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Article thanks to Greg Jordan and bdtonline.com. Links provided:
PRINCETON, WV — June, 2018 While many tractor-trailer drivers are taking a mandated detour around a major interstate project, more than a thousand others have been ticketed for skipping that detour and driving through a construction zone.
Deputies with the Mercer County Sheriff’s Department and troopers with the West Virginia State Police Princeton Detachment have been patrolling Interstate 77’s northbound lanes between Bluefield and Princeton ever since a contractor started repaving those northbound lanes. Highway signs direct truckers to leave I-77 at Exit 1 near Bluefield. The tractor-trailers then travel east on Route 460 to Exit 9 near Princeton and turn to the interstate there; however, plenty of drivers are staying on I-77 and getting ticketed.
Records at the Mercer County Magistrate Clerk’s Office showed that between May 21 and Monday afternoon, deputies and troopers had written 1,066 tickets for traveling through a construction zone; and that number was expected to rise before the day was over.
“We’re slammed with them,” Deputy Clerk Karmin Richmond said. “And there are so many that are pleading not guilty to them, so our court dockets are going to be packed.”
Chief Deputy Capt. Joe Parks of the Mercer County Sheriff’s Department said the deputies are writing multiple tickets every shift. Some deputies have issued up to 15 tickets during an eight-hour shift while other deputies on longer shifts have written up to 40. When two deputies are on duty, each often stop 20 to 25 tractor-trailers during their shift. Off-duty deputies have been contracted by West Virginia Paving, the contractor working on I-77, to do traffic control.
“We turned in 221 hours this past week, and I think the tickets were 230 that week,” Parks recalled. “That’s roughly one an hour.”
Some of the truck drivers who were ticketed said they didn’t understand the detour instructions, but signs warning that a detour is ahead start as far away as Wytheville, Va., and some are in Bristol, Tenn., Parks said. One driver who was avoiding the detour one day and was pulled over the next day.
Other drivers avoiding the Route 460 detour are “trying to save 10 minutes and hope they don’t get caught,” Parks added.
State troopers are issuing just as many tickets and hearing the same excuses from drivers. One, Trooper K.A. Filer, wrote 41 tickets in one shift, Sgt. A.P. Christian said at the Princeton Detachment’s barracks.
“It’s pretty much the same old story,” Christian said. “They say that they don’t see the sign.”
Other drivers have different excuses.
“I had another say he didn’t see the safety issue,” District Commander First Sgt. J. Tomblyn stated. “It was actually two of them. They didn’t feel the need to detour.”
Signs alerting motorists about the I-77 construction and the Route 460 detour start appearing at the 85 mile marker, and Tomblyn said three of those signs can be seen after drivers go through the Big Walker Mountain Tunnel.
The tickets have led to other charges besides going through a construction zone. Tomblyn said two fugitives have been arrested, and there has been one arrest for DUI. One tractor-trailer overturned on Saturday morning, but there were no injuries.
Back at the Mercer County Courthouse Annex, the magistrates’ administrative assistants and the magistrates’ phone system have been dealing with hundreds of calls from tractor-trailer drivers wanting to deal with their cases.
“It is a huge, colossal event that we did not see impacting the court as much as it has. We knew that it was going to be a headache and an inconvenience for the detour, but I don’t think anybody knew of the tremendous work load that it’s shifting to the magistrate court system, “ Magistrate Mike Flanigan said.
“Our traffic line really hasn’t changed much ... the only time it’s changed was two and a half to three years ago when the county commission bought a new phone system for the courthouse,” Flanigan recalled. “So we did an updated information on the phone that essentially said the same thing, and it gives fines with court costs for speeding tickets only; everything else had to be assessed by a magistrate. The magistrates got together and we decided what the fines were going to be in uniform for speeding violations in a 55, 65 or 70 mph zones. So that was all that was on the recording, and that was almost three years ago was the last time it was updated because it’s just quietly churned away.”
Each magistrate is allowed one assistant, and when the magistrate is on night duty, his or her assistant is still at the courthouse annex during the day, Flanigan said. Magistrate assistants normally answer the traffic line.
“How it used to be it would hold and it would be forwarded to an assistant. That way if it was anything other than a speeding ticket, it could be assessed by a magistrate at the time or given instructions on how to contest their citation,” Flanigan stated, adding that this routine changed when the new series of tickets started to arrive.
“When the tickets started rolling in in mass, the first assistant to suffer the traffic line was literally on the traffic line from the moment she walked in (8:30 a.m.) until 4:30 (p.m.) when she left,” Flanigan said. “She was on the phone the entire day. It was insane.”
This assistant’s magistrate was on night duty for a week.
“She was absolutely hammered by these phone calls,” Flanigan stated. “She was on the phone constantly. We started getting reports from the county commission that people were calling there wanting to know why people weren’t answering the magistrate court phone, or traffic line. We started to get calls from the (state) supreme court wanting us to know that they’re getting complaints that no one was answering the traffic line, and I knew she was because she was literally on it all day. The amount that were coming in was actually worse than what we had expected.”
The magistrate court has worked to adjust its answering system to help alleviate the call volume. In many cases, the system has hung up on people because it was overwhelmed. About 200 message left by callers could not be reached because the pass code was unavailable. The phone provider, Frontier, was contacted about the problems.
“What was happening when they would call the traffic line number, they wouldn’t necessarily be in a queue, but they would get some hold music, about 30 seconds of hold music, then it would ring twice, and then it would cut them off,” Flanigan said. “I understand why people are getting upset and angry because I would, too. Personally, I don’t like talking to robo calls. I don’t know anybody who enjoys it.”
The magistrate phone system has been “revamped and updated” so callers will have multiple options. They now can get instructions for pleading “not guilty” to their citations or pleading “guilty” or “no contest” on the tickets they’re issued by law enforcement. These tickets can then be mailed or faxed to magistrate court.
“If they want to contest the citation, it’s very simple. There’s a place on the citation that says ‘not guilty.’ They sign that. There’s two different types of tickets. There’s the traditional citation ticket; the not guilty part’s on the back,” he said. “Then there’s the e-tickets, which is a very long printed out strip of paper, and that ‘not guilty’ section is at the bottom. If they want to contest their citation, they sign where it says not guilty, they put on a piece of paper their correct address and phone number, and send that to us. Then we set a court date.”
“At that point, ticket comes in, it’s sent to the clerk’s office, and they’re evenly distributed among the magistrates. The assistants set it for a hearing,” Flanigan said. “To get that information before, you had to talk to an assistant. We automated that. The vast of majority of the charges that we’re seeing from the construction is failure to obey traffic device or failure to detour. That means if a tractor-trailer fails to take the (Route) 460 detour, law enforcement will stop them for violating the sign.”
Truck drivers found guilty or pleading guilty or no contest face paying a total $200 in fines and court costs.
“We get a lot of questions dealing with points (on licenses), but magistrate court doesn’t deal with that,” Flanigan said, adding that this is the job of the state Department of Motor Vehicles.
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