On July 1st, Floridians will be subjected to a new statewide law that will allow police officers to pull them over and write them a $114 ticket if they determine that the music playing from their vehicle can be heard from over 25 feet away.
"Some of these stereos that are playing out there are so loud that they're actually dangerous," said Lieutenant Mike Crabb (of the Orange County Sheriff's Office). "The average vehicle is about 18 feet long, so that kinda gives you an idea, if I'm even two cars behind you, I'm at least 36 feet [behind the driver]...We're not trying to target somebody who's just trying to listen to music and have a good time."
Despite Lieutenant Crabb's assurances, many have already begun to question the fairness of the procedure that leads up to the would-be citation, largely because of technicality issues and how subjective a determination can be without the benefit of a device that can clearly decipher/prove exactly how loud someone's music is or exactly who's car it was coming from, in various instances where there is a lot of traffic around. Either way, starting next week, the act of violating this newly instituted law will be viewed as a noncriminal traffic infraction, which will allow for law enforcement to dish out a nonmoving violation in response.
Source: Wesh
