Driver Strapped Skeleton in Passenger Seat to Use HOV Lane
Some men turn to blow up dolls, and others turn to plastic skeletons. It's all about personal preference.
Or what better fits in their passenger seat.
Which may explain why Bryan Stime chose a skeleton for his passenger seat when devising a plan to circumvent the rules of the road. The skeleton -- dressed in a hooded sweatshirt and holding a tin of cookies -- was given the role of Stime's HOV lane "plus one."
Police would have never been alerted to the plastic skeleton passenger had it not been for Bryan Stime's driving, according to a Washington State Patrol press release. He was going 82 miles-per-hour and making unsafe lane changes -- including in and out of the HOV lane.
As Stime told KING 5 TV, he has "a heck of a commute":
Bad commute or not, Stime earned himself a $454 ticket -- what he calls "a learning." The officer cited him for speeding, unsafe driving and unauthorized use of the HOV lane.
Though perfectly acceptable in science classes and at Halloween parties, plastic skeletons simply don't meet the HOV lane definition of "person." Neither do blow up dolls, oversized pillows or pets.
If you use an HOV lane without having the requisite number of living homo sapiens in your vehicle, you're breaking the law. And if you have a plastic skeleton in your passenger seat, you're just being silly.
Especially if you act like Bryan Stime and drive so erratically as to alert police to your presence.
Related Resources:
- Meet the guy who used skeleton in HOV lane (NWCN-TV)
- Traffic Tickets Center (FindLaw)
- Driver Fined for Mannequin in HOV Lane (FindLaw's Legally Weird)