FALCO
v.
STATE
AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.
Trial court properly denied defendant's motion to dismiss a traffic citation that lacked the required schedule of points and civil penalties, as the omission was a mere technicality that did not affect defendant's rights when he chose to proceed to trial rather than pay the fine.
A traffic citation's failure to include a schedule of points and civil penalties required by F.S. §318.20 is a mere technicality that does not warrant dismissal when the defendant proceeds to trial.
[1] A traffic citation's failure to include a schedule of points and civil penalties as required by statute constitutes a harmless technicality that does not warrant dismissa…
Previewing 1 of 1 headnotes on this case. FLexlaw’s editorially structured points of law — every proposition, pinpointed — are reserved for members.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceA police officer issued a traffic citation to the defendant that did not conform to F.S. §318.20 because it lacked a schedule of points and civil pena…
The full statement of facts, procedural history, and disposition for this case are member content.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence© FLexlaw, Inc. — AI-generated enrichments are proprietary. All rights reserved.
Explore caselaw by topic → Browse Procedural Defect cases and more on FLexlaw
The sole point raised on this appeal concerns the propriety of the trial judge’s denial of the defendant’s motion to dismiss. That motion was solely based upon the fact that the traffic citation given by the police officer to the defendant did not conform with the provisions of F.S. §318.20 in that the citation did not contain, and did not have appended to it, a “schedule of points” and civil penalities applicable to traffic offenses.
The obvious purpose of providing such a schedule of points is to inform the defendant of the consequences of his admitting the violation and forwarding the required civil penalty, that is, the $25 fine. When, as in this case, the defendant declines voluntarily to pay the fine and chooses instead to go to trial, it is just as obvious that the failure to provide the schedule óf points makes no difference whatsoever. The defect in the form of the citation thus amounts to nothing more than a mere technicality which did not affect the rights, substantial or otherwise, of the defendant and therefore should not interfere with the prosecution, of the traffic offense against him. See Lackos v. State, 339 So.2d 217, 219 (Fla. 1976). Consequently, the motion to dismiss was properly denied and the judgment below is affirmed.