Driver Faces $15,000 in Toll Fines

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) â€” Officials say Wesley Ridgwell was ``JST CRZY,'' zipping through 705 toll booths without paying and becoming one of the state's biggest toll scofflaws. <br><br>So instead

Tuesday, November 28th 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) â€” Officials say Wesley Ridgwell was ``JST CRZY,'' zipping through 705 toll booths without paying and becoming one of the state's biggest toll scofflaws.

So instead of paying 25 cents here and 75 cents there, Ridgwell is facing a $15,000 fine unless a hearing officer throws out the government's case Tuesday.

``I'm such a good person,'' said Ridgwell, 23. ``People who know me just can't believe this is happening.''

But authorities think the evidence they have compiled is compelling â€” 705 photos taken by automatic cameras as a late-model Honda bearing his Virginia vanity plate ``JST CRZY'' ran through toll booths between August 1999 and June of this year.

Ridgwell, who has a dozen convictions including speeding and drunken driving, insists it wasn't him â€” he says someone stole one of his two license plates and put it on a car similar to his.

Authorities, however, don't believe him. They said a police officer once pulled over ``JST CRZY'' for not paying a toll and Ridgwell was behind the wheel.

``That pretty much did it for us,'' said Steve Pustelnyk, a spokesman for the Orlando-Orange County Expressway.

He said it took investigators months to track Ridgwell down because he did not change his address when he moved to Florida.

``Our people had to go through public records to find him, and it took awhile,'' Pustelnyk said.

Further bolstering the authorities' case is that during two seven-day periods ``JST CRZY'' failed to run through any central Florida toll booths. Virginia officials and court records say that Ridgwell was up North, serving a 14-day sentence in Roanoke County Jail for driving 102 mph in a 65 mph zone during those periods.

Ridgwell says that's not true.

``I was out of the country,'' he said. ``It was spring break. I was in Cancun.''