FARGO (KFGO/KVRR) -The North Dakota legislature enacted a new law that allows citations to be issued to the owner of a vehicle for fleeing police. The citation is issued if the owner declines to tell police who was driving at the time of the pursuit.
“I think it’s largely going to be ineffective. I think it was ill-conceived, it wasn’t thought out very well, and I don’t think it will accomplish its aims. But it will create defenses for people that didn’t exist before its enactment,” said Mark Friese, Attorney at Vogel Law Firm.
The first offense will be a $100 fine And the second offense will be $500. Fargo Police Chief Dave Zibolski says there’s a way to avoid paying the fines.
“The other options, of course, would be to assist and cooperate with the officer in terms of who you may have given the car to or who you knew to have been driving the car at that time. Perhaps you were a passenger and weren’t the driver, or a friend borrowed the car, etc,” said Zibolski.
Friese says state law says that cities can exceed the fee amounts up to 100%.
“Cities in North Dakota have historically used traffic violators as piggy banks. Fargo undoubtedly, because this is historically what they will do, they’ll double. So it’ll be $200 and $1000. So the financial incentive in Fargo is going to be greater for somebody to cooperate or to provide information,” said Friese.
Friese says people who recently sold their vehicle may end up having to pay a fee because the buyer of the vehicle had not changed the registration. Or in other cases the vehicle may belong to their child or family member.
“I think it’s a bad decision, and it’s a bad start to what may happen next. Are we going to presume that the seller of a gun is responsible for somebody’s misuse of the gun? Are we going to presume that a parent is responsible for a negligent act of the child? Are we going to start developing these presumptions? Centuries ago, back in 1692, we presumed that everyone was a witch. That didn’t turn out very well for us,” said Friese.
Friese believes that there needs to be new rules for the police departments, as this new law will not make as much of an impact as they hope it will.
Comments