So, this is one of those “abusive drivers”?

So, tell me again how those abusive driver fees won’t get applied to people who aren’t habitual offenders?

Jessica Hodges was on her way to the hospital with labor pains when she got stopped for speeding. She thought she had a pretty good excuse, but the law didn’t see it that way.

The 26-year-old bank teller from Hodges became one of the first people slapped with Virginia’s new “abusive driver” fees. She was ordered to pay $1,050 on top of a $100 fine and court costs. 

This was one of the concerns I had about these fees when I wrote about them a couple of weeks ago. Our reps in the General Assembly and others have said that first-time offenders weren’t going to get hit with them but that’s getting disproven at a remarkably fast clip. Perhaps the law needs to actually contain language to that effect so first-time offenders really don’t get hit with them.