A Rhode Island man has finally settled a warrant issued for a traffic violation in Massachusetts nearly four decades ago.

Michael Young, of Warwick, RI, asked a judge in Attleboro District Court to dismiss a driving to endanger charge that was issued back in September 1974.

He was 23 at the time. The now 60-year-old told the court he found out about the warrant recently when he went to conduct business at the Rhode Island Registry of Motor Vehicles.

The Sun Chronicle of Attleboro reports that Judge Daniel O'Shea noted that half the people in court had not even been born at the time of the traffic violation. He granted Young's request, dismissing the case with payment of $100 in court costs.

Prosecutors agreed with the dismissal.

Source: The Sun Chronicle, http:// www.thesunchronicle.com

It's really good to know that some actions of the past can just simply be exonerated. I hate to think that a simple traffic ticket I got in the '70s would so stain my driving record that it would prevent me from conducting any kind of legal business with the DMV, today. Being young and reckless is one thing, but being young and reckless in the '70s? Do you know anyone who wasn't?!

Even though I was a teenager at the time, it was still the decade of free love and defying the "system." I mean, even the bank-robbing Patty Hearst got pardoned!

I'm wondering how many young people today even remember or know who the kidnapped heiress Patty Hearst is? I'm sure I have neckties older than some of the youngsters I work with.

While I'm trying to digest that 1974 was almost four decades ago, I should also probably consider getting some new neckties. Maybe for Father's Day I'll get one that's more trendy, or perhaps I'll just hold on to the wide, stripey symbolism of my younger days and defy the system, man!

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