29 february?

a friend of mine is in a dilemna (is that the right spelling?). hope you guys can help him out. some advise or suggestion.

now, it had been the habit of my friend to park illegally (yep, that’s right, you heard me, illegally) on a double line in front of amcorp mall, pj (opposite the taman jaya LRT station). he said he usually does this as he will be a while only, to run into the building and get something done quick, and so far he had not been booked.

however, his luck run dry yesterday – 1 march 2006 (1/3/06). he saw a parking ticket on his car. “oh no” he said “finally i’m caught”. actually he didn’t said that. i dramatise a bit. 🙂

he grabbed the ticket to see how much fine he had to pay… and something caught his eyes. the date! the date on the summon was written as ’29/2/06′. 29/2? 29 february? what the @!%^$&! (no, he didn’t cursed, me dramatise again). yesterday was 1/4/061/3/06 lah – 1 march… a day after 28 february, and february has only 28 days (at least not for leap year).

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what happened? the policeman who wrote the ticket dreamng? he thought there is a 29 february? gila! ya, me said he was gila. 🙂

my friend was wondering what to do with the summon. the date does not exist, so how will the date tally with the computer (all summons issued are keyed in computer, right). should he pay the fine or ignore the summon? the summon was issued on a non-existent date, therefore the offence can be consider as not happened at all! no such date, where got such offence?

anyway, it seemed that he had asked a few lawyers, and the lawyers had advised him to tear and throw the summon away – in other words forget about it. of course my friend is scared that if he throw the summon away, what if one day the police kacau and said he didn’t pay his summon and don’t want to let him renew his road tax. his lawyer friends said in that case, then take the police to court.

ok, boys and girls, story end. now my opinion.

first of all i ‘lectured’ my friend. haha. why he parked illegally in the first place. using the same old excuse of “i’ll be a while only”. hmph! when i blog about cars blocking my chaly (more than once!), some of those cars too said the same thing “i’ll be a while only”. a while or not a while, the fact is you are parking illegally, and you can’t expect that during that ‘a while’ time, nobody would want to move out/in (for my case). for my friend’s case, he should have known that anytime during those ‘a while’ time, a police might walked by.

secondly i marveled at how a traffic police can make such a stupid mistake. 29 feb.? i wonder than did he issued other summons on that same day to others with the 29 feb. date too.

i told my friend since his lawyer friends had advised him to forget about the summon, then maybe he should take thier advise as after all they are lawyers and should know better. however, when i heard my friend mentioned that his lawyer friends said later on if the police insist he did not pay that summon, he can take the police to court, it suddenly dawned on me = “take the police to court”? ah, doesn’t that need a lawyer? ahhh… see, the shrewdness of his lawyer friends! (but if your friends are not like this type, my apology ok).

well, one of my suggestion to my friend is to ask him why not check with the police station (or was it JPJ?). bring the summon to the police and asked them why the non-existent date. er… but… will this means for sure he has to pay the summon? the police will said alamak mistake lah and change the date, and poor him has to pay.

i don’t know as i am no expert in this field, and also am not a motorist myself (just a ‘chalyist‘). what do you guys think? any advise you can offer?