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Lee's Summit, MO —
Every Saturday my husband and I take my 90-year-old mother to lunch and the grocery store. On Feb. 4, we decided to drive from Lee’s Summit to Independence to try a restaurant we had never tried before. We parked in a handicapped space in front of the restaurant and my mother, who walks with a cane or walker, made her way to the front door. We have a handicapped permit for her in the glove compartment, but my husband forgot to hang it on the mirror. When we came out, there was a ticket on the windshield from the Sheriff’s Department that gave a court date to appear.
On March 8, my husband and I both took off work to appear in court. Both of our names were on the ticket. It was my car, even though my husband had been driving. I was only going to offer moral support, but good thing I went, since it was my name on the docket, although we had not been informed of this. In fact, the name was completely incorrect, since it was illegible on the ticket. They had combined my first and last name with my husband’s and added another that was neither of ours, mistaking Thomas for Thompson.
When we got to the courthouse there were about 80 people there for the same reason. Interestingly, even though most of these people were disabled in some way, there are only two disabled parking spaces in front of the courthouse and there was minimal seating inside the courthouse. The court time on the ticket was 9 a.m., but we had to stand in line until well after 9:30 a.m. When we were let into the courtroom, there was not enough seating for everyone and we were seated behind and to the side of criminals in orange jump suits and chains.
To Judge Bushur’s credit, he was not informed that there had been a targeted enforcement on Feb. 4 by the Sheriff’s Department, and he tried to expedite the proceedings. The two people out of the group who had parked in handicapped spaces and had no permit were ordered to pay the fine. He kept calling for someone to get representatives from the sheriff’s and prosecutor’s offices to appear since he could not dismiss any charges. After one hour, someone from the prosecutor’s office showed up and later two sheriff’s deputies showed up.
Every Saturday my husband and I take my 90-year-old mother to lunch and the grocery store. On Feb. 4, we decided to drive from Lee’s Summit to Independence to try a restaurant we had never tried before. We parked in a handicapped space in front of the restaurant and my mother, who walks with a cane or walker, made her way to the front door. We have a handicapped permit for her in the glove compartment, but my husband forgot to hang it on the mirror. When we came out, there was a ticket on the windshield from the Sheriff’s Department that gave a court date to appear.
On March 8, my husband and I both took off work to appear in court. Both of our names were on the ticket. It was my car, even though my husband had been driving. I was only going to offer moral support, but good thing I went, since it was my name on the docket, although we had not been informed of this. In fact, the name was completely incorrect, since it was illegible on the ticket. They had combined my first and last name with my husband’s and added another that was neither of ours, mistaking Thomas for Thompson.
When we got to the courthouse there were about 80 people there for the same reason. Interestingly, even though most of these people were disabled in some way, there are only two disabled parking spaces in front of the courthouse and there was minimal seating inside the courthouse. The court time on the ticket was 9 a.m., but we had to stand in line until well after 9:30 a.m. When we were let into the courtroom, there was not enough seating for everyone and we were seated behind and to the side of criminals in orange jump suits and chains.
To Judge Bushur’s credit, he was not informed that there had been a targeted enforcement on Feb. 4 by the Sheriff’s Department, and he tried to expedite the proceedings. The two people out of the group who had parked in handicapped spaces and had no permit were ordered to pay the fine. He kept calling for someone to get representatives from the sheriff’s and prosecutor’s offices to appear since he could not dismiss any charges. After one hour, someone from the prosecutor’s office showed up and later two sheriff’s deputies showed up.
Someone took our handicapped permits and put them in our case folders and the judge and the prosecutor went into his chambers. Those who had the paperwork that indicated that the name on the permit was the same as the name on the ticket were dismissed with no fine. We had not been told to bring any paperwork, so I only had the permit. We were told we could set up another court date and bring back the paperwork. I chose to pay the fine. The fine could have been anywhere from $50 to $300. I had to pay $163 with court costs. We had been there more than two hours.
I told my husband that I did not plan on eating in any more of Independence’s restaurants in the future, as our very expensive lunch with my mother had left a “bad taste” in my mouth.
