Florida Court of Appeals calls Car Stereo Music Law Unconstitutional

Posted By Daniel Schulefand Miami Traffic Lawyer || 14-May-2011

A three judge panel of the 2nd District Court of Appeal in Lakeland, Florida. This was ruled on wednesday in response to two Pinellas County cases. Both drivers were accused of playing their car stereos too loudly. The panel found the law itself unconstitutional as it is only applicable to personal vehicles. Political vehicles as well as business vehicles are exempt from this law. The law states that a vehicles is in violation if its stereo is "plainly audible" from 25 feet or more away. The three judge panel deemed this law too vague for interpretation. The ruling has been transferred to the Florida Supreme Court for further review.

This demonstrates how significant this ruling is to public safety. Perhaps had the ruling not been so vague the court would have been able to recognize the possibility of severe danger. One circumstance for example would consist of an ambulance trying to get to the emergency room with a patient in critical condition after being involved in a motorcycle accident. However there is a car in front of ambulance that decides to move from the middle lane to the right lane, the very lane that the ambulance is in. As a result of loud music, the ambulance hits the car and not only is the cyclist injured further but now the driver of the car who moved out in front and the ambulance staff are injured as well. Now this is not necessarily likely to happen but if this law is phrased correctly and specifically enough it could prevent a tragic incident such as this from taking place. My hope is that this issue is handled by the Florida Supreme Court in a timely manner so that the repercussions from the temporary removal of this law are minimized.

Nowadays music systems have the potential of reaching extremely high volumes, so high that they could be clearly understood from hundreds of feet away. It should not be in the states interest to completely limit the use of these systems but there should be an effort to constitutionally limit the maximum volume of these stereos across the board. There should be no exemptions as business vehicles as well as political vehicles should be punished for violations.