Should California Have Banned Checking Smartphone Maps While Driving? 433
Nerval's Lobster writes "According to an appellate court in California, checking your smartphone while driving your Volkswagen (or any other vehicle) is officially verboten. In January 2012, one Steven R. Spriggs was pulled over and cited for checking a map on his smartphone while driving. In a trial held four months later, Spriggs disputed that his action violated California's Section 23123 subdivision (a), which states that a person can't use a phone while driving unless 'that telephone is specifically designed and configured to allow hands-free driving and talking, and is used in that manner while driving.' In short, he argued that the statute was limited to those functions of listening and talking—things he insisted could have been followed to the letter of the law. But the judge ruled that operating a phone for GPS, calling, texting, or whatever else was still a distraction and allowed the conviction to stand. That leads to a big question: with everything from Google Glass to cars' own dashboard screens offering visual 'distractions' like dynamic maps, can (and should) courts take a more active role in defining what people are allowed to do with technology behind the wheel? Or are statutes like California's hopelessly outdated?"
Re:Bad Ruling (Score:4, Informative)
It might help to read the decision, http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/documents/JAD13-02.PDF
The court closely analyzes the legislative intent.
Re:Bad Ruling (Score:5, Informative)
The judge is only allowed to look at the relevant law, and decide whether a given set of circumstances meets that or not. In this case, the judge is not over-stepping.
Did you actually read the law? Here's the primary prohibitive statement from that law:
Was the defendant using a device to write, send or read a text-based communication? No. Therefore, he cannot be guilty of violation of this section of the law. Period. End of consideration.
But he was doing something with text, right? Here's the relevant definition of "text-based communication":
Was he communicating with a person? No. He does not meet the definition of "text-based communication". Not guilty.
The law, as written, doesn't account for other uses of a phone, possibly owing to the fact that the people who wrote it didn't have the modern phone in mind when they wrote it. The law is out of date,
Now I know you didn't read the law. It was amended effective Jan. 1, 2013. That's three months ago, plus a few days. That's what you call "out of date"? You don't think they had "modern phones" four months ago? Maybe 12 months when they wrote the law or the amendments? I know, it is California, but I think they have reasonably modern technology available there. After all, we're talking about someone using a GPS in a phone, in California.
The judge is only there to apply those laws, not question their sanity, relevance, or modernity.
The law clearly covers text-based communication. This person did not perform text-based communication. When a judge says "well, text-based communication is against the law because it is distracting, and using a GPS is distracting too, so this law clearly covers using a GPS..." he's flat out wrong. He's writing law, not interpreting it. The legislature could easily have amended this law last year to include all kinds of things AND CHOSE NOT TO. And clearly the goal was not to keep everyone from touching a phone while driving, since the law allows touching the phone while driving.
Re:The law does seem to be out of date, yes... (Score:4, Informative)
I read a different version of this tale earlier today. In that version, it mentioned that the driver in question was stuck in a traffic jam and not actually moving.
People say all kinds of things about court cases, depending on which side they support. I've looked at the court documentation, and being stationary, whether in a jam or otherwise, was not raised as a defense. So I think that's one someone made up.