License tags on Kansas vehicles contain more information to determine the owner than just the numbers.
Don Goff, Savonburg, found that out after he received a request from an Iowa police department for payment of a speeding ticket generated by a traffic camera.
The ticket was for alleged speeding that occurred two months ago near Des Moines, a time when Goff wasn’t in Iowa.
He asked Sheriff Tom Williams about the ticket and what to do. Williams took up his case.
“With the help of Jerry (Daniels, soon to be undersheriff) and local troopers we found out that the numbers on the license tag of the vehicle that was speeding were for a commercial truck,” Williams said. “Goff’s license tag, with the same numbers, are for an antique vehicle.”
Daniels, a former KHP trooper, explained that several classes of Kansas tags have the same numbers and that it was incumbent on an officer to make certain the class of a tag when checking owner identity.
After explaining to the Iowa officers what had occurred, they issued an apology.
Williams said his recommendation to anyone receiving a similar request for payment of a ticket was first to contact the issuing department or “call the sheriff’s office (365-1400) and let us help out.”
“Don’t pay a ticket that you don’t think you deserve,” he said. “There are a lot of scams out there, and sometimes shoddy police work.”
More to a license tag than its number
