What happens if I don&#39;t pay a speeding ticket from New Mexico? What happens if I don't pay a speeding ticket and am a foreigner? I recently found out, since it is not my native language, that it wasn't just a warning - it was actually a ticket.
The exact situation depends on where you are. If you are in Washington state, what you get (but did not realize) is a notice to appear in court. By not paying the fine or showing up to court, you could be subject to RCW 46.64.025, so that the department of licensing is notified. You have 15 days to respond to the notice. We assume that you are a resident, because if you are a non-resident (and not resident of another state with a reciprocal agreement), they would have required you to pay a bond at the time of the ticket (though that isn't possible with automated infraction-detection). When the Dept. of Licensing gets the notice of the unpaid ticket, they may suspend or revoke your license. At this point, you will have received notice that your license was suspended (unless you changed your address and mail isn't forwarded, in which case you have a different problem, that you're supposed to apprise DOL of your current address, and didn't do so). At that point (after they send the letter), you have 15 days to respond. One response is to pay the ticket plus the added fines, or, you can request an administrative review (to appeal the suspension). The point of going to court to plead your case would presumably be to modify the judgment against you, for instance to reduce or eliminate the added fine. You would then need to give a good reason for not being punished: RCW 46.64.025 already has you covered, because the suspension process starts with willfully failing to appear. You would then need to show that your failure to appear was not willful. It does not legally matter whether you are a foreigner or have problems understanding the language. Speeding tickets usually say pretty clearly that you must pay the ticket within a specified time frame, or appear in court, but people don't always read tickets. It is entirely plausible that one's grasp of the language is low enough that there really was a misunderstanding. If you can provide credible evidence that your failure was not willful, by law you would only be liable for the ticket. In other states and countries, the situation could be somewhat or quite different (e.g. Norwegian traffic laws are stricter). In New Mexico, it is more serious to fail to appear. NM Statute 66-8-126 states that "It is a misdemeanor for any person to violate his written promise to appear in court, given to an officer upon issuance of a uniform traffic citation, regardless of the disposition of the charge for which the citation was issued". Your license can/will be suspended (it is not clear whether suspension is automatic), but additionally since failure to appear is a misdemeanor, you can be arrested. Unlike Washington law, there is no willfullness requirement for such a penalty. Given the criminal nature of failure to appear, a traffic attorney would need to suggest an appropriate belated response.
"I don't recall" will protect you from perjury only if it's true. Let me try an example. You're asked: "Did Mr. Blatter hand you an envelope full of cash?" You say: "Not to my recollection." Now the government introduces a videotape of you receiving and counting the money, and a thank-you note you wrote to Blatter saying "Thanks for the awesome bribe!" You can defend yourself from perjury charges if you can convince the finder of fact that you had forgotten all of those things...but it's not very likely, is it? "I don't recall" isn't a magic bullet. It's like any other statement: it's perjury unless it's true.
This recently came up in a local PA homeowner association. Legally they own the roads in their development, but they have erected stop signs to make it clear who has the right of way and asked the township police to enforce them. A resident challenged the right of the police to enforce traffic laws on private property, but lost his appeal (albeit at the municipal level). The judge explained that the residents and any visitors had a reasonable expectation that the traffic signs would be obeyed, and that therefore violating them was just as dangerous as violating them on public roads, and that the same law and penalties would therefore be applied.
Being misunderstood is not a crime. You could concoct scenarios where any number of statements could be a crime if interpreted unfairly. "I went to Georgia last weekend." "I choose to believe you mean the country instead of the state, and you don't have a passport, therefore you admitted that you went to a foreign country illegally!" The police would be free to investigate, but they wouldn't be able to get a warrant or arrest him based just on an ambiguous statement, let alone obtain a conviction. Of course, if the younger sister decided to accuse him, and the older sister decided to lie about having a relationship with him, that puts the statement in a whole other context - but if someone is falsely accusing you and someone else corroborates their story, you're probably in trouble no matter how exactly that came about.
england-and-wales What would realistically happen to this person, legally speaking? Nothing The most common speeding offence is at section 89(1) of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 A person who drives a motor vehicle on a road at a speed exceeding a limit imposed by or under any enactment to which this section applies shall be guilty of an offence. And, section 1(1)(c) of the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988 requires a Notice of Intended Prosecution (NIP) be served to the car’s registered keeper within 14 days of the offence, but as the car had false plates there is no way to identify who this was. If that 14 day deadline is not met, then the driver cannot be prosecuted regardless of any confession.
When you refer to customs, that necessarily denotes travel to a foreign county, such that each county will have their own laws, rules, and regulations that govern these issues. It is more than likely that if you refuse to answer the questions of customs officials in ANY country, you will be denied admittance. The same is true if you refuse or balk at being searched (personally or your possessions), and keep in mind that this is without reasonable suspicion or probable cause. The best thing to do is to answer the questions honestly and accurately, but also as narrowly as possible to completely answer. Trying to argue with them will only send up red flags and you will be there longer. Remember it is a privilege, not a right, to enter a sovereign nation of which you are not a citizen. For example, in the U.S., customs reserves the right to detain for questioning, search you, your car, your children, your bags, packages, purse/wallet, or any other travel item with full legal authority to do sol they can even examine your electronics (content and hardware). You place your stuff on the exam station and open it. (After the exam is completed, you will be asked to repack and close the baggage.) If you are unhappy with the way you are being treated, you do have the right to ask to speak to a CBP supervisor, but I cannot see anything good coming of it, unless they were super rude without provocation or broke something of value. The authority to delay and speak with travelers derives from the United States Code (section citations below) enables CBP to prevent the entry of persons who are inadmissible under the Immigration and Nationality Act, and to prevent the smuggling of merchandise, including narcotics and other contraband items, into the United States. Speaking with travelers and examining merchandise coming into or leaving the United States is just one of the mechanisms used to identify illegal or prohibited items, and to determine whether or not someone is trying to enter the U.S. for unlawful or fraudulent purposes. Unless exempt by diplomatic status, all travelers entering the United States, including U.S. citizens, are subjected to routine Customs examinations. At times, people make the mistake of thinking their civil rights are being violated by being asked questions about their trip, personal background and history, etc. That is not the case. Supreme Court decisions have upheld the doctrine that CBP's search authority is unique and does not violate the fourth amendment's protection against unreasonable searches and seizures. U.S. Customs website has a detailed Q&amp;A section. Most modern countries do as well.
at what point can you just leave? Is it always technically illegal in the UK to leave without paying the bill? Probably depends on what you mean with just leaving. If just leaving translates I haven't paid and I won't pay (because of the hassle with the card) then that's probably Making Off Without Payment, section 3 Theft Act 1978 (Thanks @bdsl). Could the restaurant just force you to wait until close of business if necessary? What if they still hadn't fixed the payment system by then? I don't think a restaurant can physically detain you. Not even the 45 min you have been waiting. But if you leave without paying and without an agreement with them how &amp; when to pay they can of course call the police because again that looks very much like making off without payment. According to your post, they did provide a payment system (cash) which was working all the time and that moreover has the special status of being legal tender. if you don't physically have the cash on you, you can be sued? You can be sued if you don't pay your bill (assuming the bill itself is correct) when it's due. In order to avoid endless hassle of the "I tried to pay via x, but they wouldn't accept this." type, legal tender defines ways of payment of a debt that the creditor/seller must accept. In many legislations, cash in the local currency provides such a fallback if other payment methods fail. Note that cash payment is very robust against internet failure, broken devices and power The UK (+ US) meaning of legal tender is that the restaurant must accept this means of settling the debt (at this time, the food is already eaten but not payed) - but they don't have to accept any other means of payment. (Note that e.g. for the EUR-countries there is at least a recommendation to make acceptance of legal tender mandatory also in retail, which includes simultaneous exchange food vs. payment). The 2nd important implication of this is that any argumentation along the lines that no reasonable means of payment were available would be very weak. You are not required to have sufficient cash with you to pay your bill if you can reasonably assume that some other way of payment will be acceptable to the restaurant. I see that like a spare wheel for a car: if you have a flat tire (card doesn't work) having a spare wheel (cash) allows you to deal with the issue with less hassle than if you don't: change your wheel vs. having to get your car brought to a workshop and wait until they put on a new tire (pay cash instead of waiting for the card to work again or a tedious hunt for another payment method). I'd like to point out that card doesn't work and not sufficient cash at hand (or forgotten purse) is something that happens quite often in general (rarely for any given transaction, but we have lots of transactions). I'd expect a restaurant or a gas station to be experienced in dealing with that. In any case, there are several possibilities to resolve the issue short of "just leaving": The key to all this is communication: talk to the restaurant to find a way to resolve the issue. Reassure them that you're not trying to use the opportunity to defraud them - that's what they are afraid of in this situation. "Where can I find an ATM?" Possibly offering a deposit: "And would you mind looking after my bag [phone] until I'm back?" Possibly showing them your ID card (or similar, if you have any) so they have your address: remember that so far you are an anonymous customer for them: which means that suing you for the money would be somewhere between too expensive and impossible. If you are a group, it should be sufficient if only one of you leaves in search of cash. Credit cards can be charged in a total offline way (MOTO = mail order/telephone order) where the credit card data is entered manually by the seller: the restaurant may be able to charge your credit card if fill in a paper credit card payment form. They may accept settlement via other payment systems: paypal &amp; Co. wire the money via your online banking account (even if that doesn't give an instantaneous transfer, ask them if that's OK with them if you show/forward them the "transfer accepted message" for now) allow them to withdraw the money from your account via direct debit or something similar I'd not expect a restaurant to accept this possibility as they're probably not familiar with it and it means a lot of hassle for them with their bank to get listed to receive money that way. if you are in a region where cheques are still in regular use, that may be a solution as well. Restaurants like any other business can write invoices. They usually don't like this because their risk of having costly trouble to get the money is high. While your printout bill is technically an invoice already, it can be turned into an invoice (+ copy for them) giving your name + address and specifying how and when you'll pay. Which would keep track of how you (pl. = you + restaurant) decided to settle the bill under the peculiar circumstances. This works even in case of e.g. a power outage that prevents you from getting cash from an ATM in the neighborhood.
What could be the consequences of this wedding? They would be married For example, if they break up and end their PACS in France, would they still be officially married in the USA? Yes, and also in France. And if after that they marry other partners, could this be a problem for them when applying for an American visa? Yes, bigamy is illegal in both the USA and France. Does France and the USA exchange information on wedding of foreign citizens on their soil? Don't know, probably not. Could they even end up being officially married in France even without doing any paperwork themselves? Most definitely. France recognises US marriages so they would be married in France (and the U.K., and Australia, and Germany, and ...). This is true even if the French government doesn't know they are married.