Went to trial today...

[KThunder]

i thought of fighting a ticket once but i was told by a lawyer freind that traffic tickets are a bit different than other cases in many respects.
first the officer is not considered a wittness in most repects. the officer is a law inforcement agent they dont have to remember the color of your vehicle or directions or anything like that, the entirety of the evidence against you is the ticket which has the info of the offence. it can be agued but radar stuff has been standardized for decades and works very well (there is a legal term or it but i dont remeber it) if it has been calibrated and used properly (which the court assumes and is difficult to disprove) it is accepted as correct.
think of it this way if someone stole a computer from a store and there were several witnesses that is different than if an officer caught the thief in the act with cameras, a traffic violater is essentially cuaght in the act.
put it another way he has radar info (which he was trained to use) and you have a strong recollection of a speedometer (most of which are wrong by at least a few mph)

[KThunder]

-D- wrote:
...
Sure, if you plead guilty at your arraignment, that's true. The notes, and your plea, are sufficient for conviction. Trial is a little different, and something to remember is that you are supposed to be _innocent_ until (if) the judge decides that the testimony against you is sufficient to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Officer notes cannot testify against you, only the officer himself can. That's why, technically, the Prosecuting attorney has to ask permission for the officer to reflect back on his notes, once, before testifying. (I.e, he cannot testify directly from his notes.) If he can't remember anything regarding the circumstances of your ticket (in this case, even the simplest of details), well, there shouldn't be much for the judge to go on for conviction, especially if your defense is solid.

so a police officer who pulls say only 10 cars a day is supposed to remember the details of just one that happened weeks before. i would say that anyone who went to court would get off because i doubt anyone could reasonably expected to do that.
and how exactly is your defence solid does your speedometer have a printout? or a camera with date and time code stamped on it? how exactly are you defending yourslf "yes your honor i realize the radar said i was going 78 in a 55 but it is wrong i remember clearly that i was going 54.7742 mph"