No WhiteWash!

Experienced class action law firm takes on red light cameras in California.

A team of experienced class action lawyers is taking on California’s red light camera industry, and photo enforcement companies are expressing unease. Last month, the law firm of Pearson Simon Warshaw and Penny, LLP filed suit in San Mateo County Superior Court arguing that tickets issued throughout the Golden State since January 1, 2004 should be refunded where the photo enforcement contracts violated a state law mandating flat-rate compensation to companies like Redflex Traffic Systems. Redflex referred to the case as a particular business risk in an August 25 filing with the Australian Securities Exchange.

Civil grand jury joins appellate court in slamming red light cameras in San Mateo County, California.

Under court order, Redwood City, California was forced to admit that the red light camera installed at Whipple Avenue and Veterans Boulevard in March 2008 have done absolutely nothing to reduce traffic collisions. San Mateo County Superior Court Judge Clifford V. Cretan instructed the city council to respond to a civil grand jury report from June that blasted municipal programs throughout the county that raised $13.8 million from ticketing despite the lack of evidence of any safety benefit (read report).

Read more via California: Court, Grand Jury Bash San Mateo Red Light Cameras

Red light camera makers fear high court Confrontation Clause ruling will create legal challenges.

Red light camera and speed camera manufacturers fear that last month’s US Supreme Court ruling in the case Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts could create legal turmoil for the industry. The National Campaign to Stop Red Light Running issued a statement yesterday warning that the ruling has armed motorists with a greater ability to challenge the basis of automated traffic citations. Speed cameras, for example, depend heavily on legal faith in a certificate that claims to confirm the total reliability of a machine’s speed reading. In the Melendez-Diaz case, the high court ruled that merely producing such a certificate in court is insufficient. Defendants have the right to cross-examine any individual who claims to have certified evidence.

Read more via US Supreme Court Upsets Speed Camera Industry.

If you have been following the red-light cameras hearsay scene….you should check out the following links below.

California Court of Appeal Publishes Red Light Camera Hearsay Decision
California Court of Appeal declines traffic camera company request to depublish Santa Ana appellate decision.

California: Another Judge Discards Red Light Camera Evidence
Red light camera companies found to generate hearsay evidence in San Diego, California court trial.

A red light camera in Kingsport, Tennessee wrongly accused Ray Tolley, 89, of running a red light. According to WJHL-TV, Tolley received a ticket in the mail accusing him of blowing through an intersection on red in a white Ford Mustang. Tolley owns a blue 1990 Ford pickup truck, and the octogenarian rarely drives. His son, David, who was forced to fight the ticket on his father’s behalf, discovered the license plate on the pickup was off by one digit. The Kingsport police, who claim to diligently review every ticket, did not notice that the ticket claimed the Mustang in the photograph was a "pickup" truck.

via California, Tennessee: Bogus Red Light Camera Tickets.

It appears that the Kingsport, TN Police did review the evidence and found that a white Ford Mustang and a black 1990 Ford pickup is close enough. 

89-year old Ray Tolley states that he visited Kingsport about 35 years ago and his pickup has not been started since last fall.

It appears that the Kingsport Police is rubber-stamping the data submitted by camera vender Redflex as the gospel.  The photo on the right is from the Kingsport Police Department web page.

If you have been following the red-light cameras scene….you should check out the following link below.

California Court of Appeal declines traffic camera company request to depublish Santa Ana appellate decision.

California’s second highest court on Wednesday upheld the publication status of a key decision that called into question the legitimacy of red light camera evidence. The state Court of Appeal rejected the request of the cities of Santa Ana and Menlo Park to depublish a May appellate ruling of the Orange County Superior Court (view the California v. Khaled decision) that found the red light camera photographs presented as evidence in court were inadmissible hearsay.

Read more via California Court of Appeal Publishes Red Light Camera Hearsay Decision.

Ohio Appeals Court allows constitutional challenge to speed camera program in Cleveland to proceed.

Ohio’s second highest court on Thursday ruled that a constitutional challenge to photo enforcement should proceed. Attorney Jeffrey Posner had appealed a speed camera ticket he received from a private contractor operating in Cleveland on the grounds that the way the private firm handled the evidence undermined his right to due process. A three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals for the Eight Appellate District found merit in his concerns and reversed the Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court decision that previously had found no problem with the system of automated ticketing.

Read more via Ohio Appeals Court Green Lights Traffic Camera Suit.

Oregon driver accused of running green light, Texas man falsely accused and Georgia motorists trapped by illegally short yellows.

A red light camera accused a man of running a red light in Portland, Oregon even though the light was actually green. Mark Ginsberg received the $287 ticket that had been mailed by Affiliated Computer Services for the alleged February 2 offense, The Oregonian reported. Instead of merely paying the citation, the attorney took a closer look and noticed the ticket claimed the light had been red for 24.9 seconds when the camera flashed. The red phase of the traffic signal only lasts 25 seconds, meaning the light was green by the time he had entered the intersection. The prosecution dropped the case to avoid having the Multnomah County Circuit Court issue a ruling.

A man in living in San Antonio, Texas received a ticket in the mail for a crime allegedly committed in Houston. Douglas Bond was nowhere near that city when the incident happened, KENS-TV reported. Although Bond drives a Chevy Silverado, the Silverado in the citation photograph was distinctly different from his own. Houston police did not care that Bond was falsely accused and said he should just pay the ticket, threatening to place a hold on his vehicle registration if he did not. Only after KENS reporters got involved did American Traffic Solutions and the city relent.

In Atlanta, Georgia and its suburbs, three out of four signals tested by WXIA-TV had yellow signals shorter than the amount required by law. Signals with short yellows generated thousands of citations. The intersection of Freedom Parkway at Boulevard in Atlanta had a 4.2 second yellow when 4.7 was required. It generated 49,322 citations worth $2,404,010 in revenue. In January, the Georgia Department of Transportation ordered the city to shut down the red light camera as a hazard.

via Georgia, Oregon, Texas: Innocent Drivers Mailed Photo Tickets.

Red light cameras shut down across Italy in massive fraud scandal involving 109 public officials and contractors.

Red light cameras are shut down across Italy as the largest ever government investigation into the illegal use of photo enforcement expands. Carabinieri yesterday placed the inventor of the "T-Red" brand of red light camera, Stefano Arrighetti, 45, under house arrest. Another 63 municipal police commanders; 39 mayors and other public officials; and red light camera distributors including Kria, Ci.Ti.Esse, Maggioli, Traffic Technology and Open Software are under investigations. Documents and automated ticketing machines have been seized from 54 municipalities

Read more via Italy: Red Light Camera Makers Arrested for Fraud.

Missouri takes a step toward becoming the sixteenth state to ban automated ticketing machines.

The Missouri state Senate on Monday voted overwhelmingly to ban the use of red light cameras and speed cameras. The measure’s champion, state Senator Jim Lembke (R-St. Louis), had failed in previous efforts to convince his colleagues to end the use of automated ticketing machines. This year, however, he was emboldened by the state supreme court’s decision last month to strike down Springfield’s photo ticketing as illegal (view opinion). Lembke successfully attached the red light camera prohibition to a broader, 106-page transportation measure that included a number of miscellaneous provisions. The vote was 23 to 8 in favor of the ban.

"No county, city, town, village, municipality, state agency, or other political subdivision of this state that is authorized to issue a notice of violation for a violation of a state or local traffic law or regulation, shall use or employ an automated photo red light enforcement system at any intersection within its jurisdiction," Lembke’s amendment stated.

Read more via Missouri Senate Votes To Ban Photo Enforcement.

South San Francisco motorists to receive red light camera ticket refunds within sixty days

Red light camera program troubles continue to grow in South San Francisco, California. On Wednesday, the city council will meet to discuss how to pay the $250,000 bill submitted by the San Mateo County Superior Court to cover the administrative costs of processing $3 million worth of red light camera citation refunds. Because the city failed to properly ratify its contract with American Traffic Solutions, the company in charge of automated ticketing, the 6800 tickets issued between August 14 2009 and February 28, 2010 were declared invalid by the court.

Read more via California: City Fined $250,000 Over Botched Red Light Camera Program.