The Case of the Non-Case

The Case of The Non-Case

September 9, 2022

The client was in a car accident and received a traffic citation. He dutifully mailed a written plea of not guilty form to the clerk of the court. The clerk mailed back the form and said that the form was rejected because there was no case number in their system. The law enforcement agency that issued the ticket had either failed to file the citation with the clerk, or the citation was returned to the agency due to some defect. The clerk’s letter, however, did notify the client that he could consider the clerk’s letter as proof that the not guilty plea was timely filed.

The client came to me wondering what to do, as there was no official case. I checked the online court docket, searched for his citation/case number in the system, and sure enough nothing came up.

I proposed we use the speedy trial rules to our advantage: Rule 6.325 of the Florida Rules of Traffic Court. Under the rule, from the time the officer issues a non-criminal traffic citation, the government has 180 days to bring the case to trial. If trial is not commenced within 180 days, then the defendant is entitled to have their case dismissed. Note that the case is not automatically dismissed at 180 days. The defendant must file a motion to dismiss.

Over the next few months, the client and I periodically checked the court docket—and still no case came up. Had the police officer filed the citation/paperwork within the 180 days and had the clerk then set the case for trial within the 180 days, the client would have been out of luck. Fortunately, when the 180 days passed, there was still no case in the clerk’s online docket system.

Now it was time to file a motion to dismiss. Ordinarily, when there’s a case in the system, I efile documents, electronically. But to efile, you need a case to be in the electronic system. I wondered if my motion to dismiss would be returned to me, just as the not guilty plea had been returned.

I mailed the motion—with a copy of the citation, a copy of the clerk’s letter, and my notice of appearance as counsel—to both the clerk and the law enforcement agency, by registered mail, signature service requested. I also emailed everything to the local State Attorney’s Office using their service email. (I probably didn’t have to serve the law enforcement agency, but I wanted to make sure that no one would later be able to say I hadn’t given proper notice and somehow “hid the ball.”) A few days later, the State Attorney’s Office replied to my email, stating that my documents were not accepted and not deemed served, as they were “unable to verify” my email. Obviously, the problem was that there was no case in the electronic system, so all they could do was reject the motion. This felt a bit Kafkaesque, but at least I had electronic proof that I’d served them with the motion. If anyone ever did try to prosecute the client for the citation, and suggest that I hadn’t “properly” or “actually” served the motion, well, I was prepared to go head-to-head with the State and even take it up on appeal, if necessary.

So, now we waited. Would the clerk accept my motion to dismiss? Would the law enforcement agency, having received the motion in the mail, finally submit the paperwork to the clerk? Or would the non-existent case merely languish for eternity?

About a month later, I received an envelope in the mail from the clerk of the court, with a single sheet of paper inside. It was a carbon copy of a standard form the hearing officer uses to indicate whether a motion is granted or denied. The form contained a few x marks, the hearing officer’s signature, and the word “Granted.” The motion was granted! The client was, of course, pleased.

The moral is that even if one’s traffic citation doesn’t make its way to the clerk, not to give up. My client was entitled to have his citation dismissed, despite the law enforcement agency’s failure to submit the paperwork. Rules are rules, right?

On a more philosophical note, some may question: Is it fair that the case was dismissed on purely technical grounds? First, it’s never the defendant’s job to prosecute himself. My client was under no obligation to inform the law enforcement agency, “Hey, you screwed up! Please prosecute me correctly!” Second, it’s not like he hid his citation from the system. He sent a not-guilty plea to the clerk. At that point the clerk could have tried to fix the matter by contacting the citing agency and/or the State Attorney’s Office. The clerk apparently did neither. My client did what he was supposed to do—neither more, nor less.

The speedy trial rules exist to ensure that cases don’t languish in a Kafkaesque void for eternity. Imagine my client needed to renew his vehicle insurance. With an open citation, that might have been difficult, if not impossible, as the insurance company might have refused to renew until the case was disposed of. Or they might have renewed but raised his premium because of the citation. The rules also keep law enforcement on their toes. If police don’t follow the rules, then their work is “punished” as the case for which they took the time to write a citation gets dismissed.

Often the rules work in favor of the government. This time they worked in favor of my client. And as an attorney it would have been shoddy of me not to have advised the client that we could move to dismiss under the rules. It was my job to use the rules—the law—to get the best outcome for the client. And it worked.

As my client learned, just because there’s no case, doesn’t mean there’s no case.

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This article was posted with the client’s permission.

DISCLAIMER. This article was written by Joshua Tarjan, Esq. The article is for informational purposes only and is not intended as legal advice to the reader. Reading this article creates no attorney-client relationship between the reader and the author. If the reader has a specific legal issue to address, they are urged to consult with an attorney qualified to practice law in the reader’s jurisdiction.

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