Got a Speeding Ticket, Went to Arraignment and Pleaded Guilty, What if I Don't Pay

[johnjohn]

My question involves a speeding ticket from the State of: California

Hello everybody and thank you for your attention.

I have a speeding ticket in the LA county. The thing is I'm leaving the country for good in 3 weeks, I am a french citizen and I don't plan on coming back here anytime soon, even though I might have to for professional reasons but this is unpredictable and somewhat unlikely.

I was in court this morning for my arraignment, and since they couldn't have a trial set for me before I leave the country, I pleaded guilty and got the fee reduced from 670 to 490.

My question is : since I appeared in court, I won't be charged for a failure to appear, right? But then what happens if I don't pay my tickets ?
They will put a hold on my license but it expires in three weeks at the same time my visa does.
My tickets will go to collection but I don't have a credit report, nor an address here, nor anything ?
So can I get in trouble if I try one day to come back in California, or in another State?
Can I get arrested, or I will just have to pay the tickets (much more than 490 I guess, but how much ?)
Or is there a chance that this get dismissed after a certain time ?

Thank you very much

[HonkingAntelope]

Failure to pay is a separate offense. If you don't expect to ever come back to US, you can probably go ahead and blow it off. On the other hand if you do decided return in the future, you may well run into serious trouble with the INS. I've heard stories of people getting arrested or turned back in cases of multiple outstanding tix. $490 is not a trivial amount of money, but it's not enough to take the risk, IMO

[johnjohn]

Thank you very much for this quick answer.
So it seems nothing is certain?
But I agree, if it might be very bad, then I should better pay.

$490 is not enough to take the risk, but is it enough for them to keep track of that for several years?

[Joshuadeuce1]

.

$490 is not enough to take the risk, but is it enough for them to keep track of that for several years?

Yes it is.

[HonkingAntelope]

$490 is not enough to take the risk, but is it enough for them to keep track of that for several years?

The state would have absolutely no problem spending 10x that amount just to make an example out of someone who blows them off the way you intend to

[johnjohn]

Ok. I have to take care of that properly then.
Thank you for your help.

A last question though, since i have some time and no money, can i still ask for community service or is it too late? I just found out about this and it would help me a lot.

[johnjohn]

I can't find consistant information on the internet regarding if I can ask for Community Service now or if it is too late. Does anyone knows something about this ?

[EWYLTJ]

john,

I wish you would stop for a moment and reread your original post. You have pled guilty and you want to find out what will happen if you fail to pay your fine. If you look at my posts, I am a strong advocate of people challenging the state by providing a zealous defense for themselves... but I do not advocate advising someone on how to break the law (i.e. not pay a fine after pleading guilty). What you were asking is not only illegal, it is morally repugnant. This site is designed to assist people on how to produce a legal defense, not evade responsibility after a guilty plea. The fact that you appear to have changed your mind about evading after you were advised it won't be just written off does nothing to repair your moral deficiency. You, in my opinion, are not worthy of an American visa. We have enough moral bankruptcy in this nation without importing more from France. I would just about be willing to pay the $490 for you if I could be garunteed that you would never return to this nation.

If you wanted to get out of paying the $490, you should have raised a legal defense. However, when you pled guilty, you accepted responsibility for the act and for the fine. If you have one shred of dignity, you will come here and announce that you have paid the fine and appologize for your behavior to the people of this state and this nation.

[kelly690]

I have a friend who is from England who was here in the US on a visa. It expired and he went back to London for a year, then decided he wanted to come back to the US because his family was here (his mom married an American citizen and all of his siblings also were here). The problem was, he got a LOT of tickets before he left the country (speeding tickets, let his insurance and registration lapse, parking tickets, etc.). In fact, he was basically acting reckless thinking it wouldn't be an issue because he'd be gone out of the country and he wasn't a citizen. He tried to come back and they wouldn't give him another visa until he cleared the mess up, which was much worse than what the original fines would have been. Consequently, he's still in London as I type this with very little hope of being able to come back any time soon because of the mess he made for himself. If you ever have the need to come back here for professional reasons you may not be able to. If by professional you mean you may have to come back for a job, they're probably not going to be too happy if you have outstanding legal issues in a country you need to do business in. The amount of money is definitely enough to possibly cause you problems in the future.