One of the most frustrating things that can happen to us is getting a ticket. Most of us would agree it is like rolling up money and throwing it out the window.
Perhaps that is how one woman in Texas felt when she received a ticket. Fortunately, she was able to have the ticket dismissed but then she received a second one for the same offense.
According to NBC news, Brandy Bottone, a resident of Plano, Texas, was driving in a high occupancy vehicle (HOV) lane when she was pulled over. The police gave her a ticket for being alone in a high occupancy lane but she claimed she wasn’t alone because she was pregnant.
This really brought up some interesting issues, because she was 34 weeks pregnant at the time. She was in a hurry to pick up her son and said: “I noticed it was getting congested, and it’s right where I can hop on the HOV.”
She later spoke with NBC-Dallas-Fort Worth, saying: “[The officer] starts peeking around. He’s like, ‘Is it just you?’ And I said, ‘No there’s two of us?’ And he said, ‘Well where’s the other person?’ And I went, ‘right here,’ pointing to her stomach.”
According to the police officer, that didn’t count so he gave her a ticket. He said that the two people had to be outside of the body to meet the requirement.
“And then I said, ‘Well [I’m] not trying to throw a political mix here, but with everything going on [with Roe v. Wade], this counts as a baby,'” Bottone told the officer.
The ticket was for $275 and she argued in her defense. The law was rather blurry, but it seems as if the Texas Penal Code does recognize a fetus as a person. The problem was, that the transportation laws of the state of Texas don’t agree.
She took the ticket to court and was able to get it dismissed. Now that she has received a second ticket for the same offense, about a month later, she is going to be going back to court again.
Her attorney’s representative said: “Yes, Ms. Bottone’s HOV case was dismissed. The defendant received a second HOV citation about a month after the first. This second citation is currently pending.”
In speaking with TODAY, she talked about her second ticket. She said it was issue “the day before I went into labor on August 3. I was using the same route that I did previously and they had another checkpoint set up.”
“I was going to pick up my son from his father’s house and they had a checkpoint set up,” the mom told TODAY. “I was pulled aside and asked the same question. I stated, ‘Yes, right here,'” she said pointing at her belly.
“I hope that someone in a higher political position than me takes a stand on the issue of the laws not speaking together correctly and not projecting as an ‘I want my cake and eat it too,'” she stated.
Sources: NBC News, NBC Dallas Ft Worth, TODAY