You don’t have a right to a jury trial for a traffic ticket, Utah Supreme Court rules

Stock image, St. George News

SALT LAKE CITY — The Utah Supreme Court has ruled that a traffic violation does not mean you are entitled to a right to a trial by jury.

The Court rejected a demand by Santiago Steven Maese, who faced two class C misdemeanor charges of failure to signal and failure to obey traffic control devices. According to the ruling, Maese was cited by the Utah Highway Patrol for crossing the double-white line for the HOV lane on I-15, and crossing several lanes without signaling, according to a report from Fox13Now.

Maese went to South Salt Lake’s Justice Court where prosecutors made them infractions, but he challenged their authority and insisted he be tried by a jury. He argued it was his constitutional right. But two lower courts rejected his demand.

In the Court’s ruling, Justice John Pearce wrote that a right to a jury trial is in the state’s constitution, but it’s not very clear about what offenses guarantee it.

“Although it is difficult to peer back more than one hundred years and know with great certainty the parameters of what did and did not trigger a jury trial in 1895, we know that shortly after statehood, juries were not available for some minor offenses that carried penalties of incarceration for fewer than thirty days and/or a small fine,” he wrote. “While we leave open the possibility that future cases and additional historical evidence might provide us the opportunity to refine our understanding of the scope and limitations of the right to a jury trial, we conclude that the Utah Constitution does not guarantee Maese a jury trial for his traffic violations.”

Read the full story here:  Fox13Now.com

Written by BEN WINSLOW, Fox13Now.com

Copyright 2019, KSTU. A Tribune broadcasting station

Free News Delivery by Email

Would you like to have the day's news stories delivered right to your inbox every evening? Enter your email below to start!