CHP Crowns New Champ as State’s Ticket Master : Enforcement: Officer gave 778 citations for traffic violations, surpassing the old mark, and could top 1,000 before month is out.

California Highway Patrol Officer Tony Gubler is the pride of his department, the bane of many motorists, and as of Wednesday, the most prolific ticket writer the state has ever known.

Gubler, who has been citing traffic violators in Orange County at a blistering pace, broke the state’s unofficial record for the most citations written by an officer in a month.

The 29-year-old Gubler nabbed his 778th traffic violator on the northbound Orange Freeway near Katella Avenue about 5 p.m. to surpass the previous mark of 777 citations set by another CHP officer in Orange County in 1988.

After citing a man in a red Mitsubishi hatchback for expired registration tags, driving without a license and not wearing a seat belt, Gubler simply hopped back on his motorcycle and tracked down numbers 779 and 780--a pair of speeders--less than five minutes later.

“I’m just trying to do my job to the best of my abilities,” he said.

Gubler, a seven-year member of the CHP, said he did not intend on setting a record but decided to push himself after an especially productive ticket-writing day earlier in the month, when he cited 57 motorists.

“I wanted to see what I could do if I sustained that kind of motivation--without lowering my standards,” he said.

What he ended up doing in only 14 working days was to write an average 55 tickets during an eight-hour shift. At his current pace, he could break 1,000 citations before the end of February, which is a short month. Most of the citations, he said, are for speeding and passing on the shoulder.

One of the reasons Gubler has written so many tickets is that he is a member of the five-officer Special Enforcement Unit, which primarily focuses on citing traffic violators.

“Most other officers have to take care of traffic accidents and other duties,” said CHP spokeswoman Linda J. Burrus, adding that on average, a CHP officer cites about 10 motorists a day.

The Special Enforcement Unit targets “trouble areas” on the freeways, where most of the county’s accidents occur, Burrus said.

CHP officials say that although no statistics are kept as to how many tickets individual officers write, they concede that no officer has written more than Gubler. They also add that no motorist has complained about any ticket Gubler has written this month.

While Gubler’s supervisors acknowledge his ticket writing prowess, they are careful to point out that there are no quotas, no internal “contests” among the officers and no bonuses for officers who issue more citations than other officers.

Gubler said that although he is “proud” of his work, he realizes that motorists may look at his accomplishment with disdain.

“I know there are people who may view this in a negative way,” he said.

Indeed, one of the speeders Gubler cited Wednesday said he didn’t like the fact that he was ticketed by the state’s most “ticket-happy cop.” But when asked if he was guilty of the offense, the Santa Ana motorist smiled and said “yes.”

“I was going a little too fast,” he said. After a pause, he added that Gubler “was a nice guy about it.”

Despite initial grumblings about getting a ticket, some motorists have actually been grateful later, Gubler said.

Once, he recalled, he cited a motorist for not wearing a seat belt and found out later that day that the same motorist had survived a major traffic accident because he was wearing the seat belt.

“I felt real good about that,” Gubler said.

“Nobody likes to get a ticket,” he said. “But maybe my giving them a ticket will make them drive safer. . . . I look at it like I’m saving people’s lives. Unfortunately, there are no statistics for that.”