Kathleen Thomas is a 36-year-old Florida woman who went viral in 2026 after a Palm Beach County Sheriff's deputy issued her a ticket for allegedly holding a phone in her right hand while driving, despite the fact that Thomas was born without a right hand. Her bodycam footage of the encounter drew millions of views and led to the citation being dismissed.
Who Is Kathleen Thomas?
Thomas, who goes by Katie and posts online as @slightlyoff.balance, was born with her lower right arm missing. She lives in the Lake Worth area of Florida and had largely used her social media presence to share everyday content before the traffic stop turned her into a national news subject, according to CBS News.
The February Traffic Stop
In February 2026, Thomas was pulled over by a Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office deputy who said he observed her holding a phone in her right hand while driving. When Thomas rolled down her window and explained her right arm ends at the elbow, the deputy continued questioning her, at one point asking her to swear "hand to God" that she had not been using a device, then specifying she needed to raise her left hand only, footage that Thomas later obtained and posted publicly.
The Citation And Its Reversal
Despite the clear physical impossibility of what she was accused of, the deputy issued the citation anyway. Thomas planned to contest it in court, but the deputy requested the ticket be dismissed before the scheduled hearing, a decision the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office attributed to a lack of clarity in how the violation was labeled in its citation system, per the department's statement to CBS News.
| Timeline | Event |
|---|---|
| February 2026 | Thomas pulled over and issued citation despite missing right hand |
| Following weeks | Thomas obtains bodycam footage and posts it on TikTok and Instagram |
| Video goes viral | Millions of views, tens of thousands of new followers |
| May 2026 | Deputy requests dismissal before scheduled court date |
| May 28, 2026 | Thomas speaks exclusively to CBS News |
What Thomas Hopes People Take Away
Rather than frame her story purely around the dismissed ticket, Thomas has used her sudden visibility to push for broader awareness of limb differences. She told CBS News she does not believe the deputy acted with malice but suspects he simply was not trained to handle the situation, and she has said she would welcome a direct conversation with him about what happened and why the stop escalated the way it did.
What stands out in Thomas' account is her refusal to flatten the story into a simple villain narrative. She has repeatedly said both she and the officer walked away shaken, which is a more complicated and more useful framing than the usual viral-outrage format, and it is likely part of why her story kept spreading well past the typical 48-hour viral news cycle.
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Sources
Full account and quotes sourced from CBS News; additional reporting via CBS12 News.
