Two summons by a Lakewood resident has attorneys bewildered.
Several weeks ago, a Lakewood resident opened his mailbox to find a letter stating he failed to appear in court. The letter stated he had two pending tickets.
However, these alleged incidents never occurred, but the resident is having a hard time proving it.
After receiving the letter, the resident called the Howell Court to explain the mistake, but upon giving them the information, he was told that these tickets were issued by the Monmouth County Sheriff’s Office.
In a written letter, the resident explained to the court the mistake, stating these tickets don’t belong to him. The court responded that he would be offered a plea bargain deal.
Not accepting this answer and not wanting to pay for a crime he never committed, the resident had no choice but to hire an attorney.
His attorney spoke with the prosecutor, who offered him an even a better deal, but also a plea bargain.
At this point, the resident and attorneys upset about the frivolous charges submitted an OPRA request the information from the Sheriff’s office.
The OPRA request, obtained by TLS, shows the tickets as well as the license plate of the vehicle that was allegedly being driven during the incident.
Attorneys were able to track down the woman who owned this vehicle, but she said she had never lent out her vehicle, and does not know what they are referring to. She did however mention, that she had received a ticket from the Monmouth County Sheriff’s Office earlier – which could explain her vehicle in the system, allowing it to be attached to other tickets.
At this point, the tickets are still open against this innocent resident.
The question remained, who was driving the said vehicle, and how someone in Lakewood received these tickets?
Attorneys at this point believe somebody, without a license, gave a false name to police, which resulted in this innocent resident receiving the frivolous summons – and the plate entered was possibly a sloppy job by the officer.
Attorneys are hoping the court will recognize the mistake and reverse the tickets, as well as cover the victim’s legal fees.
Last year, TLS reported a similar incident, and after its publicizing was reversed by the court.
An OPRA request or subpoena should be made for the dashcam footage of the police/sheriff’s car(s) involved, as well as their body camera footage (s). That should Bsyata D’shmaya exonerate the falsely accused person. Sadly, false charges happen too often.
Maybe someone in Westgate left their keys in the car and someone borrowed their car without permission.
I am the “woman who was tracked down” and while ironically i do live in Westgate, my car was not stolen that night. (i did get a ticket by the same trooper a few minutes earier)
And I thought NYC was bad !!!! The grass isn’t greener on the other side !!!
Why am I not surprised
Sounds like a computer glitch to me
This sounds like sloppy work on behalf of the officer and now the little guy has to shell out money to exonerate himself.
I had a incident happen to me about 10 years ago. I received a call from an Insurance company asking me if i was ok and how the accident happened. I asked them what accident are they referring to. They said the 1 that my wife was involved while she was driving my car in Howell ( I’m not married ). I said you must have the wrong number or the wrong information because I’m not married and my vehicle was not involved in an accident. They insisted that they had the correct info so i asked them to send me a copy of the police report. They sent it over to me. It did have my information including my drivers license number so that info was correct but the rest of it was not since the vehicle was not mine and I didn’t recognize the people who were listed as involved in the accident. The police report was from Howell so i called Howell PD and spoke to a supervisor regarding it. He said he was going to speak to the officer who did the report. Long story short, i had gotten a speeding ticket in Howell almost 15 years ago so i was in their system. My name is the same name as the owner of the vehicle that was involved in the accident that his wife was driving. The officer just clicked on the first 1 that popped up without verifying that it was the correct one. I actually got a call back from the officer himself apologizing and saying it was going to be corrected right away.
I received a ticket for disregarding an officers traffic directions in a north jersey town I’ve never been to.
I called the court and told them I can prove with my Google timeline that I wasn’t there that day.
They said to come to court and fight it.
I just paid the 65 dollars instead of wasting my day.
Point is, the officer saw a car and didn’t see the license plate clearly so I ended up with a ticket.