Driving with a Suspended License, Part IV: The Clerk's Withheld Adjudication -- a Secret Weapon to Avoid a Five-Year HTO Revocation Articles / Law Posted by dpakula on Sep 21, 2006 - 07:11 PM If you have two prior convictions for driving with a suspended license within a five-year period (in some instances, a withheld adjudication counts as a conviction), your third strike within the five-year period will result in a five-year HTO (habitual traffic offender) revocation of your driver's license. If you find yourself in this predicament, there is one extremely important thing you must know: do not, I repeat DO NOT attend your arraignment before checking with a qualified attorney. You may be eligible for a one-time procedure known as a "clerk's withheld adjudication." However, this "secret weapon" generally is unavailable after your appearance at arraignment. Many attorneys commit malpractice by allowing their clients to attend or waive arraignment, because they are not familiar with the clerk's withheld procedure, or because they did not bother to check the client's driving record to determine the client's eligibility and need to utilize the procedure. Our firm has a policy of always checking the driving record of a client charged with the criminal offense of driving with a suspended license with knowledge. We make an initial evaluation of the client's situation before the arraignment date. By doing so, we have saved many clients from a five-year HTO revocation of their driver's licenses. Not everyone is eligible for a clerk's withheld adjudication. The procedure is only available to those whose licenses were suspended for certain reasons, such as failure to pay or failure to appear. In addition, the procedure is not necessary in every case. We recommend that you request a consultation from a qualified attorney immediately after you receive a citation for driving with a suspended license. A legal evaluation should be completed in advance of the arraignment. Waiting until the last minute, or until after the arraignment, could cost you your driving privileges for five years. One more thing -- if you receive a citation for the non-criminal infraction of driving with a suspended license without knowlege, do not, I repeat DO NOT pay the ticket. Paying the ticket through the mail results in a conviction and an automatic habitual offender strike. This result is so easy to avoid, but so many people fall into this trap. A little knowledge goes a long way to avoiding an HTO revocation. It is a shame the law has set up so many pitfalls for unwary motorists. We hope that our series of articles on driving with suspended license will help. This article is from Florida Traffic Ticket Defense   http://www.floridatrafficticketdefense.com/ The URL for this story is:   http://www.floridatrafficticketdefense.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=15