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Customized cars with dark tinted windows may become a thing of the past if state Sen. Deborah Cherry has her way.

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A bill introduced by Cherry, D-Burton, would stiffen penalties for illegal window tints with a $500 fine and up to 90 days in jail.

Currently, the offense is a civil infraction with fines determined by the jurisdiction in which the violation occurs. In most cases, an offender can have the tint removed within 30 days to avoid fines, which are usually about $90 with no points added to the license.

Window tinting was in the news this past week when Detroit Piston Darko Milicic was stopped by Sterling Heights police because of dark windows on his 2004 Audi. He said he had been driving it for more than a year and didn't know it was illegal.

Lt. Gerry Scherlinck of the Troy Police Department said window tint can be up to only 35 percent in terms of darkness on a vehicle's windshield and passenger- and driver-side windows, and the tint can not exceed 4 inches.

"You can do whatever you please to the back windows," he said. "When you see some of these cars that are totally darked out, that's illegal. It poses a threat to police officers (and emergency workers) trying to see inside the car."

Denise Flannery, legislative aide for Cherry, whose district includes a portion of Oakland County, said the bill was introduced in response to a recent event in which a police officer was concerned for his safety.

"We feel the current fines are not enough to deter the illegal use of window tinting," she said.

The bill has been referred to the Senate Committee on Transportation.

The only exemption to the current legislation is a signed doctor's note specifying the tint is needed for vision problems.

Leticia Weatherby, a 22-year-old nurse's aide from Waterford Township, said she has been pulled over at least twice for her tinted windows, which she said allows officers to see inside her vehicle.

Weatherby owns a twodoor 1996 Monte Carlo and had all of the windows, except the windshield, tinted in February.

"I was under the impression that the tint shop only did the legal amount," she said. "I agree people shouldn't be allowed to tint windows so darkly that it causes a problem with the law. But I don't understand why they allow these shops to apply illegal tint but ticket you for it."

Weatherby said it costs about $179 to have the windows tinted and about $300 to have the tint removed.

"I'm not taking it off," she said. "I had the windows tinted to keep the sun out of my face and out of my child's face. If it's illegal for people to have the tint, it should be illegal for the shops to put it on."

There are no laws prohibiting the installation of illegal tint. Roger Griffi ths, outside sales coordinator with Ameristar Auto Outfi tters in Waterford, which specializes in window tinting, said his company does warn customers of the consequences of illegal window tinting but will still perform the work.

Flannery said including window-tinting businesses in the bill was "not the direction we're taking right now."

Sgt. Nathaniel McQueen with the Michigan State Police said one of the issues is tinted windows are also offered by manufacturers.

"In some areas, such as Arizona and Texas, it's legal because of the heat index," he said. "There needs to be a regulation stating it is illegal for a secondary vendor to put it on. Otherwise, you run into problems with manufacturers.

"This is really something the state needs to look into. I would think anyone proposing legislation to increase the penalty for illegal tinting should include the businesses that are putting this tint on the windows." John Sturk and Kevin Curtin of the Capital News Service contributed to this story.

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