Florida’s Super Speeder Law Makes Getting a Fort Myers Speeding Ticket Much Worse

By David B. Pittman, Esq. — Founder, Pittman Law Firm, P.L. | Last updated May 12, 2026

Florida moved the line on extreme speeding from “traffic infraction” to “criminal offense,” and a lot of Fort Myers drivers still treat the citation the way they treated a 12-over ticket five years ago. That is the wrong instinct. A parent typically calls our office because a son or daughter just got a ticket for 105 in a 70, and someone in the family told them this is no longer a normal speeding ticket. They are right. House Bill 351, effective July 1, 2024, did something the Legislature had been talking about for years — it made triple-digit speed a matter for a judge, not just a clerk’s window.

That change matters in two directions. On the criminal side, the driver who gets cited is now looking at the possibility of jail, a real court appearance, and a record. On the civil side, the citation itself becomes a powerful piece of evidence in any injury claim that grows out of the same incident. Both sides of that coin are part of what I want to walk through here.

What Florida law actually says about Super Speeder offenses

House Bill 351, which Governor DeSantis signed in 2024 and which took effect July 1, 2024, created a new category of speeding violation in Florida. The triggering thresholds are written into the statute in plain numbers: 50 miles per hour or more over the posted limit, or 100 miles per hour or more on any road regardless of the posted limit. Hit either number and you fall under the new framework. A driver caught at 105 in a 70 trips both wires at once.

Plain English on the criminal side: a first conviction can carry up to 30 days in jail, a $500 fine, or both. A second conviction can carry up to 90 days, a $1,000 fine, or both. If the second one lands inside five years of the first, the driver’s license is revoked for at least 180 days and up to a year. There is no “mail in the fine” option. The statute requires a personal court appearance.

On the civil side, the Florida statutes that govern an injury claim arising from a Super Speeder crash are the same ones that govern any other negligence case, and they got tighter in 2023. Section 768.81, Florida Statutes, sets out modified comparative negligence. In plain English: if a jury decides you are more than 50% at fault for your own injuries, you cannot recover at all. Section 95.11(4)(a), Florida Statutes, now gives an injured person two years from the date of the crash to file a negligence lawsuit. That window used to be four years. A lot of Floridians still operate on the old timeline and lose the case before they ever sit down with a lawyer.

Two more statutes matter for almost every Fort Myers crash, Super Speeder or not. PIP, the $10,000 no-fault medical benefit, is set out at section 627.736. Uninsured-motorist coverage is at section 627.727. And the crash-report obligation lives in section 316.066. Those four statutes plus the new Super Speeder charge are the legal architecture you are living inside if you get hurt by a driver who was doing triple digits on Daniels Parkway.

The five Super Speeder patterns we see in Fort Myers

The Super Speeder citations we see in Fort Myers fall into a small number of recurring fact patterns. After running a personal injury office in this market for three decades, I can tell you the call rarely surprises me anymore:

• The young driver on I-75 near Alico Road. A driver under 25, often male, gets clocked at 105 to 120 mph on the stretch between Estero and the Bell Tower exit. The number on the radar is enough by itself to file the charge.
• The “open highway” run on Daniels Parkway after dark. Daniels gets wide and quiet east of the airport. We see runs at 90 to 100+ in a 55 zone, and they often end with a deputy waiting at Six Mile Cypress Parkway.
• The straight-line stretch on Summerlin Road or Pine Island Road. Long, flat, lightly trafficked at certain hours. Riders on sport bikes and drivers in tuned cars use these for triple-digit pulls.
• The “out-of-state visitor” pattern on Colonial Boulevard or Cleveland Avenue. A driver passing through who does not know the corridor, does not see the school zone or the residential cross-street, and pushes the speed because the road feels open.
• The repeat offender with a history. The most dangerous category. Prior citations, a sometimes-suspended license, and a pattern of escalating speed. These are the cases the new law was written to deter.

Each of those scenarios produces a slightly different evidentiary picture in a civil case if a crash follows the speeding. The young-driver case usually means a parent’s auto policy and a parent’s UM stack to pursue. The repeat-offender case usually means a punitive-damages argument and a hard look at prior driving records.

Super Speeder injury cases — what makes them complicated

People sometimes assume a Super Speeder injury case is simple because the speed is so extreme. In practice, the cases are harder than they look. Three reasons.

First, the criminal case and the civil case run on different tracks and on different clocks. The State Attorney handles the criminal charge. The injured person, through their lawyer, handles the civil claim. If the injured family waits until the criminal case wraps before calling a lawyer, the two-year civil clock under §95.11(4)(a) keeps running the whole time. We have had families lose months that way.

Second, the insurance posture often gets aggressive. A carrier insuring a driver who was doing 105 mph often takes the position early that punitive damages are on the table, which changes how reserves are set and how the file is handled. That can cut two ways. It can mean more money is available to settle the case fairly. It can also mean the carrier digs in, hires its own engineering witness on the crash reconstruction, and tries to build a comparative-fault argument against the injured person. The §768.81 50% bar makes that argument worth a lot to the carrier.

Third, the medical picture in a triple-digit crash is rarely simple. A 100 mph impact produces injuries that show up days or weeks later: traumatic brain injury, internal bleeding, spinal injuries that look like a stiff neck for the first 72 hours and turn into something worse on the MRI. PIP runs out fast in those cases. The $10,000 ceiling under §627.736 covers a single emergency-room visit and an MRI, and then you are into health insurance, then into the at-fault driver’s liability policy, then into UM. We work that order constantly.

A head-on collision in South Fort Myers — how distracted speed plays out

We represented a South Fort Myers man who sustained a fractured wrist and facial injuries after a head-on collision with a distracted driver. The other driver had been looking down at their phone and drifted across the center line. When we pulled the at-fault driver’s cell records and the event data recorder from the vehicle, the data showed the driver had not touched the brakes before impact — they never looked up in time. That evidence, combined with a treating surgeon’s documentation of the wrist fracture and facial scarring, drove the case to a $575,000 settlement. Speed and inattention together are a combination carriers settle rather than defend in front of a Lee County jury.

What to do if you or a family member gets a Super Speeder ticket — or gets hit by one

The advice depends on which side of the citation you are on. Both lists come from things I have watched go right and go wrong in our office over the last few years.

If you got the citation:

• Do not miss the court date. The mandatory court appearance is not a suggestion. A missed appearance often produces a bench warrant and a license suspension on top of the original charge.
• Do not post about the stop on social media. Anything you write about how fast you were going, why, or what the deputy did is discoverable.
• Get the dashcam and bodycam footage requested in writing through counsel before it ages out of the retention window.
• If you were on the way home from anywhere medical-adjacent — a hospital visit, a prescription pickup, an emergency at home — preserve the documentation. It does not erase the charge, but it sometimes affects how a prosecutor frames it.

If you were hit by a Super Speeder driver:

• Get the crash report number under §316.066 and request the full report once it is available, usually within 10 days.
• Photograph the vehicles before they are moved if it is safe to do so. In a 100 mph crash the damage pattern tells the engineering witness more than any witness statement.
• Get checked out the same day, even if you feel intact. PIP under §627.736 has a 14-day window for initial medical care to qualify for the no-fault benefit. Miss the window and you can lose the benefit entirely.
• Save the citation. The criminal citation against the other driver becomes part of the civil file.
• Call a lawyer before the carrier calls you. The at-fault carrier will offer a recorded statement in the first week. The recorded statement is for them, not for you.

Key Takeaways

• Florida’s Super Speeder law (HB 351, effective July 1, 2024) makes 50+ over the limit or 100+ mph a criminal offense with potential jail time, a $500 to $1,000 fine, and license revocation on a second offense.
• A Super Speeder citation requires a personal court appearance. There is no mail-in option, and missing the date can produce a bench warrant.
• If a Super Speeder driver caused your crash, the citation and the criminal record become evidence in your civil injury claim, and punitive damages may be available.
• The 2023 tort reform shortened the negligence statute of limitations to two years under §95.11(4)(a). Waiting on the criminal case to resolve is one of the most common ways injured people lose their civil claim.
• Under §768.81, an injured person who is 50% or less at fault can still recover. A driver going 105 mph is rarely going to win the comparative-fault argument, but the carrier will run it anyway. Get counsel in early.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q1. What speeds trigger Florida’s Super Speeder Law?
The law applies to drivers caught at 50 mph or more over the posted limit, or at 100 mph or more on any road. Hitting either threshold is enough; a driver clocked at 105 in a 70 zone trips both.

Q2. Is a Super Speeder charge a criminal offense in Florida?
Yes. Unlike a standard speeding ticket, a Super Speeder citation is treated as a criminal traffic offense. A first conviction can carry up to 30 days in jail and a $500 fine; a second can carry up to 90 days and $1,000, plus license revocation for 180 days to a year if the second offense lands inside five years of the first.

Q3. Do I have to appear in court for a Super Speeder ticket?
Yes. A Super Speeder citation requires a personal court appearance. You cannot mail in a payment or resolve it with an affidavit. Missing the court date can produce a bench warrant and an automatic license suspension.

Q4. If a Super Speeder caused my crash, can I sue for damages?
Yes. A criminal speeding charge is separate from the civil injury claim. The driver’s conduct, the citation, the dashcam, and any prior record can all become evidence in your personal injury case. Under Florida’s modified comparative negligence rule (Fla. Stat. §768.81), an injured person who is 50% or less at fault can still recover.

Q5. How long do I have to file a Florida injury claim after a Super Speeder crash?
Under the 2023 tort reform, Florida shortened the statute of limitations on negligence claims to two years from the date of the crash (Fla. Stat. §95.11(4)(a)). Wrongful death has its own two-year window. Waiting on the criminal case to resolve before calling a lawyer is one of the most common ways injured people lose their civil claim.

Talk to our office

If you or a family member was hit by an extreme-speed driver in Fort Myers, Cape Coral, Estero, Bonita Springs, Naples, or anywhere across Lee and Collier Counties, call our office. The consultation is free, and there is no fee unless we recover for you. The two-year clock under Florida law is short, and the carrier on the other side is already working its file. Call 239-992-8259.

About the Author

A more-than-thirty-year personal injury practice in Fort Myers and across Lee County has been the daily work of David B. Pittman, Esq., founder of Pittman Law Firm, P.L. The firm’s Fort Myers presence handles a steady stream of serious-injury work along the Daniels Parkway, Six Mile Cypress, McGregor Boulevard, Cleveland Avenue, and Summerlin Road corridors, and along I-75 between Estero and Bell Tower. David represents injured clients across Lee and Collier Counties, with a particular focus on commercial-vehicle, complex-liability, and serious-injury cases — the kind of files where the speed, the conduct, or the corporate defendant turns a routine claim into something a jury needs to hear.

David is a Citadel grad (The Military College of South Carolina, undergraduate) and a University of South Carolina School of Law grad (JD). Martindale-Hubbell rates him AV-Preeminent; he belongs to the Multi-Million Dollar Advocates Forum. He has tried cases, mediated cases, and resolved cases across Southwest Florida for more than three decades.

David has held a Florida real estate broker license for twenty-five years, a credential that shapes how the firm reads the property side of premises cases. The firm handles personal injury cases across Lee and Collier Counties, serving Fort Myers, Bonita Springs, Naples, Cape Coral, Estero, and Lehigh Acres, with offices at Windsor Place in Bonita Springs (main) and Fort Myers (satellite). Call 239-992-8259 for a free consultation.

This article is provided for general information only and is not legal advice. Reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship with Pittman Law Firm, P.L. Every case turns on its own facts; if you have been hurt, talk to a Florida-licensed attorney about your situation. Attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.