Legal Review: Excessive Speeding in Chesapeake and Virginia Beach Over Holiday Weekends

The Virginia State Police are cracking down on speeding, and they want citizens to be aware. On Monday, the state police posted numerous photos on Twitter of speeding tickets that they wrote over the 4th of July holiday weekend.

The tickets might shock some people who consider themselves safe drivers. For example, one officer caught someone driving 134 mph in an area where the speed limit was 60 mph. That’s 74 mph over the speed limit and considered reckless driving. Two of the other tickets posted included someone driving 120 mph in a 55 mph zone in Virginia Beach and another person driving 106 mph in a 70 mph zone in Botetourt County.

All of the drivers are scheduled for traffic court appearances in August.

Warning Citizens About Dangerous Driving

The goal in posting the images is to warn drivers across Virginia that Virginia State Police are taking speeding seriously and making them aware of dangerous drivers on the roads where they live.

Unfortunately, the speeds they saw over the holiday weekend were not out of the ordinary. While they did catch a high number of drivers speeding, the state police have noted that troopers stop people going at these types of speeds every day.

The police want drivers to be more aware that speeding can lead to deadly accidents and reiterate that there is no need to speed on their roadways.

Reckless Driving Putting Citizens at Risk

One Virginia state trooper said that a man died on I-664 in Hampton on Friday. He was speeding when he came up behind completely stopped traffic. The man, named Kevin Riddick, swerved his car to avoid hitting others. In the process, he hit a barrier, and his vehicle overturned multiple times, eventually throwing him from the car.

I-564 is another road where state troopers see speeding fairly often. One area of the road, a straightaway, is a common spot. One of the drivers pulled over on the holiday weekend was going 131 mph in this spot, when the speed limit is 55 mph. According to state police, immediately after making that stop, the same trooper stopped another driver going 94 mph.

Reckless driving does more than put dangerous drivers themselves at risk. Others on the road can quickly end up in accidents because of them. One citizen said she almost always sees a car flying past her during her commute.

Virginia State Police Hoping to Keep Roadways Safe

Police hope that posting the images will bring more people’s attention to the importance of slowing down.

“Reckless driving is considered a crime in Virginia, and many drivers do not realize they can be charged with reckless driving when they are speeding,” says Virginia criminal defense attorney Karin Riley Porter of Price Benowitz Accident Injury Lawyers, LLP.

According to Virginia law, driving over 20 miles above the speed limit or over 80 miles per hour can result in being charged with a Class 1 misdemeanor. Keep in mind that this is regardless of the speed limit on any particular road. This kind of offense could warrant fines and even jail time. Often, the punishment will be more severe the faster the driver was going.

To keep Virginia’s roadways safe, state police are keeping close tabs on roads across the state and hoping to encourage drivers to step off the gas and be more careful.