Speeding Tickets in North Carolina – Do I Need a Lawyer?

Our job as attorneys is to help guide you through the system, to provide information, and give you an honest assessment of your different options.

We firmly believe good decisions are made after considering, carefully, the different options available to you.

In order to do that, we will want to ask quite a few questions.

It’s important to consider both your driving history and the factual scenario of the charge(s).

Indeed, it’s not all that unusual to encounter multiple charges on a single citation.

How to handle more than one matter at the same time is just one of the many factors to review.

• We will Answer your Questions
• We will help Explain the Legal System, Traffic Court, and How Things Work
• We will go over Best-Case and Worst-Case Scenarios
• We will review the consequences of a conviction or pleading guilty including
  • Insurance Points
  • DMV Points
  • Court Costs
  • Fines
• We’ll let you know if we can help
• We’ll tell you exactly what we do and how much it will cost
• We’ll also let you know if you should handle the ticket yourself

While related, “points” assessed by the North Carolina Department of Transportation (DOT) – Division of Motor Vehicles (DMV) and Insurance Assessments are in fact different.

Some offenses carry differing points values, as set forth with the North Carolina General Statutes and per the North Carolina Safe Driver Incentive Plan (SDIP).

Put simply, it can difficult to understand, as there are different point values: DMV & Insurance for a regular, “Class C” operator vs. Commercial CDL “Class A” or “Class B” licensees.

The speed “detected” or otherwise charged, the posted speed limit, and in some instances, the prior record of the offender are important considerations.

Normally if you’ve received a Speeding Ticket, the Charging Officer would have issued either a Uniform Citation or eCitation. Again, a lot depends on the type of offense charged.

MORE INFO: What happens if I pay old tickets?

If the operator of a motor vehicle is determined by a member of law enforcement to have violated North Carolina speeding laws, he or she may be issued a citation. The ticket or citation lists different information such as:

• Your name
• Date of Birth
• Mailing Address
• North Carolina Driver’s License Number – NCDL #
• Date of the Offense
• Time of the Offense
• Officer Information
• Violation & Statutory Authority
• Date, Time & Location of the Court Setting

North Carolina speeding tickets may not actually require a personal appearance in a court. In North Carolina, there is a distinction between WAIVABLE and “ NON-WAIVABLE offenses.”

It is important to note SOME non-waivable appearances can indeed be handled in abstentia and/or by way of legal counsel. For the purposes of explanation, an attorney may be able to negotiate a plea to a lesser offense with the State.

Furthermore, some jurisdictions (Charlotte-Mecklenburg being one) have what is referred to as an Administrative Court (Courtroom 1130) where an attorney may appear on the behalf of clients to negotiate a plea or otherwise determine a trial setting, if so required.

Courtroom 1130 handles:

1. Reduced traffic tickets
2. Guilty pleas
3. Setting Trial Dates
4. Advisement of Counsel

The North Carolina Department of Transportation / Division of Motor Vehicles DMV normally keeps track of convictions, including those for speeding tickets, infractions, and accidents.

Individuals who accumulate 12 or more points in North Carolina over a three-year period may potentially have their licenses suspended by the North Carolina Division of Motor Vehicle

SEE NCGS 20-16

Costs of Court have skyrocketed in the last few years and often represent a substantial percentage of the expense in handling a traffic ticket, speeding citation or otherwise.

SEE RELATED: 2013 – North Carolina Costs of Court

Give us a call now. We’re here to help – Bill Powers

Hey, this is Bill Powers and we have a lot of information on the website regarding different traffic offenses.

Gosh, I don’t know what is the most common speeding- excuse me, traffic offense.

Is it speeding? Is it something else? I would think it would be speeding. It seems like just about everybody does at one time or another, whether it’s intentional or not.

We get a lot of questions about it.

There are some speeding tickets that, frankly, you should just handle yourself. It’s not financially worthwhile to hire a lawyer, unless you can’t go to court, or have time to do something like that.

Some people tell us ‘Hey Bill, I know I can handle this myself, I just want to make sure it’s done right. I don’t want to take any chances.’ – Bill Powers

And that’s great, we are more than willing to help you.

There are other speeding tickets where I hear the, “Well, Gee, I’m a taxpayer, it wasn’t like I’m murdering somebody. Why do they want to revoke my license? Why do they want to suspend me?”

I once represented someone whom had had an DOD clearance (Department of Defense clearance) on their way down (from up North) for vacation, not going that far over speed limit, or fast over the speed limit, and got arrested. When you get arrested with a DOD clearance, that’s a big deal.

You may be surprised to know, there are some speeding violations in North Carolina where it is within the discretion of the Law Enforcement Officer to decide whether to charge and arrest you.

Speeding can carry long term consequences to your license and insurance points, even for cases that you don’t think are all that serious.

We have to look at a series of different factors, and it takes a fair amount of ciphering through the record and prior history, and asking a lot of questions, and getting information, to tell you what we think the most appropriate way is to proceed.

So we’re going to ask you questions like:

• What have you had in the last three years?
• Is there anyone else on your policy?
• Did you go to driving school?
• Have you had a Prayer for Judgment?
• Have you had any wrecks?
• What was the value of the wreck?
• Did anyone else in your household or anyone on your policy have any of the above?

We like to start kind of ticking through things, and then we can say, it’s like an equation, where we’re adding things up.

We say, “Okay this is option A, B, C, these are your options, and this is what we think is most appropriate.”

There are other times we say, “There aren’t a lot of options. This option’s crossed out because you did this, here. This option’s crossed out because of this, and because of the interactions.”

It’s complicated. I’m not making this stuff up. If you don’t believe me, go into General Statutes and look up the Safe Driver Incentive Plan and try to figure out the difference between Insurance Points and Motor Vehicle Points and how they’re together, and how they’re separate.

Not defending it, but it’s complicated for a reason, because there’s a million different ways these things can take place.

Give us a call. We offer help.

That’s why our telephone number is 704-342-4357. I look forward to hearing from you.

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• Passing a Stopped School Bus in North Carolina