Virginia Lawyers Weekly is reporting that the Virginia Attorney General’s Office wants the Henrico County case challenging the abusive driver fees to take an expedited track to the Supreme Court:
The Virginia attorney general’s office has offered to help put Anthony O. Price on a fast track to the Supreme Court of Virginia in his attack on the constitutionality of the state’s civil remedial fees.
Esther Windmueller, who is representing Price along with Craig S. Cooley in Henrico County courts, said the AG’s office told her it would agree to an interlocutory appeal provided by Virginia Code § 8.01-670.1.
J. Tucker Martin, a spokesman for the AG’s office, said, “While the Henrico Circuit Court’s decision is correct, we believe that it is imperative for the state Supreme Court to hear the case and affirm the Henrico court’s reasoning as soon as possible. To that end, we will support any effort by Price to expedite proceedings.”
Windmueller said she is not inclined to accept the offer because she wants to raise issues in addition to the equal protection argument that Circuit Judge L.A. Harris Jr. rejected on Monday. She also questioned whether the civil procedure statute applies to a law with both civil and criminal aspects.
Not to mention the fact that the equal protection argument probably won’t go far in the Virginia Supreme Court.
August 27th, 2007 at 8:51 am
What is the goal? Safer roads or to collect revenue? The important goal is to make driving safer on Virginia roads. Is imposing a higher fine going to work? Virginia highways have some of the worst accident statistics in the USA. Enforcement practices that have not changed for 40 years have failed the citizens. Virginia State Police need to be more visible instead of hiding and unseen. They need to observe traffic and what is actually happening. Traffic flow is important and causing any traffic to slow from the natural flow causes many problems. There are troublesome drivers that should be fined. The officers need to OBSERVE what is going on not just watch a radar or Vascar result and chase. Blindly chasing the vehicle in front is not stopping tailgating, agressive driving, quick lane changes and hazardous drivers. Many times the driver in front is attempting to get to a safe position on the highway. Many cases of passing demonstrate the lead driver begins to be tailgated by another driver wanting to go much faster. In an effort to get out of the way the lead driver is clocked and stopped where the agressive driver is not stopped and gets away with the intimidation. This is especially true of some trucks. All the police departments need to get with it and make the difficult stops. Observe the traffic by moving around and seeing what is going on. Speeding is not the problem. Poor driving and aggressive driving is the issue and causing Virginia Highways to be unsafe for all. By the way stopping a vehicle on a Sunday morning with no traffic on the road for exceeding the spped limit is ridiculous. If there is not some unsafe act going on we are wasting out tax dollars and officers time by such prctices. The Virginia State Police need a different focus as there public service value is minimized when it comes to the archaic methods being used today. II am in favor of cutting the budget for the VIrginia State Police and any other Police force in Virginia that does cannot clearly demonstate siginificant safety improvements for the roads. Sitting around with a machine does not make for safe roads. Increasing fines does not make for safe roads. Safe drivers make for safe roads and thank God there are many safe drivers in Virginia or the statistics would be more shocking. Personally I have lost a lot of respect for the methods of enforcement in Virginia since I see other states doing much better in the safety department. These states have more traffic than Virgina and their police are not hiding and looking for the first person exceeding the posted limit. Usually the posted limit is being exceeded by most vehicles. Dangerous drivers are the ones these places are looking for. The people are paying enough taxes now…how much more can we be expected to pay? Our founding fathers would roll over if they knew the atate of affairs now. People are sick of the way government is ignoring us while asking us to pay for what it does.