This has been a confusing year for people who received traffic tickets in New Orleans.
Do you remember when the City of New Orleans was hacked and the traffic court was shut down for over a month?
Well, courts reopened briefly and things almost got back to normal. But, on March 14, 2020, courts closed again so we could all social-distance, flatten the curve, and prevent the spread of COVID-19.
With no clear end to the infections caused by the Coronavirus, many courts in Louisiana are closed indefinitely.
If you received a traffic ticket in the New Orleans area in the last few months, here are some concerns you might have:
- You couldn’t go to court for your appearance date at the bottom of your ticket and now you don’t know what to do.
- You’re worried the court issued a warrant for your arrest because you missed your court date.
- You can’t afford a contempt of court fine assessed by the court because you did not appear as ordered. This is even more of a challenge because your employer terminated you because of the virus.
- Your license is suspended, you would like to fix the suspension issue, but you can’t because both the Louisiana Office of Motor Vehicles is closed AND the courts are closed.
- You might be wondering when courts will reopen and what your responsibility will be then?
- With all of your new responsibilities (like child care, home school, working from home, remembering to keep 6ft from the next person), you don’t have the time and brainpower left to remember to handle this ticket.
- You’re concerned about going to court with ALL of the other sick people when courts finally reopen.
All of your fears are valid. At Crescent City Law, we pride ourselves for guiding our clients away from fear and into trust, confidence, and calmness.
Here’s how Crescent City Law we can help:
- The court date at the bottom of your ticket is your arraignment date. Most courts allow us to mail a motion to enroll, plea of not guilty, and request for trial to the courthouse to get a trial date. In our experience, the courts will assign a trial date about 90 days after the date written on the ticket. In the last month, we filed countless motions for our clients to satisfy “appear” for our clients. We can do that for you, too.
- Every job is done by live humans who use computers to help make their job easier. This is also true at the courthouses. It is possible a warrant was issued for your arrest by the computer system automatically. The attorneys at Crescent City Law have a personal relationship with the judges, clerks, and district attorneys which we develop by fighting 1000s of tickets every year. In many cases, we can persuade the judge to recall warrants without our client even appearing in court.
- Like the system that automatically issued a warrant for your arrest, the same computer probably issued a contempt fine for failing to appear as ordered by the court. In most cases, the judge will waive the contempt of court fines for our clients simply because they hired a lawyer. In one case last year, I was able to save a client about $1600.00 in contempt.
- License suspensions are difficult to resolve even when everything is open. Our attorneys have direct phone numbers to the attorneys who work at the Department of Motor Vehicles. In some cases, we can get the DMV to agree to lift a hold on a license in times of emergency.
- When the courts open, it will be your responsibility to go to court to get a date to fight your ticket. Everyone who has received a ticket with an appearance date beginning March 16, 2020 will flood the courthouses to get a new date. You and tens of thousands of people will be waiting in line for hours to either pay your ticket or get a new date. Not only that, you’ll be at risk for getting sick. When you hire Crescent City Law, we’ll handle these appearances for you so you don’t have to wait in line and won’t put yourself and loved ones at risk of getting sick.
- Crescent City Law uses a state-of-the-art practice management system to keep track of all of our cases from your initial call to our office to the completion of your case. This system helps us remember when to appear in court to fight your case.
Your health, freedom, and finances are important to you and Crescent City Law is here to support you. If you or a loved one received a traffic ticket…
