There's a driver's case that entered court in Speyer, and it concluded yesterday. SWR (public TV, regional) covered the story.
I had briefly discussed this about two months ago....the professional executive driver (from Italy), who'd been driving for a long while, and got stopped by the cops.
His chief problem was that he was 'working' in Germany, and still carried the Italian license, which had long since expired. The cops validated the number of 'drives' with the onboard system....added up the points, and came to 373 points (a hell of a lot).
The court situation? Well, they confiscated his executive transport vehicle, and sentenced the guy to 8 months in prison. Yes, it is a bit of a severe sentence, and likely to be challenged in court. If the onboard system hadn't recorded the 'drives', the court would not have been able to reach the 373 points or the prison requirement.
All of this brings up the German point system for driving issues. If you discussed this with most Germans, they'd admit over a 30-year period that they might have racked up five to eight points.....mostly for speeding. The key feature of the German point system is the limited nature of the points. For most of the one-point episodes, there's a 2.5 year limitation....meaning that it goes away eventually.
A serious infraction (creating an accident with extremely bad decisions)? A 3-pointer, and that could be around for 10 years.
Here's the thing, once you reach the scale limit of 8 points, that license is gone for six months minimum, and you can figure some remedial driving course required (figure 1,500 Euro minimum).
This Italian guy? I'm guessing that he's sitting there in the prison and fellow inmates are asking what kind of criminal he is, and he responds that he's a professional driver. And they will sit there amazed.....over the limited nature of his crime.
No comments:
Post a Comment