DC Jurisdiction for VA License plate laws? (Washington: insurance, credit report) - Washington, DC - City-Data Forum

marcva · 01-28-2008, 02:01 PM

While parked (legally) in DC last week, I was ticketed ($50) for not having a front license plate on my virginia registered car. I have lived with this car in VA for 12 years including 8 years in Old Town with its rigorous enforcement) and have never been notified by VA officials (annual inspections and two traffic stops over the years) that this was an issue. The car does not have a front license plate bracket, so I will order one to mount the plate.

My question is, do DC traffic enforcement officers have jurisdiction over VA license plate laws as a primary offense?

Thanks,

Marc

DC's Finest · 01-28-2008, 02:44 PM

Yes. While driving in DC, you have to abide by the laws of the District of Columbia. If you don't pay that ticket you will not be able to renew your plates. I have DC tags and I once got a speeding ticket in Hagerstown. They notified DC and I had to pay up. You don't have to order a front plate bracket. Just put the plate in the front window. I have seen people do that to avoid a ticket.

rlchurch · 01-28-2008, 04:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DC's Finest

Yes. While driving in DC, you have to abide by the laws of the District of Columbia. If you don't pay that ticket you will not be able to renew your plates. I have DC tags and I once got a speeding ticket in Hagerstown. They notified DC and I had to pay up. You don't have to order a front plate bracket. Just put the plate in the front window. I have seen people do that to avoid a ticket.

A plate in the front window is not legal.

David1980 · 02-05-2008, 09:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DC's Finest

Yes. While driving in DC, you have to abide by the laws of the District of Columbia. If you don't pay that ticket you will not be able to renew your plates. I have DC tags and I once got a speeding ticket in Hagerstown. They notified DC and I had to pay up. You don't have to order a front plate bracket. Just put the plate in the front window. I have seen people do that to avoid a ticket.

This doesn't really answer the question. Requiring to have a front plate is a Maryland specific law, as it is for Virginia. You don't see cars from Delaware getting tickets for no front plates, do you? In Delaware you are not required to have a front plate. When you are in a different state or D.C. you abide by their laws, but since when can they give you a ticket for a specific violation noted in your home state? Say your state has lower emission standards. Can D.C. give you an inspection ticket because their emission standards are higher? NO!! What they are doing is either totally wrong... or there is a special loop-hole as to how they can write you a ticket for your home state laws.

As far as I am concerned, I am being discriminated for being from Maryland. Say I am parked side by side with a Delaware car. We are not being treated equally if I get a ticket for no front plate and they don't. In this case, whose law overrides whose? Well in this case D.C. is saying Delaware law is overriding theirs. Since when does a state care what another states laws are? It is as if D.C. is picking and choosing when it pleases them.

Another perfect example in the eyes of the law. Say D.C. had the death penalty and you killed someone. Say Maryland had the death penalty and Delaware didn't. Do I get "special rights" in D.C. as a Delaware citizen and not be subject to the death penalty because it is not legal in my home state?

dkf747 · 02-06-2008, 06:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by David1980

NO!! What they are doing is either totally wrong... or there is a special loop-hole as to how they can write you a ticket for your home state laws.
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There was qa Dr. Gridlock column in the Washington Post a few years ago that dealt with this. I can't recall all of the details, but it had to do with a DC ticket because a car with Va. plates had an expired inspection sticker. IIRC, the answer was that a car must be legally and fully registered according to home state laws when driving it in DC. An expired inspection sticker means the car is not legal to drive in Va., therefore, it is not legal to drive it in DC. I think it would be the same here. Va. requires a front plate so it is not legal without it, Delaware doesn't, so it is legal. I don't know if this is right or wrong, but it does make sense.

PenguinSix · 02-07-2008, 06:29 PM

I got a ticket in NY City once for having one of those dealer 'plastic' things over my license plate. Those things are illegal in NY and I was ticketed for it.

However, as I investigated the law of NY, it said for out of state cars, I need only not block the state and number on the tag to be considered legal. I wrote 'since you wrote my state and number on the ticket, your officer has basically confessed that I was within the law.' Ticket was dropped.

You should examine what DC law requires for out of state drivers. I'd be shocked if it was 2 plates as they would be pulling over people pretty much everyday.

AdrianV73 · 05-15-2009, 09:38 AM

Does anyone know if Hawaii law enforcement has jurisdiction over mainland license plates? I was told that with the Idaho plates I have on my vehicle there is no jurisdiction in Hawaii therefore i have reason to register my car or get insurance.

akorosdc · 05-15-2009, 10:51 AM

Check on the Hawaii board. However, unless they have a special law there, my understanding was that if your car is not up-to-date with its registration that you can get a ticket anywhere, regardless of which state your plates are from. It's illegal for that car to be on the road, so actually they can even tow/impound the car until you get it all sorted out. Hawaii is part of the country, so I assume the rules are the same, however maybe there's a lag in sharing information with the mainland so it's easier to get away with.

Workin_Hard · 05-15-2009, 12:31 PM

Last time I inquired on this, there is no reciprocity between DC DMV and VA DMV, at least not on non-moving violations. The worst that will happen is that your right to drive in DC may be suspended.

This is not as bad as it might seem, as the only way it will arise is if you keep your current plates or get more tickets. (I think 3 unpaid is the magic number that will result in a boot.) A friend who worked for a courier company said that due to getting tickets, his guys were replacing plates on a regular basis. Let's say you have a 2003 Malibu with VA tags ABC123. That's the specific car and tags DC will be aware of. You may get new tags just by going to VA DMV and saying "I don't like these numbers so can I have new tags?" So now you have a 2003 Malibu with VA tags XYZ123 and can drive in DC again! They're looking for that car with ABC123 tags, not you as a driver. The ticket issued by DC will not be recognized in VA to the point of impeding registration or anything here. The DC DMV Website says that unpaid tickets will result in an inability to register your vehicle in DC or obtain other DC DMV services. If you live in VA, who cares? You just have to decide if the trouble of getting new tags outweighs the cost of the ticket(s).

Now DC will send to you letters which double your fine to $100 and threaten to turn you over to a collection agency. Let them. After about 60 days, pull a free credit report and see what credit reporting agency they've sent you to. Write a letter to that CRA, based on the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act, saying "This is not my debt. Please investigate and send verification and validation." The DC DMV Adjudication Collection Agency has 30 days to respond. Based on experience, no part or agency of the DC city government could find their own butt using both hands on a sunny afternoon within that 30-day period. You will get a letter from the CRA saying that the creditor did not respond and no further reporting of this will be made. (DC may verify but by definition cannot legally validate!) Problem solved.

Based on the ticket, DC is looking for and issuing fines on the basis of auto registration - not a moving violation where the driver is readily identifiable. Just because they ticket an object - your car - does not mean that you were the one to park it there and are responsible. They send notices to the registered owner and people usually pay without question, at least often enough to make writing tickets the one profitable thing that the city can do.

I've had my VA car improperly cited for an expired inspection sticker when I was within the two week period the 'fail' sticker was valid for. DC also sent me photos of my car, when I was not driving it, citing an alleged speeding violation. (When I countered that I was not the driver, and provided proof that I was out of town in my response, they said I must tell them who was. Yeah, right... that's *not* my job!) Anyhow, in both instances the method I outlined above has worked for me.

And every few years, DC becomes so swamped with new ticket records that they either lose them or their recordkeeping system crashes. They declare defeat and start all over again.

This is all part of DC's attempt to impose an alternative way of stealing money from MD and VA residents since they cannot impose a commuter tax. Corrupt officials are expensive to maintain and DC needs all the money it can get. (They tend to ignore how much $$$ is spent by commuters inside the city every day. I'd love to see an absolute boycott on commuter spending - no coffee, no restaurants or bars, no sporting tickets - and predict the DC government would crumble in a month!)

Now if you have a VA ticket, that's another story altogether! Those get paid quickly!

Good luck!

(I've discussed this with VA officers who are friends, both local and above, and they agree that it's pretty much spot on.)

(Note to DC's Finest - You had a moving violation and signed the ticket, making you identifiable and acknowledging receipt. Different situation altogether.)

cpterp · 05-19-2009, 09:46 PM

What the cop did was illegal. The only thing you're required to have in DC as a non-DC resident is a license plate.

On as side note, I was looking at some info about this on wikipedia (where else?) and interestingly enough I noticed that Virginia is the only Southern state that requires a front license plate. DC and all states North except Pennsylvania, and West V. require front plates. It probably has to do with politics...