Plea-Deal Limits Proposed

By Michael Mansur, The Kansas City Star, Mo.

Mar. 18–Sweeping changes were proposed Friday for Kansas City’s traffic court system that once allowed violators to bargain down speeding and other offenses multiple times each year.

City Attorney Galen Beaufort recommended that fleeing police, DUIs and other serious non-speeding tickets no longer would be pleaded down to “defective-equipment” charges. The defective equipment deals allow defendants to avoid points on their driving records and escape insurance rate hikes.

Beaufort also recommended limiting defective equipment pleas in Kansas City Municipal Court to only one per calendar year, and no longer requiring defendants to hire an attorney to get the break on traffic tickets.

“I’m not comfortable at all with a defective-equipment (plea) for DUIs,” Beaufort told Mayor Kay Barnes’ newly formed task force on traffic safety.

He also proposed that all plea agreements for speeding be reduced to “speeding less than 5 mph over the posted speed limit,” rather than a defective-equipment plea, which Beaufort said is “too much a fiction.” In addition, he suggested increasing the current $157 fee for avoiding points to $192, and requiring all plea agreements to be made before a judge.

Beaufort will have the final say on whether the proposals are implemented in coming weeks. But defense attorneys must be heard first, said Karl Zobrist, task force chairman.

Attorneys Coulter de Vries, Phil Cardarella and others had lobbied Zobrist during the meeting to be included on the task force, arguing that the group had too little knowledge about how the municipal court system functioned.

The attorneys maintain that the current system generally works well, benefiting defendants and generating additional revenues for the city. They said some of Beaufort’s proposals limit prosecutorial discretion and may be unworkable.

For example, reducing a speeding ticket to speeding less than 5 mph still would appear on a driver’s record as a moving violation, even though it carries no points. As a result, some drivers may be unwilling to accept such a plea agreement.

De Vries noted that many non-speeding charges are pleaded down to defective-equipment because prosecutors know they will have difficulty proving the charges if the case goes before a judge. One of the six DUIs reduced to a defective-equipment plea last year involved one of his clients, de Vries said.

A city prosecutor only agreed to reduce the charge after de Vries said he showed that officers had not acted properly during the traffic stop. So the prosecutor reduced the charge in exchange for a $500 fine, he said.

“The city got $500 that it probably wouldn’t have gotten,” de Vries said.

City Prosecutor Beth Murano issued a statement Friday to the task force indicating that the six DUIs reduced to defective-equipment pleas in 2005 were because of problems involving evidence.

“The prosecutors were able to negotiate a plea bargain that resulted in fines and/or probation for the defendant where otherwise the case may have been dismissed,” Murano wrote.

In January, The Kansas City Star reported that Municipal Court was more lenient than most other traffic courts in the metropolitan area.

A computer analysis of the court’s records at that time showed that of roughly 30,000 defective-equipment pleas, nearly 250 defendants received three or more. One received as many as six.

Beaufort later placed a moratorium on granting such pleas until he studied the matter. Barnes then added the issue to those being examined by the traffic safety task force, which also will consider installing cameras at intersections to catch red-light runners.

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To reach Michael Mansur, call (816)234-4433 or send e-mail to mmansur@kcstar.com .

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