Beating Red Light Cameras
How do you beat a red light camera? We get asked that question all the time. The short answer is, it's complicated, but it can be done, and we do it all the time.
Red light camera tickets are a unique type of ticket, mainly because they are not issued by police officers, they are mailed to you after the camera takes a picture and a private company sends you the ticket. They have been in the news since they first came out because the only reason they were installed was to generate revenue (spare me the rhetoric about public safety) and now that they've been operational for a year, lo and behold, they are not producing the type of money the cities were promised.
The main reason given for why the red light cameras are not generating the expected revenue is because of the number of people who are fighting them and winning. Not only is this costing the city every time a ticket gets dismissed, but the cost in trying to prosecute these tickets is also cutting into the cities expected profit.
My answer to that? Too bad for the cities. These tickets are just another tax and the law that was created was so poorly written, it's no wonder the lawyers are defeating them. The law is flawed in so many ways you can take your pick in how you choose to defend yourself.
For starters, it turns on its head the notion of innocent until proven guilty as the state does not have to prove your guilt, you are forced to prove your innocence. These tickets charge the owner of the vehicle instead of the driver and if you were not driving, you are forced to prove to the state you were not driving and give them information about who was driving? Heaven forbid you know it was your spouse who was driving when you received the ticket, as the law regarding a spouses privelege from testifying against another spouse clearly was not considered.
I don't want to get too technical, but the rules of evidence were also not taken into consideration as there are blatant violations everywhere. Additionally, there are equal protection arguments to be made, constitutional arguments and chain of custody and many others.
Going to court and fighting these tickets allows you a virtual cornucopia of defenses. So, to summarize, beating red light camera tickets is possible, we do it all the time, and we encourage as many people as possible to fight every one they get.
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