For six years, Patrick Mulroy calmed thousands of resentful motorists through a combination “therapy” of wit, humor and useful information provided in his comedy traffic school classes. His students were angry about many things: unfair tickets, overzealous cops, predatory fines, rude and dismissive court employees, and their own sense of helplessness. Patrick introduced his students to the California Vehicle Code, a gold mine of information containing every traffic statute in the state of California. By better understanding their rights under California law, including the very convenient right to contest a citation by mail, unfairly cited students left the class feeling empowered, vowing never to be abused by a bogus traffic ticket again.
Some of these students decided to put what they had learned in Patrick’s class into action and successfully contested the ticket that had brought them to his school. Other students contested future tickets, occasionally calling Patrick to thank him for the enlightenment. Despite his earning a marginal living from this work, the good karma generated by helping others stand up for themselves kept Patrick in the traffic school business for over five years.
Patrick gave up his traffic school business to focus full time on helping his fellow Californians from being unfairly fleeced by the state. This site is an attempt to preserve in some form, the empathy he had for his students, his passion for teaching them, his satisfaction at seeing them stand up for their rights, and the insights into California traffic law that he gained through hours of lively debate.
Who this site is for
This site is for everyone Patrick ever had in his class: the good, the bad, and the ugly (you know who you are). This site is for everyone Patrick never had in his class and never will have in his class. This site is for people fed up with paying exorbitant fines for laws they did not break. This site is for people who can’t afford to pay a $500 ticket for going through a yellow light. This site is for people full of undirected anger that need the information to fight back and not submit to injustice. This site is for defense contractors and their robot cameras to know that they can’t continue to manipulate the truth for their own profit. This site is for traffic court judges that would prefer to be judges instead of rubber-stamps for an out-of-control prosecution state. But mostly, kind reader, this site is for you.
What do we get out of it?
Our biggest benefit is good karma from grateful friends we’ll probably never meet. Our site is financed entirely by voluntary shareware donations from people who use the site to fight their traffic ticket. As with all shareware, we are not guaranteed any payment in advance. We rely upon the goodwill and honesty of people we help to pay our modest fee ($25) if they win their case.
Who the hell are we, anyway?
Virginia Woolf believed that biography, even autobiography, was a form of fiction. So do we, so we’ll keep it short.
Web Author: Patrick Mulroy, B.S., M.A.: 6′ tall, 175 lbs, black hair, green eyes.
Patrick owns a cat and has a vestigial third nipple, just like Marky Mark. As with most tri-nippled cat owners, he is single and lives alone.
Brush with Greatness : Patrick was rudely bumped into at a Waterboys concert by Sinead O’Connor. Later that same night, the Artist formerly know as Prince tried to beat her up. She fled his mansion in a panic. Coincidence?
Personal Heroes: Thomas Paine, James Joyce, Shane McGowan, Billy Bragg, Rufus Wainwright.
Curious Fact: Patrick can’t seem to get a certain ABBA song out of his head. Curious.
Web Designer: Tim Wayne, M.D.,M.A.: 5′ 10 tall, 160lbs, red hair, green eyes. Tim owns a dog and has the normal compliment of two nipples. As with most two-nippled dog owners, Tim lives alone.
Brush With Greatness: Tim met author Quentin Crisp on two occasions and has a photograph to prove it. Quentin Crisp is now dead. Coincidence?
Personal Heroes: William S. Burroughs, Hunter S. Thompson, Alan Ginsberg.
Curious Fact: Tim enjoys going to raves, where he often gets backrubs from total strangers. Curious.