According to the Tuoi Tre News website, police in the central city of Da Nang imposed an unusual punishment for a 20-year-old woman who was caught driving down a one-way street in the wrong direction.Instead of imposing a fine, they made the woman write out lines, adopting an old-school style approach.
Picked by BBC News, it seems that local police chief Tran Viet Hoa allowed his officers to come up with alternative punishments in order to reduce bureaucracy. In this instance the police officers gave the evidently nervous-looking woman the benefit of the doubt. This was after she stated she had not noticed a one-way sign.
The officers told the woman she could write “I promise not to travel in the wrong direction on a one-way street again” 50 times, or face the conventional fine. The woman opted for the low cost line writing. She apparently perched herself on the kerbside, took a sheet of paper and wrote out the required statement 50 times.
Mr. Hoa explained further that as well as looking at alternatives in general, he did not wish to punish first time offenders severely and he also wanted to build up a more positive attitude between the local population and the police force.
This approach seems to be popular, with Toi Yeu Da Nang police force’s Facebook page receiving more than 70,000 likes.
