Q: I live in Florida and went on vacation with my wife and two daughters to Georgia to visit my mother.
On our way back to Florida on 75 I was pulled over in sycamore county for tinted windows and given a ticket. The car was bought new at Toyota and came with tint from the dealer and is in compliance with Florida law but I guess not Georgia law. My tint is 30 on the front 2 and 15 on the back 3. Is that even legal, and can I do anything to fight against this? Seems to me it's just a way for the state to get money from out of state travelers and a reason for them to pull you over as reasonable cause to see if you are doing anything illegal.
A:
I am not authorized to practice law in Georgia. However, the statute in Georgia is, as follows:
Georgia's O.C.G.A. § 40-8-73.1 regulates vehicle window tinting. Under this statute, you cannot legally tint the front windshield at all, and you cannot reduce light transmission through the rear windshield and windows to less than 32 percent, plus or minus 3 percent. The statute defines “light transmission" as ratio of the amount of total light, expressed in percentages, which is allowed to pass through a surface to the amount of light falling on the surface.
O.C.G.A. § 40-8-73.1 also prohibits increasing the window and rear windshield light reflectance to more than 20 percent. "Light reflectance" means the ratio of the amount of total light that is reflected outward by a product or material to the amount of total light falling on the product or material.
An officer may stop your vehicle if he or she suspects illegal window tinting. Officers can determine the tint of your vehicle's windows using a tint meter. Unfortunately, even if the field test later shows that the window tint is within the legal limit, it would not render the stop illegal as long as the officer's belief that the tinting was outside the legal limit was reasonable.
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