Can you be pulled over in Virginia for having a license plate frame? Yes. I am Andrew Flusche.
I'm your Virginia traffic attorney. This is a big issue that people need to be aware of
with their vehicles is do you have a license plate frame or cover or anything else that
could arguably be obscuring your license plate from easy reading? I see lots of cars going
up and down the roadway that have license plate frames or covers on them and that do
arguably obscure the reading of the plate. If your frame is just around the very edge
of the plate, then it shouldn't be a problem. It's not actually touching the words or the
stickers or covering up anything of substance on the plate.
However, some frames have a really wide border for better designs or lettering for your favorite
team, and I appreciate the team spirit, but you've got to be careful that your design
on your plate doesn't actually cover up the lettering, so what a lot of people do is it
covers up the Virginia at the top where it's hard to read. I've even seen license plate
frames that cover up over half of the word Virginia where unless you really know what
that says, you cannot read it. Those frames, I would argue, are for sure
a problem, and even ones that really just touch on the words or the letters I think
are just asking for an officer to use that as a reason to pull you over if they suspect
you for something more serious like DUI or marijuana. Typically, an officer's probably
not going to waste his time on a license plate frame violation when he's got better things
to do, but if they think that there may be some kind of foul play going on, and they
really look for a reason to pull you over, you don't want to give it to them with a license
plate frame or cover. This is why I recommend don't have them at
all. That's my personal opinion and philosophy, but if you do have them, make sure that you're
very careful about how you use them, and if you are pulled over for some type of license
plate frame or cover or improperly mounted plate, you definitely need to contact me so
we can evaluate that together. If you were stopped in Virginia for some other reason,
check out other videos to see if we've covered your stop, and if we haven't, definitely give
me a call, and we can talk about it together.