fail to signal

Does anyone have a legal update or similar concerning failing to signal. I was under the impression that the legislature updated the statue this year, making it mandatory to use a turn signal to both switch lanes, and when making a turn regardless whether or not other traffic is affected. I have made cases off of these stops and now I'm having problems with them possibly being dropped.

You must have been talking to Heather Franco. The SAO has dropped many cases recently concerning turn signal pretextual stops. I was under the same impression but I haven't looked into it either.

When you do a pretextual stop, do you write a written warning or a UTC??? I would definately write a written warning, but if they are still throwing that out of court, then: It sounds like the upper courts have ruled that pretextual stops are legal, while some attorneys in the 12th Judical Circuit have decided that pretextual stops are illegal - or at least not worth their time.
[/*:m:19upqzdo]
Or it could be based on case law, where there have to be X number of cars around the def before a turn signal is required.
[/*:m:19upqzdo]
Or case law may have decided that a turn signal isn't required if there isn't a car in the lane that the def is moving into (or isn't X number of feet within the def's car).[/*:m:19upqzdo]But to answer your question, yes, the Florida state statute now requires that turn signals be used when cars are changing lanes, but it's such a new law (just a couple of years old) that maybe the attorneys are already dictating what the case law will be? Or maybe the case law has already been decided? This is obviously something that Curt Hoffman needs to look into (attorney-to-attorney) because otherwise, we'll never get a straight answer.

Along this same lines, has anyone had any trouble with cases being dropped where you stopped a car for a brake light out due to the fact that the third brake light, located in the rear deck of the car was working in conjunction with one of the other primary brake lights. I recently saw case law out of Charlotte County where a deputy lost a case based on this because the statue reads that you must have two operational brake lights and they dont have to be symetrical so the third brake light counts. I know I have made cases based on this but never had them dropped, yet.

Along this same lines, has anyone had any trouble with cases being dropped where you stopped a car for a brake light out due to the fact that the third brake light, located in the rear deck of the car was working in conjunction with one of the other primary brake lights. I recently saw case law out of Charlotte County where a deputy lost a case based on this because the statue reads that you must have two operational brake lights and they dont have to be symetrical so the third brake light counts. I know I have made cases based on this but never had them dropped, yet.Florida used to have inspectation stations and a car had to pass inspection before it could be registered. In order to save money, Florida got rid of all the inspection stations and a car can be a POS with multiple violations -- and you can still register it, year after year. :roll:

We were told that they expected us (the police) to enforce the equipment-violation laws. But now you say that those tickets are being thrown out of court??? It's funny how in the old days, an inspectation station would not allow the car to be registered, but in the 21st Century, judges are throwing out those equipment-violation tickets.

Just do like I do and don't write anybody for anything. Let traffic get so bad that a roadrager will run over and kill a judge. :lol:

Who cares? :shock:

If a judge can throw out tickets, then we can stop pulling people over. ;)

Judges better wise up because once they "burn the rookies" by throwing their hard work out of court, then the rookies will quickly figure out that it's best to not pull people over -- and not write tickets -- and let the citizens kill each other -- because judges will just throw tickets out of court anyways!!!

Let'em all kill each other!!! :!: