82-year-old’s jaywalking ticket fight has world beating path to her door
LOS ANGELES – First, 82-year-old Mayvis Coyle got fined. Then she got famous.
She got a $114 jaywalking ticket, and now people the world over know her story about why she thinks the motorcycle cop did her wrong.
Editorial writers from Sacramento to Scotland have rushed to Coyle’s defense. Strangers in distant lands are rising to support her. Camera crews show up at her Sunland trailer unannounced, wanting her to repeat the story once again.
And she doesn’t even have a phone.
As Coyle tells her story, she was doing her best to shuffle across Foothill Boulevard, walking cane in one hand, groceries in the other, when the light changed from “WALK” to “DON’T WALK.” But she simply couldn’t get across the street in time.
Enter a Los Angeles Police Department motorcycle officer, who gave her the ticket, which she is challenging in court.
Her case has become more than just a traffic dispute; to her supporters, it’s about the rights of senior citizens and pedestrians everywhere.
“I didn’t want all this publicity,” said Coyle. “But I’m not objecting to being used if it gets the lights changed and gets respect for the elderly. … I’m speaking for all those seniors who can’t get across the street.”
The furor all began on Feb. 15 when Coyle was crossing Foothill Boulevard and Woodward Street on her way home from a trip to the grocery store.
She claims she was crossing the intersection on a WALK signal, but when she got more than halfway across, it changed to DON’T WALK.
That’s when a motorcycle cop drove up and began repeatedly shouting at her, “You’re obstructing the flow of traffic!” she said.
“I don’t like being talked to like I’m a 6-year-old,” she added.
She tried to explain to him that she walks slowly because of her age and that she couldn’t make it across in the allotted time, but he refused to listen, she said. “He should have gotten off his motorcycle and helped me cross when he saw me struggling,” she said.
The LAPD tells a different story, insisting that the officer noticed her beginning to cross the street after the DON’T WALK sign began flashing.
“While many people may look at that and say the LAPD should have a greater heart and should care more that this was an 82-year-old woman, our desire is that this 82-year-old woman and all citizens of L.A. conduct themselves in a manner that is safe,” said Michel Moore, deputy chief of operations, Valley Bureau, of the Los Angeles Police Department.
Coyle is still fighting her ticket in court. If she loses, the owner of her mobile home park gave her the money to cover it.
Friends at the mobile home park, however, hope she wins her case and that the ticket ends up forcing the city to help pedestrians more.