Alpharetta Police Find it Difficult to Enforce Texting While Driving Ban

Posted on Aug 06, 2011

Although Georgia adopted the texting ban a year ago, some officials say the jury is still out on the effectiveness of banning texting while driving.

According to Executive Officer George Gordon, the Alpharetta Department of Public Safety has only issued 18 citations for texting while driving in Georgia. He stated that one of these resulted from a Georgia car accident and two others were factors in DUI cases.

North Fulton jurisdictions are having a hard time enforcing this new law. Because an officer of the law has to see a motorist texting while operating a vehicle, it is more difficult because patrolling police are moving and are looking for speeders and aggressive drivers. However, stationary police are able to more frequently spot motorists texting.

Police can subpoena phone records in serious Alpharetta traffic crashes in order to determine if a driver was texting at the time of the collision.

In Milton, police issued one citation for texting while driving because the driver told the officer she lost control of her car because she was texting.

In Roswell, seven citations for texting while driving were given to adults this year, but none have been given to drivers younger than 18 years old.

Police in Georgia will act if they see a driver violate this law, but they are not going out looking for drivers who text.

The Dover Law Firm would like to encourage drivers to not text while driving to reduce your chances of being in an Alpharetta car accident.