Swiss Millionaire Gets $290,000 Speeding Ticket - Sets New Record

1985 Ferrari Testarossa

For going 100 km/h

A Swiss millionaire has been fined 299,000 francs ($290,000 USD / €202,000) for driving a Ferrari Testarossa through the town of St Gallen at 100 km/h (62 mph).

While this sounds a bit absurd, the court said "The accused ignored elementary traffic rules with a powerful vehicle out of a pure desire for speed." They then demanded the man pay the fine out of his 23.3 million franc ($22.5 million USD / €15.7 million) fortune.

This princely sum exceeds Switzerland's previous record fine of 111,000 francs ($107,000 USD / €75,000), which was set in 2008 by a Porsche driver in Zurich.

Source: reuters.com

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joelynn

i see no reason why fines shouldn't be means tested. a 100 euro fine would mean nothing to a multi-millionaire, this is really a punishment.

January 8, 2010 10:08 am

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SirTristan

he's RIGHT! for a normal person, normal tickets wouldnt mean anything. and for him, this is a hefty bit of money he needs to fork out

January 8, 2010 10:55 am

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dbehmoaras

This is the most ridiculous thing I ever read. I hope whoever's the one enforcing this ticket burns in hell.

January 8, 2010 10:22 am

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Meilen

Do you think that 200.000 is a lot for a guy who have 23.3 million franc ($22.5 million USD / ?15.7 million) fortune ?? For him is peanuts ...

January 8, 2010 10:49 am

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bob6600

I live in switzerland and I read it in newspapers this morning. The true wasn't in town of St Gallen (which is only where he lives)... the 53 years old man drived at 140 km/h instead 100 km/h area in motorway (the swiss motorway is limited 120 km/h) and because he is a repeat offender who loves speed and arenaline they decided to give him an exemplar punishment. When he was arrested he also said to be a diplomat from Guinea Bissau to attempt a diplomatic immunity

January 8, 2010 12:18 pm

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mmr66

.....yes it is alot even for this guy. they judge who ruled this should be fined how ever i would agree to this amount of money if he wwas doing 200kph+ but 100kph no way.

January 8, 2010 1:16 pm

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rokke

actually he drove 137 km/h where 80km/h were allowed....

January 8, 2010 1:45 pm

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dmanero

This is just ridiculous. Ok so he is caght speeding, why should it matter what he drives when it comes to the cost of the speeding ticket. People are outraged becuase people do racial profiling, profiling someone when applying for a job or the policing stoping you for inspection just because you have a modified ride. Bloddy Pigs. Even still this is pocket change for him and I'm sure if were to go to court his lawyer will get him out of it.

January 8, 2010 2:25 pm

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pismeov

i think it's the fairest of all methods. let your speeding ticket amount be a fair percentage of your financial worth/income. for example, a 400 dollar fine for an average joe making 50k a year (which one can get for speeding here in vancouver, canada) translates to around $184,000 for one who is worth 23 mil. the weight of the penalty will thus be felt for both circumstances. if both persons got a 400 dollar ticket, the millionaire would probably just scoff at that fine as it would be like slapping the average joe an 87 cent fine for speeding. that sounds more ludicrous than the seemingly ridiculous fine that the millionaire got. you must realize that this is a punishment for breaking the law that the driver knows of fully. it wouldn't be much of a punishment if the fine isn't even an effective amount. bottomline, if the millionaire didn't want to have such a sizable chunk of his fortune be swiped away from him, then maybe he shouldn't have sped. it's not like he was picked out of random or anything; he got caught for doing something he shouldn't have been doing.

January 8, 2010 5:56 pm

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2010S5

$290,000 is an astronomical sum for anybody regardless of how rich he/she is. This is ridiculous.

January 8, 2010 2:53 pm

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Meilen

"$290,000 is an astronomical sum for anybody regardless of how rich he/she is. This is ridiculous. " With 23.000.000 you gain more or less 1.2 M only in interest per MONTH ... I'm still insisting that for him is peanuts ;)

January 8, 2010 3:01 pm

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Andres2007

That's an absurd argument like I have never seen before. Should we start charging rich people $60,000 for a cup of coffee instead of $6 because $60k is peanuts for them? NO. THERE'S A REASON WHY you work your butt off in order to be rich. It's not so that they scale the prices and charge you more money for everything you do. Plus you're assuming that the $23 million he is worth are safely deposited in banks producing more money. If they are saying his net worth is $23 million, that could be including all his assets and properties and stuff. He's rich, but $290k is not "peanuts" for him. Just like $290 is not peanuts for someone worth $23,000. I do agree that if the offender deserved an exemplary punishment, a hefty fine had to be set for him, but $290,000 is WAY too much for such an offense, PERIOD. It's just unreasonable. I'm sure a tenth of that amount would have taught him a couple of lessons, and it wouldn't have been inhumane.

January 8, 2010 7:34 pm

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JonnnnY

god, imagine what could happen, if they had caught top gear filming their movies there. revving ferrari in the tunel? bbc is rich television, so they can fine them about 250'000'000 pounds. this is just absurd.

January 8, 2010 3:07 pm

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conneem

Even if he was an average person worth maybe 300,000 euro, the fine would be close to 4,000 if scaled linearly, clearly an astronomical amount.

January 8, 2010 3:27 pm

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dr-210tm

Meilen, 1.2M interest/month? Are you smoking crack?

January 8, 2010 11:12 pm

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9TNine

According to Business Week, Switzerland ranked 2nd (Zurich) and 3rd (Geneva) best place to live in the world in 2009?.! Perhaps NOT, after this?. Guess cuckoo clocks aren?t selling that well and the Swiss authorities have to get income from somewhere.

January 9, 2010 9:18 am

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slick11

this is FARCICALLLLLLL.....a millionaire doesn't mean he has to share his wealth with this oppressive Judge. ok the man made a mistake...there's a fixed fine for breaking the rules..like me i was driving my R8 140Km/h on the highway that limited to 100Km/h, i went to the court and paid about 2.5$ for each Km above the limit, and they took my driving licence for 3 months...(of course i didn't use the Bus-i drove another car)... that's Fair and i accepted it...i guess Switzerland is suffering from world financial crises and seeks to get more money by making a millionaire a half millionair

January 10, 2010 5:05 am

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nickmini

"The accused ignored elementary traffic rules with a powerful vehicle out of a pure desire for speed." - I'm guilty too, except my vehicle is NOT POWERFUL.

January 10, 2010 2:18 pm

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marino

I always thought that fines should be proportional to someone's income. A fine is a punishment. If someone makes $10hr and gets a $100 fine they have to work 10 hours to pay it off. If someone makes $1,000/hr they only have to work 6 minutes to pay the same fine. One gets punished 10hrs of labor the other one 6 min. Not fair.

January 10, 2010 6:30 pm

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R0ADR4G3

i understand how you coul think of this as unfai MARINO, but also think about the other side, maybe this guy/girl had worked hard to get there, and socialist bastards, not u but otheres say be fir, y take way my hard earned money because im wealthy, not that i am, its envy or jelousy, im just saying look at both sides.

January 10, 2010 10:45 pm

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alessandro

Speeding at 100 km/h in Testarossa is much more expensive than doing it with some Lantra-crap. It is an idiocy where we are not equal in the eyes of justice anymore and driving Asian cars stays not punished! So for affordable speeding we should pick a reasonably priced car.

January 12, 2010 9:22 am

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ministru

Do you want punishment and social justice for something like this? Maybe you would like to see Hitler wiping your white european left foot just because you make 50k a year and bought yourself a green, affordable, crappy asian piece of garbage and you were traveling at 60km/h in a city. Or maybe you would prefer paying 5k for a rice pack just because you have a fortune of 2 million in your non secret swiss bank account. That's probably enough for you to survive for about 1 year. :D Grow up for christ sake. I don't see you saying that's not fair what china is doing by copying european cars without license and turning them into real crap. I don't see those auto(junk)makers getting a 5 bucks fine either.... I would not be surprised if you green socialists idiots decided that as of 2012 everyone traveling alone in his car trough an european city should get fined proportionally to his underwear color!

January 14, 2010 6:11 pm

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R0ADR4G3

im not quite sure what you said but i understand the last part, and because under priveledged people persuade these countries people of money are in trouble, because they dont know how to save it and spend it wisely,etc. especially in america!!!!!!! :(

January 15, 2010 12:11 am

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