Is “Sitting Out” Traffic Tickets The Best Option?

Dallas Municipal Court

“Sitting out” tickets is the phrase most commonly used to describe when a person wants to do jail time instead of paying a traffic ticket. However, there are some major concerns with Dallas Municipal Court if you are considering time served as an option. You need to make sure that you are willing to deal with the negative impact time served has first. Second you need to make sure if you do go to jail that the judge will actually grant you time served.

Dollar Value For A Day of Time Served – Time served means that you will sit in jail until it is deamed long enough to pay off your tickets. Most courts do a $100.00 per day exchange rate on time served requests. So, don’t think you can sit in jail for 12 hours and have your buddy bond you out and expect to get $500.00 worth of tickets paid off. You must be willing to sit out at least 2 days per traffic ticket outstanding. Many tickets will require 3 days of time. A court will only hold a person for 10 days before they must release them on traffic tickets. Basic math tells you that the maximum value you will get for time served is $1000.00 after serving 10 days in jail.

Time Served Means A Conviction On Your Record – Don’t think the tickets vanish after you do time served. Time served means you get convicted of the crime you were charged with. This also means it will be reported to DPS as a conviction. Some convictions cause surcharges to be assessed against you. These surcharges can be more than the value of the ticket. For example, a no insurance ticket convictions requires a $260.00 be paid to DPS for 3 years. So, you sit out a $300.00 no insurance ticket only to find out you now owe another $780.00 to DPS before they will lift any hold on your driver’s license. Was time served worth it in this case? No. Time served is supposed to save you money, not cost you more.

Court Pitfalls in Dallas Municipal Court For Time Served

Dallas Traffic Attorney

Entering a Plea Before Time Served Will Be Considered – Your plea is the biggest piece of leverage you have with Dallas Municipal Court. If you have entered a plea of “not guilty” the court is required to take steps to give you a trial. These steps take time and cost the City money. They want you to enter a plea of “no contest” or “guilty” so they don’t have to listen to you. A guilty plea means they tell you how much to pay and kick you out of the court to get arrested if you don’t pay it. If you are requesting time served you need to make sure you are going to get it. The scam goes as follows:

* Dallas Municipal Court will require you to enter a plea of “guilty” or “no contest” before they will consider time served requests.
* Once the plea is entered, they will deny your time served request.

Because you already entered your plea of “no contest” you now owe the full amount of the ticket or you can go back to jail.

Solving The Plea Problem – Enter a plea of “not guilty.” Make sure you stay in jail for the required amount of time to pay off your tickets. Once this happens an attorney can normally bond you out for $100.00 per ticket. Let the lawyer go in and negotiate your time served request so that you don’t end up sitting in jail and getting no credit. Alternatively, if you can talk with the judge and tell them you will not enter a plea of “no contest” until you are assured you will get time served for your tickets. If the judge cannot assure you of this, then keep your “not guilty” plea in place.

Remember that you “not guilty” plea is the only power you have over a court. Without it, they can do as they wish. Use this power to your benefit.