(A) Issuance of citation tags.
(1) The Chief of Police is hereby authorized and directed to supply police officers with citation tags in sets, each set consisting of an original and at least two duplicate copies, for the purpose of giving notice to persons violating any provision of this title.
(2) Notice may be given by delivering the tags to the violator or by affixing it to the vehicle involved in the violation.
(3) Each citation tag shall direct the violator to appear and to present such tag at a designated place on or before a date and hour specified thereon.
(4) Nothing in this division (A) shall be construed to abridge the power of a police officer to arrest any violator and take him or her into custody.
(B) Failure to obey citation. It is unlawful and an offense for any person to violate his or her written promise to appear, given to an officer upon the issuance of a traffic citation regardless of the disposition of the charge for which citation was originally issued.
(C) Failure to comply with citation attached to parked vehicle. If a violator of the restrictions on stopping, standing or parking under the traffic laws or ordinances does not appear in response to a traffic citation affixed to such motor vehicle within a period of five days, the Clerk of the Municipal Court may send to the owner of the motor vehicle to which the traffic citation was affixed a letter informing him or her of the violation and warning him or her that in the event such letter is disregarded for a period of five days, a warrant of arrest may be issued. On any occasion where two or more such traffic citations have been affixed on the same motor vehicle and the traffic citations have been disregarded, a warrant of arrest may be issued without sending the letter provided in this section.
(D) Presumption in reference to illegal parking.
(1) In any prosecution charging a violation of any law or regulation governing the standing or parking of a vehicle, proof that the particular vehicle described in the complaint was parked in violation of any law or regulation, together with proof that the defendant named in the complaint was at the time of the parking the registered owner of the vehicle, shall constitute in evidence a prima facie presumption that the registered owner of the vehicle was the person who parked or placed the vehicle at the point where, and for the time during which, the violation occurred.
(2) The presumption in division (D)(1) of this section shall apply only when the procedure as prescribed in this chapter has been followed.
(E) Illegal to cancel or solicit traffic citations. It is unlawful for any person to cancel or solicit the cancellation of any traffic citation in any manner other than is provided by this chapter.
(F) Records of citations, warrants, complaints.
(1) Every police officer, upon issuing a traffic citation to an alleged violator of any provision of the motor vehicle laws of this state or any traffic law of the city, shall deposit the original and a duplicate copy of the citation with his or her immediate superior officer, who shall cause the original to be delivered to the municipal court.
(2) Upon the filing of the original citation in the municipal court, the citation may be disposed of only by trial in the court or by other official action by a judge of the court, including forfeiture of bail or by payment of a fine.
(3) The Chief of Police shall maintain a record of all warrants issued by the municipal court which are delivered to the Police Department for service, and of the final disposition of the warrants.
(4) No member of the Police Department or other officer or public employee shall dispose of, alter, or deface a traffic citation or any copy thereof, or the record of the issuance or disposition of any traffic citation, complaint, or warrant, in a manner other than as required in this chapter.
(G) Court records; abstract sent to state.
(1) The municipal judge shall keep a record of every traffic citation deposited with or presented to the court and shall keep a record of every official action by the court or its traffic violations bureau in reference thereto, including, but not limited to, a record of every conviction, forfeiture of bail, judgment of acquittal, and the amount of fine or forfeiture.
(2) Within ten days after the conviction or forfeiture of bail of a person upon a charge of violating any provision of this chapter or other law regulating the operation of vehicles on highways, the municipal judge or Clerk of the Court in which the conviction was had or bail was forfeited shall prepare and immediately forward to the State Department of Public Safety a certified abstract of the court’s record of the case. An abstract need not be made of any conviction involving the illegal parking or standing of a vehicle.
(3) The abstract must be made upon a form furnished by the State Department of Public Safety and shall include the name and address of the party charged, the number of his or her operator’s or chauffeur’s license, the registration number of the vehicle involved, the nature of the offense, the date of hearing, the plea, the judgment, whether bail was forfeited, and the amount of the fine or forfeiture.
(Prior Code, § 6-2-12)