Man caught speeding 35mph over limit slapped with $1.4M ticket
A driver in Georgia will almost definitely think twice about speeding in the future after he was slapped with a $1.4 million fine for driving 35mph over the limit.
Being hit with a fine for bad driving is always going to be annoying - proving that it's a good way to learn your lesson - but Connor Cato felt that more than most after he was pulled over in Savannah, Georgia last month.
Cato had been traveling in a 55mph zone at a hefty 90mph, so it's really no surprise that a cop was quickly on his tail.
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Speaking to WSAV-TV, Cato admitted that he knew he was going to get a ticket, but he never anticipated just how much the fine would be.
The driver was slapped with the seven-figure fine of $1.4 million - not exactly the type of cash you have saved for a rainy day.
Cato was convinced the figure must have been some sort of typo, so he called the court in a bid to clear things up.
Unfortunately for Cato, the court only confirmed the number.
“‘$1.4 million,’ the lady told me on the phone," Cato recalled. "I said, ‘This might be a typo’ and she said, ‘No sir, you either pay the amount on the ticket or you come to court on Dec. 21 at 1:30 p.m'."
Criminal defense attorney Sneh Patel was just as shocked as Cato, telling the local outlet: "Not $1.4 million — that’s something that goes into cases that are drug trafficking, murders or aggravated assaults, something of that nature."
When WSAV-TV contacted the Savannah Records Court, it was told that such fines are common practice in the Savannah area to make sure 'super speeders' appear in court.
A 'super speeder' is anyone caught driving more than 35 miles over the speed limit.
However, Cato won't actually have to find $1.4 million to hand over.
Joshua Peacock, a spokesperson for Savannah’s city government, explained that the figure is generated by e-citation software used by the local Recorder’s Court and is automatically applied to super speeders.
The real fine, which cannot exceed $1,000, plus state-mandated costs, will be set by the judge at Cato's mandatory court appearance.
“We do not issue that placeholder as a threat to scare anybody into court, even if this person heard differently from somebody in our organization,” Peacock said in a statement.
“The programmers who designed the software used the largest number possible because super speeder tickets are a mandatory court appearance and do not have a fine amount attached to them when issued by police.”
Peacock added that the city has been using the system since 2017, but it is 'currently working on adjusting the placeholder language to avoid any confusion'.
Emily Brown