Police ticketed an Abbotsford driver because his passenger was a real dummy.
The 28-year-old man was in the HOV lane on Highway 1 when a pair of transit officers returning to their office noticed that “something was not right about what or who was in the passenger seat.”
When the man pulled over his late model Mercedes Benz, the officers found the top half of a female mannequin wearing a grey hoodie in the passenger seat, according to Transit Police Sgt. Tom Seaman.
When the driver failed to offer an explanation, the officers issued a $109 fine for illegally driving in the High-Occupancy Vehicle lane without a (human) passenger. The mannequin and her hoodie were seized.
Transit Police Const. Bruce Shipley said finding the dummy was unexpected.
“That is a first for me,” the three-year member of the police service said. “Everyone is in a hurry these days, but the HOV lane is there for a reason, you get caught misusing it and you could be fined.”
