IN RE: MOSLEY. (1999)

This matter came on for adjudicatory hearing on March 2, 1999.   The youth, J. Gram Mosley, was present with his parents.   James B. Grandey, assistant prosecutor, represented the state of Ohio.   Evidence was taken.

In case No. B-990019, the state presented its case.   The youth had no witnesses.   Based upon the evidence, the court finds the youth to be a juvenile traffic offender having violated R.C. 4511.21(D)(1), speeding, as alleged in case No. B-990019.

The facts presented in case No. B-990004 show that the youth was stopped after the officer received information from the LEADS computer that the registration of the motor vehicle he was driving expired on December 20, 1998.   The stop was made and the citation issued on December 24, 1998.

The youth's father said that he renewed all of the family's motor vehicles on his birthday, which is December 27.   The vehicle that the youth was driving was leased to his mother.   The leasing company's renewal date was December 20, 1998.

R.C. 4503.101(A) provides for motor vehicle registration renewal on the owner's birthday.   Section (B) of that law does, in fact, allow for all motor vehicle owners residing at one address to select the birthday of any one owner as the renewal date for all the vehicles in the residence.   R.C. 4503.101(B) and Ohio Adm.Code 4501:1-7-04(A)(7).

 The problem here is that the above law applies to motor vehicle owners.   The owner of this truck was the leasing company.   Ohio Adm.Code 4501:1-7-05(B) allows anyone owning twenty or more vehicles to select any single date on which to register the vehicles.   The leasing company, as owner, has selected December 20, 1998 as the date the registration is to be renewed.   The lessee is obliged by the lease agreement to abide by the lessor's selected date.

R.C. 4503.102(A) requires the Registrar of Motor Vehicles to notify the person in whose name a vehicle is registered forty-five days in advance that the registration will expire on a certain date and must be renewed.   R.C. 4503.102(E) states that even if the notice is not received, the person must timely register the vehicle.

The validation sticker must show only the year and the month, Ohio Adm.Code 4501:1-27-0(A).   It is not required that the day of the month be on the sticker.

 R.C. 4503.21 states that neither the owner nor operator shall fail to display a sticker issued under Ohio law.   Even though the truck the youth was driving had an orange December sticker, it had expired on December 20, 1998, as discussed above.   To hold that stickers expire only at the end of the month printed on them would fly in the face of the renewal laws outlined herein.   In addition, it would create the unequitable situation of, in effect, giving a driver with a first-of-the-month birthday a thirty-day grace period and giving a driver with a last-of-the-month birthday no grace period at all.   A court must find that the Ohio legislature, in enacting statutes, is presumed to have intended a just and reasonable result, R.C. 1.47.

WHEREFORE, the youth is adjudged to be a juvenile traffic offender in case No. B-990004 and case No. B-990019.   It is ordered that this matter shall come on for dispositional hearing on the 15th day of April, 1999 at 2:30 p.m.

So ordered.

NANCY DRAKE HAMMOND, Judge.