Show highway safety conferences are held in utah this last week more uniformity in traffic court policies imp improved roved reporting of convictions vict ions for traffic offenses development of informational data for justices of the peace in service training of local police in traffic matters and general tightening up of enforcement policies across the board were some of 0 the alpar end results of a highly successful series of traffic court conferences completed last week the conferences were held in eleven cities throughout th state and were at tended by city and county officials judges justices of the peace and enforcement officers the conferences were conducted by a panel of officials of the attorney generals office state department part ment of public safety and utah safety council justice J allan crockett supreme court of utah delivered the principal adress at each meeting and also participating ici in the panel discussions general uniformity in fines and penalties for principal traffic alo violations that cause most accidents was also reached in the series of meetings justice crockett referred to the statement by sidney J williams ot I 1 the national safety council in a 1 newly published text book on traffic courts charging that the courts are unquestionably the weakest link in the chain of 0 trat fic safety he stated that this Is a challenge that cannot be ignored and that there is both a legal and moral responsibility for the courts to keep pace with the progress on other fronts the supreme court justice also emphasized that in the long run the greatest kindness both to the alleged offender and to all society is to do simple and exact justice under the law letting an offender oft off without restraining action can often be the most unkind thing to do he said as it may very well encourage him to commit subsequent violations leading to death or serious injuries on the other liand land unreasonably severe penalties destroy respect for the law and tend to nullify the basic intent ot of the system designated to prevent violations and traffic accidents widespread support to the suggestion to hold a single statewide state wide traffic court conference next year was also expressed such a conference by a team ot of nationally rec leaders under the auspices of the american bar association |