Taylor’s Speeding Ticket Saga Finally Comes to an End

The nearly 18-month long journey has its finale.

There's a good chance you've been following my speeding ticket saga. Nearly 18 months ago, I got a speeding ticket on the Taconic. They claim I was going 75 in a 55. I claim they are wrong. After a whole saga, which you can catch up on below, I finally got a plea deal in the mail. They dropped the charge to violating a traffic device, which gets me two points and a nice hefty fine. While I'm thrilled this speeding ticket saga is over, I am not thrilled to have two points on my license and a $150 fee with a $93 surcharge.

If you've missed my speeding ticket saga, here's the whole thing. In January 2020, I got a speeding ticket on the Taconic State Parkway. Like anyone, I plead not guilty to this ticket. For some reason, whenever I get a ticket (which has only been 3 times) I drop my ticket off in person at the courthouse. I want to make sure they get it and there's no dispute. I stopped by the Town of East Fishkill Court on the very last day possible to present my guilty plea. That was February 2020 at this point. I was told it would be "several months" before I heard anything about a court date...and that was pre-pandemic.

Fast forward about a month and we're in March 2020 and the pandemic has fully shut New York State down. Government buildings, which include courthouses, were all closed to the public. For me, that meant waiting even longer for my court date. But as things re-opened, I got the letter in the mail with my court date. The letter came in November calling me to court on December 1.

But then, I get another letter about 10 days before my court date, saying my appearance has been indefinitely postponed. They postponed my court date due to rising COVID-19 cases and the East Fishkill Court was once again closed to the public. And then came February 2021 when I got a letter from the court in the mail offering to plea me out via mail. Of course, I did this, and that's why I am where I am now. Which is $243 poorer.