As northern California drivers, most of us have had the unfortunate run-in with a friendly or not so friendly police officer who issued us a ticket to appear in court for a traffic violation. In most counties including Sacramento, Alameda and San Francisco the court permitted us to pay the inexplicably high fine through mail. For an additional amount you could even go to traffic school and have your case dismissed upon completion. Most of the time traffic school would make the court conviction virtually disappear, dismissing the case. Even though the wallet was a bit lighter most of us were glad to have the chance to go to traffic school and get the case dismissed. No one would have to find out about our conviction, not the DMV and not our car insurance company.
Under the current law, courts allow motorists cited with certain moving violations to attend traffic school as part of their sentence or offer outright dismissals upon completion of the traffic school. The legislature noticed that often times people would take advantage of this traffic school "loophole" and attend traffic school more than once every eighteen months as allowed by the law. The problem was that since the violation would be completely dismissed upon completion of traffic school other courts would have no way to know the reason behind the dismissal.
A new law, AB 2499, will take effect on July 1, 2011 and it will bring changes to the traffic school system. The main change is that upon completion of traffic school, a driver's DMV record will still show a conviction instead of a dismissal. It does provide however that upon completion of traffic school no points will be counted against the driver's record. The new law also removes any confidentiality of the conviction if the person holds a commercial driver's license, the violation occurred in a commercial vehicle, or the conviction places more than one point on the driver's record.
Under the new law drivers who receive a citation for a moving violation that carries one point can still attend traffic school in order to prevent the insurance companies from finding out about the violation. Since most insurance companies do conduct a periodic DMV record check for the people they insure, it is difficult to imagine how DMV will keep the conviction information away from the curious eyes of the insurance companies. After July 1, 2011 if you believe that your insurance company raised your rates based on a conviction for which you completed traffic school, it is advisable that you contact a traffic attorney.
The new law AB 2499 not only changes the entity in charge of keeping track of traffic school attendance but also tightens up the requirements for traffic school administrators.
If you received a traffic ticket in Sacramento, Yolo, Solano, Alameda, San Francisco or any other northern California county call the traffic attorneys at Bonilla & Cintean, LLP. Both Mr. David Bonilla and Mr. Alin Cintean have extensive experience when it comes to traffic laws. In their careers as Deputy District Attorneys they have tried more than one hundred and fifty traffic related court trials. Your case will receive the attention it deserves.
For those who would like to own and operate a traffic school, this new law changes most of the regulations. If you would like to operate a traffic school in the Sacramento region contact our traffic lawyers at our Sacramento office. We have opened a new San Francisco Bay Area office for those who are in need of a San Francisco Bay Area Attorney.
