Notorious Toll Skipper Apologizes

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) â€” A rebellious motorist known as ``JST CRZY'' agreed to pay more than $7,000 in fines after he admitted to speeding through 705 toll booths without paying. <br><br>Wesley Ridgwell,

Wednesday, November 29th 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) â€” A rebellious motorist known as ``JST CRZY'' agreed to pay more than $7,000 in fines after he admitted to speeding through 705 toll booths without paying.

Wesley Ridgwell, who initially denied being one of the state's worst toll scofflaws, had accumulated more than 700 violations and 100 tickets in a yearlong campaign of zipping past Florida toll booths.

On Tuesday, he agreed to a deal with the Orlando-Orange County Expressway Authority.

``I apologize,'' said Ridgwell, 23. ``I do understand that everyone should have to pay the tolls.''

Automatic cameras captured 705 photos of a late-model Honda, bearing a ``JST CRZY'' Virginia vanity plate, running through toll booths from August 1999 to June of this year.

Ridgwell, who has a dozen convictions ranging from speeding to drunken driving, had insisted that someone stole one of his two license plates and put it on a car similar to his.

The court suspended his license for three months and had imposed a $15,000 fine for missing an earlier hearing.