The town is small and so is the store. That particuliar day, my husband (who is a 100 percent disabled veteran) wanted to ride with me. He asked me to stop inside the stripmall and let him out. He needed to stretch his leg as it and his back was killing him. He wanted to walk around and being a victim suffering from spiinal stenosis could not sit or ride for any distance without some relief.
He is 100 percent disabled for PTSD as well. He can become very disoriented at times, especially when in pain.
I told him I would park at the DV space in front of the store. He indicated he may walk to the next door motel to
see our daughter who was working there at the time. I indicated I had rather he not as I would not be that long in the store.
I pointed where I would be and parked. We have a government issue tag that clearly states DV1234 (example).
It is part of his VA benefit that he receives a tag indicating the vehicle is entitled to handicapped parking.
The vehicle is in both our names. The tag is on our main passenger vehicle. As the 4 year old and I approach the
car, a city policeman riding on his bike is circuling my car. I have no groceries and get in the car. I look around for my husband when the bike cop asks me for my license. This annoys me. First, I am looking for hubby and second, why he is looking at my car? I asked why?
He says, What is your disability? You look healthy to me. This is clearly against the law regarding the ADA
of 1990. I remind the cop of that but explain the car is legally tagged and my husband was a disabled veteran. he then asks where my husband is. "I reply and not very compliant, I do not have a clue but he is around here somewhere". I pull out the cell phone and try to call home, in case he had called home. No answer. I did not figure he had. I tell the cop that I need to go look for him and he says, No he is supposed to be in the car with you. He preceded to write me a ticket and that is where it begins to get testy.
I tell the cop that he is wrong. I had every right to park in a spot where my husband could find easily and did not deserve a ticket. Now it was the principle of the thing. He asks the color of my eyes. He has my license but I didn't remember if it was on the license. I look straight at him and said, "Figure it out". He asks if my hair color is my natural hair color. I did not answer.
He asks for my cell phone number. I asked why? He told me to move the car. I said. No. He tells me again..Move the car as he hands me the ticket. I am furious. I don't see my husband and I just got a ticket.
I drive around the parking lot over and over and stil do not see my husband. I drive to a spot and park the car and look and still do not see husband. I get out of the car and start walking with a 4 year old the strip mall of about 7 stores. I finally see my husband who is looking around where I last parked and the space is empty and he is holding on to a buggy rail almost ready to fall. I get in the car and he is furious. Why had I not been where I said I would be? I explain the ticket and he wants to go down to the police dept. I drive there and
he demands to see the officer. He is basically dismissed and they finally call the officer to the station. He explains that he had been let out and we were properly parked. The cop tells him, well she said you may be at the motel, maybe I should arrest her for lying to a police officer. My mouth flew open. He said, "My wife is not my keeper and she just knew I had to walk around and did not know where I was". He then asks to see a Capt. Parker who again says to my husband, "Well, you were not in the car
when the ticket was issued and you don't look disabled !"
I cannot believe they are breaking the Federal law in this respect as some disabilities are invisible. Cancer comes to mind. PTSD. COPD. Traumatic Brain Injury. All of these things come to mind. We state we are not paying the ticket. I have my mind made up and this was a fight now for the disabled and handicap parking. the bicycle cop says something smart as we are leaving and my husband calls him a punk. He is older than my husband but that didn't matter. We walk out.
This was not about the money but about justice for the disabled. I talk to a friend of mine who husband is also a disabled veteran and she said back last summer she got a ticket from the same cop at walmart and paid a 15.00 ticket. She said, "He is going to run into the wrong vet one of these days and they will wrap that bike around his neck". I knew now I had to do something. She was right.
I called a friend of mine who had owned a local newspaper but his son had been killed in Iraq and he longer owned the paper but knew almost everyone in town. He was on his way to Orlando and knew of my advoccy. We never got along politically but were good friends otherwise. He is a staunch republican but politics did not get in either of our ways as far as veterans couldn't and I could not having a 501 C let politics influence me regarding veterans.
He is mad. He tells me that is ridiculous and he said, Good grief, Amanda, did he want to ticket you or get a date, with those questions? he preceded to call the mayor about the business practices of the Villa Rica Police Dept.
Neither of us called the Chief of Police. A week later, I called the mayor and he said he would meet with the City manager and I told him I would provide him a letter and a copy of the law regarding Ga parking and disabilities.
I called the DMV and they say, I had a right to park in the space.
I know many abuse the handicap parking zone but what is the good of it, if the elderly and disabled veterans who were properly tagged or permitted were getting tickets.
Sure enough...three weeks later I see this cop harrassing
another person to move their car and now I have a phone with video capablities and I take a video and then go interview the woman with three children at the same parking lot after she moves her car. Her Mother who is handicapped was inside grocery shopping and she was told since it was so close to Christmas he would not give her a ticket but move the car. The car was properly tagged.
I then take a pic of the tag.
I go to traffic court and ask for a jury trial. I then hired an attorney on behalf of this injustice and he agrees to defend me as he is a vet and a dang good lawyer and magistrate judge. He is our personal attorney. They try to set the court calender up in front of a state judge and he protests and demands a juryI trial. The fine for me by the way was 150.00. Again I say, this was not about the money but the stopping of this practice of squeezing people for a dollar and injustice. They are ticketing people that are on fixed incomes. Greed and discrimination plain and simple. The solicitor sends my attorney a letter yesterday stating that the officers had
responded and the cops lied. They stated that my husband created a scene and approached the mayor (and trust me, he does not fight my battles) approached the chief of police,had offered to pay the fine until he found out the price. This was all a lie. My husband would not know the mayor if he saw him in our living room or the chief of police. My husband did feel bad about calling the guy a punk, as he tries to live his faith and he and my son shortly after the whole thing began, went down and apologized for name calling and said he still had not intentions of paying the fine. I would not go down and apologize for anything but he is a better Christian than me. Yesterday when I got the city's rebuttal, I told thim, "This is what you got for retracting calling the cop a punk" and he went into a rage about the lies. My son who is almost 18 said, "That is a lie". He enver talked to anyone but that one captain and said he should not have called the bike cop a punk and said he still wouldn't pay the fine.
This has gone beyond just angry for me. His PTSD is worse
now and I called my attorney and said, Get it on the calender and he agreed to fight this clear to the supreme court if necessary for the disabled. I found out recently of another disabled person (wife of disabled) getting a ticket and they paid 75.00.
This is going to jury trial and then I plan on suing the City.
Anyone know someone, who wants an interview regarding the discimination of our disabled and veterans in small town America? I will gladly speak to anyone.
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