By Brad Sears
“What was that”, asked Lucy. I checked the rear view mirrors and there was a little white car veering away from the car trailer that was attached to the motor home. I was, at that point, in the middle of the intersection going straight across on a green light so I pulled to the curb on the other side of the intersection. After all it was morning ruse hour traffic in Harrisonburg, Virginia on a rainy spring morning and as the incident appeared minor I pulled clear of the intersection and over to the side.
Almost instantly a police cruiser appeared with lights blazing. The other driver opened the damaged door and stepped out with a cell phone to her ear. She identified herself as a county employee and was talking to her supervisor on the phone.
That is only the beginning of the story. The officer asked each of us for our papers and then asked up to wait in out vehicles for him to come back. He processed the county employee first and then came to the motor home.
First he handed me my paper work and then issued me a citation and a summons to appear in court for illegal lane change. This without seeing the incident, taking measurements, in the absence of witnesses or anything else. As he asked me to sign the citation he said that he was going to the court and have the charges dropped but that under the law he had to other alternative than to issue the citation.
He gave me the case number but not any information about the other driver and he had already sent her on her way. As the court date approached I contacted the officer and he assured me that I did not need to appear and that he would ask the judge to drop the charges. That did not happen and the next thing that arrived in the mail was a summons for a new court date. Now Harrisonburg, Virginia is a fair distance from New Hampshire and as such the trip to court to defend myself would likely cost several thousand dollars out of pocket.
I called the court and they said that I could settle the matter for a fine of 91 dollars and a pleading of guilty. But wait a minute, a pleading of guilty would reflect on my insurance rate for the next god knows how many years and the cost could run the several thousand dollars that the trip would cost. And would going to court prove me innocent in the absence of witnesses?
I asked the clerk that answered the phone at the court house if she would attach a letter from me to the case file if I sent a check for the amount. The letter would state that I was not guilty and only paying the fine to eliminate a costly trip to Harrisonburg court. She agreed to that stipulation for what it would be worth.
Looking back on the situation here is what I think that I should have done. As I was moving slowly from a stop as the light turned green, I should have stopped in the middle of the intersection blocking traffic. This way the officer could have seen that I was in my own lane and had not cut across in front of the county car. I would have given any thing to have a video recorder hooked up to the rear view camera.
The damage to each vehicle was minor. My exhaust extension was the biggest loose on my rig and a little scrapped paint on the car trailer. Yep, the exhaust tip was the first point of contact, well behind the rear wheels. It still amazes me how I got the back end of the rig to move sideways opposite the swing. If I had made a lane change as accused the back end of the rig would have swung away from the county car not towards it.
Talking to my insurance company today I learned that the county in Harrisonburg has not been in contact with them and my insurance is not inclined to pay them if they do file a claim, but that still leaves the citation.
The question here is what would you do, travel to Virginia and fight it as an out of state defendant or pay the $91 and chalk it up to a bad dream. This occurred on the second to last day of a 6 month 11,000 mile incident free adventure.