Juvenile Traffic Tickets

As one might assume, the consequences of traffic ticket convictions in Virginia for juveniles are not the same as for adults. These consequences include required involvement of their parents in the court process, increased insurance costs, and more severe penalties from the DMV, among others.

 

No. Anyone who commits an offense when they were under age 18 will have to go to the Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court-even if that person is no longer a juvenile.

Involvement Of Parents In Juvenile Speeding Or Traffic Case

The main difference procedurally between adult and juvenile speeding cases in Virginia is that if a juvenile is charged with a traffic infraction, a parent must be involved-either by coming to court or signing a notarized waiver of court appearance.

Can Juvenile Drivers Pre-Pay Speeding And Other Traffic Tickets?

A juvenile driver can pre-pay a ticket, waive his or her court appearance, and plea guilty to the offense-just like an adult can. However, both the juvenile and his or her parent must either come in person to the court or to a magistrate and sign a waiver of court appearance. In the alternative, the juvenile can mail in the plea and waiver, but the parent must sign the waiver and the parent’s signature must be notarized.

However, not every offense can be pre-paid. And if a juvenile is required to go to court for an offense or decides to fight a ticket, one of his or her parents must go with him. The juvenile’s parent will receive a summons, which is a court document requiring him or her to go to court. If the parent fails to appear, he or she could be charged with contempt of court (which is a crime).

Car Insurance

Car insurance for juvenile drivers is always higher than it is for adults. Consequently, if a driver under 18 (or even 19 or 20) is convicted of speeding (or any other traffic offense) in Virginia, the driver’s car insurance rates will most likely go up exponentially. There are a number of factors that insurance companies take into account when approving (or cancelling) a policy and determining rates, including length of time driving, length of time with the company, and history of traffic offenses, among many other considerations. Any traffic conviction will have a negative impact on anyone’s car insurance rates, but especially juvenile drivers.

Penalties for Juvenile Traffic Tickets in Virginia

Traffic tickets in Virginia are punished with a fine and court costs, even if you do not contest the ticket in court.

DMV Penalties For Rapid Point Accumulation For Juveniles

The court cannot impose any different penalty on a juvenile for a traffic infraction than they would for an adult. However, the problem comes with the action the DMV takes after a juvenile is convicted of a traffic infraction.

Driver Improvement Class

Drivers who are convicted of any traffic offense resulting in demerit points (that was committed when they were under 18) will be required to take a driver improvement course. They also will be required to take a driver improvement course if they were convicted of a seat belt or child restraint violation.

Unlike adult drivers, a juvenile driver cannot get any safe driving points on his record if the DMV or court required the person to take a driver improvement class.

Additionally, drivers under 20 cannot take a driver improvement class online and must take the class and test in person. This usually is a major inconvenience, as the person will have to arrange several hours when he or she is not in school or working to attend the class, as well as pay for the class. And usually, it is the parents who end up paying for the class-and the parents who end up driving the person to and from the class.

Driver’s License Suspension Or Revocation

Juvenile drivers face DMV driver’s license suspension and revocation much quicker than adult drivers.

There are a variety of reasons a juvenile driver’s license could be suspended or revoked, including:

• failure to take required driver improvement class within 90 days
  • penalty for conviction of traffic offense resulting in demerit points
  • license will be suspended until class completed
• second conviction resulting in points (or a safety belt or child restraint violation) committed when the driver was under 18
  • driver’s license suspension for 90 days
• third conviction resulting in points (or a safety belt or child restraint violation) committed when the driver was under 18
  • driver’s license revocation for 1 year or until the driver turns 18, whichever is longer.

If a juvenile driver’s license is suspended, the driver may or may not be granted a restricted driver’s license. If the driver is able to get a restricted license, the restrictions are far more onerous than those for adults (who probably already think those restrictions are very onerous). First, a juvenile driver must show that he or she has no other means of transportation to get to school or work. If the driver is granted a restricted license, he or she will be allowed to drive only to school and work-nowhere else. If the driver’s parents relied on him or her to run errands or drive other children to school, this will now create a major inconvenience for the driver’s family.

In order to reinstate driving privileges that were suspended or revoked, the juvenile driver will have to wait until the end of the suspension or revocation period and then comply with any reinstatement requirements relevant to his or her particular situation, including taking a driver improvement class, reapplying for a license, taking a knowledge and skills test, and/or paying reinstatement fees.

Drivers Under 19 Convicted Of Offenses Committed When They Were Under 18

Offenses Resulting In Demerit Points

• First Demerit Point Offense, Seat Belt, Child Restraint Violation
  • mandatory driver improvement clinic
• Second Demerit Point Offense, Seat Belt, Child Restraint Violation
  • driver’s license suspension for 90 days
• Third Demerit Point Offense, Seat Belt or Child Restraint Violation
  • driver’s license revocation for one year or until driver turns 18, whichever is longer

In addition to these penalties, the DMV will take additional action against juveniles for rapid demerit point accumulation:

Penalties For Rapid Demerit Point Accumulation For Juveniles

• 9 points for convictions of offenses committed within 12 Months (or 12 points in 24 months)
  • mandatory driver improvement course
  • DMV probation for 6 months
    • conviction for offense resulting in demerit points will result in driver’s license suspension
  • control period for 18 months after probation period ends, as discussed above.

Drivers Under 20

Drivers under 20 who are convicted of offenses resulting in demerit points are punished by the DMV the same as adults, except that they must attend any required or volunteer driver improvement class in person.

Reckless Driving

Reckless Driving by Speed in Virginia is a crime. In Virginia, criminal convictions cannot be expunged (erased from public records). This means that if someone is convicted of a crime in Virginia, no matter how minor and how long ago, the person cannot erase it from his or her record. As a result, the person will have a permanent criminal record.

Juveniles in Virginia are afforded a slight break when it comes to convictions and expungements-but not much.

Juvenile Records Are Sealed, Aren’t They?

Not always. This biggest mistake a juvenile driver can make is to assume that a conviction will just go away after the person turns 18.

While generally the courts restrict who can access juvenile records, there are a number of provisions in the Virginia code that allow sharing and dissemination of these records for certain “limited” purposes.

Additionally, many juvenile convictions (usually referred to as “adjudications” or “findings of not innocent”) will remain on a person’s criminal record for several years after the person turns 18-and possibly forever.

Expungement of Juvenile Records

Contrary to what most people think, juvenile records are not just automatically sealed, erased or expunged. And the record does not just automatically “go away” when the person turns 18.

If a juvenile is convicted of a misdemeanor, that conviction will remain on his or her criminal record for several years. Generally, the court will destroy records of juvenile traffic and misdemeanor cases when the person has reached the age of 19 and five years have passed since the date of the last court hearing on the matter.

This means that if a 17 year old is convicted of a misdemeanor, the record will not be destroyed until 5 years after the last court date. So, at the very least it will not be destroyed until the person is 22 years old. If the last court date was when the person was 18, it will be when he or she is 23 years old, etc.

Certain offenses will remain on the person’s record even longer. If the conviction record was sent to the DMV (such as a Reckless Driving conviction), the record will not be destroyed until the person is 29 years old. This means that the driver will have a misdemeanor conviction on his or her criminal record until he or she is 29 years old.

Some offenses committed while the person was a juvenile will even remain on the person’s criminal record permanently. Felony records, or charges that would be felonies if the person was an adult, will not ever be expunged. If a juvenile is convicted of a felony, that will remain on his permanent criminal record.

Additionally, sometimes records-mistakenly-do not get expunged. No one should assume that just because a certain period of time has lapsed that his or her juvenile record is just “gone”.

Take-Aways For Juvenile Drivers

Juvenile drivers must be aware of all of the consequences that come with convictions for traffic violations-no matter how minor the offense may seem. Many are surprised to find out that they cannot hide this trouble from their parents, because the law requires at least one parent to be involved. Their car insurance rates will go up (again, not likely something they can hide from their parents because they are probably on their parents’ policies). Juveniles face license suspension and DMV penalties much more quickly than adults do for the same driving behavior. They also have even more limitations on restricted driving privileges. Finally, and perhaps most surprisingly, convictions do not just go away when the person turns 18.

Even drivers who are over 18 are still subject to more limitations, such as the requirement of taking a driver improvement course in person.

Juvenile drivers should think twice before just pre-paying the fine for a traffic ticket or admitting guilt to Reckless Driving in court. The results of doing so could lead to all of the unintended consequences discussed in this chapter and throughout this book-among others.