Dismissed Speeding Tickets Could Bring Millions to City

MEMPHIS, Tenn. - FOX13 has discovered thousands and thousands of speeding tickets are being dismissed in Memphis traffic court some with no questions asked. Some say if the tickets are going to be written, they need to start collecting on them, others say, fighting the budget issues with traffic fines is not the answer.

"It was dismissed," said Bonnie Denton.

"They dismissed the ticket," said Vanessa Lee.

"Just dismissed, she didn't ask me if i was guilty or anything, just dismissed," said Denton.

Dismissed is a word heard frequently in Memphis traffic court and some aren't happy about so many tickets seemingly tossed aside.

"You take off of work, come down here, find a parking space, and stand in line for an hour, for 5 miles over? Dismissed?" said Denton.

Court documents show 27,000 speeding tickets were dismissed last year and court costs were never collected on those tickets. Circuit Court Clerk Thomas Long says that's a lot of potential money that could be passed along to the city.

"You're looking at $2 million and that's on the low side," said Long.

It's money the city could use now that it's been ordered to re-pay the school district $57 million. The mayor recently asked all divisions to suggest how they could cut 25 percent of their budget. CAO George Little says they're looking into the traffic ticket issue.

"Our first concern is with enforcement of public safety, of course there is issue of fines and fees associated with it," said Little.

FOX13 spent a couple days talking with people outside traffic court. We found many tickets, 10 miles or less, were dismissed, and some, up to 14 miles per hour, were also dismissed with no questions were asked.

"We think it's unacceptable if laws on the books are not being carried out reasonably and if tickets are being routinely dismissed," said Little.

Each judge handles cases differently. Judge Tarik Sugarmon admits to having a policy where he dismisses tickets, 5 mph or less. He says he's been doing it since 1998.

"I stand by my policy. It's an inconvenience, first of all, to have to come down here and secondly, difficult to enforce 5 mile per hour tickets," said Judge Sugarmon.

Judge Sugarmon says the accuracy of speedometers and radar come into question and he also cites this 1993 recommendation the city attorney gave prosecutors.

"In that they felt tickets 10 miles or less should be dismissed at court costs but no fine, no points, no penalty on drivers record," said Judge Sugarmon.

But Judge Sugarmon does not order court costs to be paid for those 5 and under. It's something the city is looking at changing.

"In other jurisdictions unless you're found not guilty they still assess court costs," said Little.

We calculated if everyone who had their speeding tickets dismissed in court last year were ordered to pay court costs, which are $61, it would total $1.6 million for the city. Now if we included parking, brake lights and other tickets, the city could find $5.6 million.

The judges make it clear, they cannot take city budget or revenue into account when issuing judgments and it would be inappropriate to expect them to.

But with reports of officers assuring speeders that certain tickets will be dismissed in court and judges admitting they're dismissing tickets, some wonder why they're even being written.

"I think we ought to be serious. If we're going to write parking tickets, if we're going to write speeding tickets then we ought to collect that money," said Long.

"I'm comfortable our officers here in Memphis exercise good judgment about when they do issue the citations and to have these cases dismissed I think is a bit of a disservice to them," said Little.

"There's no need for these, not 5 miles over when they need to be out there catching somebody else," said Vanessa Lee, a patron whose ticket was dismissed.

The city chief administrative officer says he plans to get together with judges, court clerks and police to talk about the issues soon.

Director Godwin would not comment on the tickets, but a spokesperson said "officers have a duty to enforce the law regardless of the judicial outcome."

Thursday we find people are not paying court costs, ordered by a judge, we'll tell you how much that's costing and why nothing's being done about it.