The man who said the law was an ass was a comfortable member of the middle class. If I remember correctly, the phrase is attributed to a Dickens character who had just lost a civil case. Those who dwell in humbler circumstances do not find that the law is an ass. They find that it is a tiger likely at any time to maul their lives. They are engulfed by the inexorable machinery of justice, and transported to a strange world where the normal laws of language and logic do not apply. The law is merciless, vengeful and punitive.
If on the other hand you do not live in humbler circumstances, but in more palatial ones, then the law is still not an ass. It is a pussycat, readily placated by the blandishments of an expensive lawyer. If you have already banked your first million you are very unlikely to see the inside of a Hong Kong prison. The intricate relationship between wealth and justice comes to mind following the case of Peter Lam Kin-ngok, whose prosecution for speeding has opened up an entertaining conundrum over use of speed guns.
Mr Lam was clocked by the traffic police at 114km/h. This is not in itself an outrageous speed. But the speed limit at the relevant spot happens to be 50km/h, so Mr Lam was in some difficulty. If you are caught in a state of such excess speed, you usually lose your licence. My experience of speeding allegations is that a missive from the traffic police drops into your letterbox two or three weeks after the alleged offence and usually refers to road names you have never heard of. Having no precise memory of the incident, you plead guilty. A court appearance is likely to add to the expense and unlikely to change the outcome.
A lawyer would cost more than the fine. There is no legal aid. Still, faced with the possible loss of a driver's licence many drivers proceed to Plan B, which is to insist on a formal trial and have a lawyer try to establish reasonable doubt.
And sometimes they are lucky. I recall a member of my family back in the UK who managed to obscure the reality of a moment of exuberance on the Kingston bypass by grilling the police witnesses at great and confusing length on the question of how far apart the lamp posts were. This sort of thing is of course perfectly legal and proper.