary vehicle that just so happened to be driving out of the neighborhood when I was coming home.  I love it.  

You can read all about it here:
Keeping up with the Russians

Here's the rest of the story.

I got a ticket for driving in an HOV Lane.

Here is the catch.

The signs for the entrance ramp indicate that there is an HOV lane when you take a left turn.  They don't say HOV ONLY.  They say "HOV-2".

The entire freaking highway (Route 66) goes HOV ONLY for certain hours.  That's right, the entire highway. Two lane highway, both lanes.  Do you know how many signs there are on a 20 mile stretch of Route 66 indicating this?  No HOV-2 signs on the highway.  No HOV diamonds on the roads.  ZERO indicators!  Every HOV LANE in Virginia has diamonds every 200 yards and signs about every 400 yards. The only signs for an ENTIRE HIGHWAY are on the roads adjacent to the entrance ramps.

I told the judge that the state has a legal and ethical obligation to ensure that its citizens are given clear indicators of rules of the road.  And that in a unique situation such as an entire highway being HOV, even a larger obligation.

"Fine reduced by $20.  Next case."

Eff you man!  Imma take this som-beach all the way to the Supreme Court.

That would be frustrating, and I think I'd do the same thing.  

Good luck on your appeal.

Good Luck with this. I'll be following to see how it goes. Keep us informed please.

I ran out of time and just paid the fine.  Eff me.  The man out-waited me.