Posted on 01/25/2007 11:33:36 PM PST by weegee
Cameras recently began snapping photos of red-light scofflaws at 10 more intersections across the city, but many violators likely won't pay the $75 fine.
About a quarter of drivers ticketed from September through December had paid the fine by the end of the year, Houston Police Department records show.
The actual collection rate may be higher because of a lag time between when a driver receives a violation and pays the fine, said Adam Tuton, vice president of American Traffic Solutions Inc., the camera vendor.
Violators have 45 days to pay or request a hearing to contest the citation. So some drivers ticketed in December still have time to pay, or payments already made may be recorded in January statistics.
More than 14,000 citations were issued between September, when the program went into effect, and December. That includes 10 city intersections where cameras were first installed, as well as 10 more locations where cameras began photographing violators' license plates in November.
"The program is working much like we anticipated," said Sgt. Michael Muench, who oversees it.
Cameras at a third set of locations, mostly on service roads including several on the Southwest Freeway, began photographing violators Saturday. Police plan to install the technology at a total of 50 intersections.
Estimate on track When the camera-monitoring program began, police estimated a quarter of violators would pay their tickets. Houston Police Department Budget Director Larry Yium said then that the estimate was low and somewhat arbitrary. Jim Tuton, Adam Tuton's brother and the CEO of ATS, said previously that he expected the collection rate to be as high as 90 percent, based on collections in other cities.
Unpaid citations are referred to collection agencies, so nonpayment could show up on credit reports. But because camera-generated citations are civil, not criminal, courts can't issue arrest warrants for those who don't pay, as they can for drivers who don't pay speeding tickets — or red-light tickets issued by police who witness violations.
The lack of that criminal tool against violators caught on camera may partly explain why the city hasn't been able to dragoon more violators into paying.
Only a handful of drivers who were issued civil citations during the first two months contested them, records show, with even fewer persuading a judge to throw the ticket out.
Red-light-camera citations are difficult to argue because the evidence, a video recording, is so damning. Jim Tuton said some violators who plan to contest their ticket decide not to after reviewing the video online.
Houston PING
Our big brother types here in Tucson just approved a bunch of cameras to catch speeders. This is a city with absolute gridlock. You can't move. We have almost no freeways. We sit backed up at traffic lights with no one coming the opposite direction. But they want more cameras.
The imbeciles do construction only at peak times on peak streets and have just cut speed limits on the freeway access roads citywide to 25 miles an hour from 50 because of a gem show. Earlier this week they closed every bridge in the city because it had snowed. Wrecks were rampant and the snarls were five times as bad as usual.
This is a liberal city with a rino mayor and all Dem city council. These liberals are devils I tell you. Complete nutbags.
I'm surprised as heck that these aren't criminal cases. Usually for traffic stuff they'll toss you in jail to rot.
Here in LA the cameras DO catch people who run lights and kill people. And the find is more like $250.
I meant to say fine.
The only reason they get away with this crap is that so few people know anything about law. There has to be a plaintiff and a witness. In these cases, the plaintiff, witness, and evidence are all a machine. Machines have no standing to sue. And since the court is an equity court (most people don't even know that), a contract has to be created. Most of the time the contracts is the judge's offer of a fine. All you have to do is decline his offer of contract and there's nothing else anybody can do about it.
Follow the money. These are revenue tickets. Since the collection has been outsourced (as is tax collection), those seeking payment just don't have the authority.
Oh... Fooled me. From the title, I thought they had set up cameras in the red-light district and had proven that most customers were running away rather than paying.
So, if I don't care about my credit rating (I don't), these cameras have no power over me at all.
Not having a front license plate don't hurt either...
It's revenue for the city, pure and simple, and they're just getting more and more brazen about it with each passing month.
The burden of proof is on their shoulders, how can they prove that you were driving?
Not here in New york city. They send you this citation in the mail along with a photo of your cars licence plate and they deem you guilty without anyway to contest it, and you must pay or they will "suspend your license". I was talking to someone about this last week, how is this constitutional? Where the hell do they get off declaring me immediately guilty without any plea on my behalf? How do I know the camera wasn`t broken and took the pic when it was a green light?
Find a copy of the United States Constitution, then read article 7 of the Bill of Rights. Then THINK : that's YOUR constitution right : if it's over $20 you can request a jury trial(and "a" means singular, not plural).
That is my preferred greeting to an intersection camera. It's my way of acknowledging big brother is #1 and they can just go..... you know.
I think the case waits to be made, that liberals hate cars because they hate the freedom that cars give other people to go when and where they please.
Urban planners have always been liberals, and they've hated cars intestinally since the 1960's at least, when I was surprised to have a look at an urban-planning magazine, just out of curiosity, and find such animosity across the board against their having to plan and allow for people's cars. It was surprising then, given that America was such a progressive country and Americans liked their cars so well.
Nuh-uh. These cameras can't be used without an observing officer signing a complaint, under common law, so what they've done is to rejigger the laws and bring in the red-light cameras and radars under admiralty law, which is a relic of pre-revolutionary jurisprudence that has somehow escaped reconciliation with the Constitution.
It's extraconstitutional and pre-constitutional law, the defendant is your car itself, and you have no rights, nor even any standing before the law.
Smoke that for a while!
IOW, it's worse than you thought, and oh, by the way, admiralty law is growing and creeping into all sorts of situations in which the Powers That Be don't want to bother with you and just want to tank you and take your money.
It isn't -- see my last.
This is so bad, even Dick Armey, while he was still House Majority Leader, was running a private crusade against this stuff. Google on Armey and red light cameras and a couple of other keywords ("radar" etc.), and you'll find references to his activism against red-light cameras four or five years ago. He also delivered some material to the Houston City Council when they were considering this program at the end of 2004, but he didn't stay to testify to the Council. Only a couple of council members showed any signs of taking a real interest in the issue.
No problem-o : what do they call it when thousands of people join in a law suit against the government? All a young firebrand of a lawyer has to do is gather the names of all the people(public information, yes?)that didn't pay the speeding ticket-fine, then file a motion for them to omit admiralty law under the constitution.
District court all the way to the supreme court : which rules : this arcane admiralty law or the law all federal officers are sworn to uphold? After all, who REALLY rules in a democracy, the cops/criminal justice system or the PEOPLE?
Judges firmly believe their job is to protect the cops and the system from the people. How many SWAT teams do the people have?
Well then, if that's the case, the insurance companies can't raise your rates since it's the car, not the person.
This is my big beef with these cameras...My wife and my kids drive my car. The camera can't tell who is driving if they only picture the license plate. My should my insurance rates get raised if, say, it's my kid who drove the car.
LOL, funny story: I was visiting Quincy, Ill last year from my native Michigan, and I hit this school zone with a radar equipped sign that said "Speed Limit 20, Your Speed xx" I slowed down, but not fast enough, and strobe lights fired off from the same sign.
The thing took a picture of the front of my car! But Michigan doesn't have front plates...
Here in Iowa that is the cause for a class action suit.
But the cities won't stop, and say it is a "safety" measure. So in the city court, the fine goes to the owner of the car, and not the driver.
That's because they instill fear in all the other drivers who will no longer risk using the rest of the yellow to clear the intersections.
The loss of a few seconds crossing time at every light controlled intersection in a large city can be massive.
Now if the cameras don't work, there are these electrically controlled machineguns that might. A few serious "incidents" and folks would quit running the red.
I got one of the notes and I haven't done a thing with it.
EVERY person should contest these tickets and clog the courts. Let em eat crow.
Last year the city ticketing system was screwed up and in 2006 were being served with warrants for failure to appear in court for 2007 court dates.
And the city said they would stand by the arrest warrants, it was up to the citizens to get the charges dropped.
In Houston gridlock is caused by poor synchronization of traffic lights. Of course making the lead car stop at every intersection (when driving the limit) is a good way to encourage "red light runners" to pay their red-light tax.
I got one recently. Paid it right away since I was wrong.
I remember when these red light cameras first came out some clever entrepreneur invented a clear plastic cover for your rear license plate that made the numbers unreadable unless you were looking directly at them. I don't remember what they were called but I do remember wanting to get one.
You can find them on the internet. In states that have red-light cameras they are also technically illegal.
I say "technically" becuase it is required to have a front plate in my state but none of my cars have had them since the early 80's. I've gotten two tickets in that time...
And the interesting thing is that I got speeding tickets, yet did not have a front plate and they did not ticket me for that.
These cameras are such B.S. If you're doing 25mph and you're 30ft from the light in a left turning lane, you enter on the yellow and it turns red while you're in the middle of the intersection - and you get a ticket for that? Or what, hit the brakes and skid into the crosswalk and throw everything in the car forward? What a bunch of crap. This needs to stop. Now I can understand it if someone blatently runs a red light while cross traffic is and has been obviously running green. That's dangerous. But busting someone for the above scenario is just plain B.S.
Thanks, I`m going to check him out. What my problem is, is that I drive a taxi (see my profile) and the tickets are just never ending. It`s usually little stuff such as my trip sheet is not filled out correctly, or a license plate light is out (a ticket I got last week) but what really drives me crazy is these damn traffic cameras.
I would say I get one at least once a month, the latest being 2 weeks ago, and believe me, I make damn sure I stop at all yellow lights, not even red, YELLOW and I STILL get these effin` things in the mail! And it drives me nuts I can`t contest them.
This is absolutely unconstitutional, it doesn`t matter how small the violation is. I talked to a lawyer about this and he told me "there is the law and then there is the cities law which doesn`t follow any kind of reality"...Just wonderful..unreal, but the way I see it, just by not letting me contest these tickets is reason enough why they should be dismissed.
Ha! In real gridlock, with real idiots, you probably can't move at all when your light turns green, because the intersection is clogged with idiots who entered it without any exit in sight. They do this partly because they are in competition with all the people turning right onto the same street. I got caught in this in Vancouver a couple of years ago - must have taken me 20 minutes to move a hundred yards.
That's the problem isn't it? The judges, esp federal judges, consider themselves THE LAW. That's why Roberts and Alito sit on the supreme court now. The ARROGANCE of clinton's liberal judges is slowly being eroded away by GWB, and that's a GOOD thing.
You see, the Founders knew that men must be governed, ie, not anarchy, so they designed the constitution to put GOVERNMENT on a short leash. They knew only too well the TYRANNY of unrestrained kings, and army thugs, and JUDGES.
The movie is THE PATRIOT starring Mel Gibson. As relavent today with expanding government as it was then...
Heh, heh. O ye of little faith!
They'll just say they aren't raising your rates -- they're just raising rates on the car!
Haven't heard yet about any moves by the insurance companies yet to get ticket info. Think they're waiting, biding their time. Expect to hear from them eventually, though -- although it'll probably be an "outing" of a subterranean, mole-like industry-group (I.I.I. or I.I.H.S., one of the umbrella groups) effort to weasel the info out of the City (pardon the mixed critter-metaphor).
Think that was a Nightline piece on ABC. At least ABC is willing to admit that they've been significantly underestimating Thomas.
Having never had a car in my intestines, I can understand why.
Well, that's not entirely true. I had a Probe up there, once.
Yes, remember well his "high tech lynching" during his confirmation hearings by anita hill(judas)and her gang(pharisees). He's been a lightning rod for the liberal thunderbolts thrown at the supreme court ever since. And yet he's borne up well against all the assaults, showing everyone the christian gentleman that he is. The faith and patience of the saints : we're still waiting to see the judas-ending for anita hill...
Sounds to me pretty much like what needs to happen.
Meanwhile, while out driving,
Now, there was a bent chick...... yeah, she and Cindy Sheehan will be sharing a halter, I should imagine. And Hanoi Jane, and Michael Moore. Moore had better go last; he might break it. Or if it's to be "rage before beauty", Jane would go last. But if it's "pearls before swine" then Moore would go last.n "Pearls before swine" it is.
I think it's deliberate policy. The New Urbanism shibboleth covering it is "traffic calming", a euphemism for "let's screw traffic up so bad nobody will be able to afford to live in the suburbs any more".
I've seen the same thing in Nebraska, in lightly-patrolled speed zones near town, e.g. on U.S. 81 between York and Belleville, Kansas. They're in pairs, one facing each way at either end of the speed zone, and they use Ka-band radars. They're purely advisory, although I suppose they could be equipped with cameras. Watch out for the fullgrown bear, though, about half a mile beyond the first sign, parked down in the median.
Bunker mentality! Really though, we do need a decision on this "admiralty law" thing. Every federal officer takes an OATH upon the BIBLE to defend and protect the CONSTITUTION against all enemies, foreign and domestic. GWB is doing that now w/the sanfransicko and her cronies.
So all we have to do, to halt this slide toward a police state under this "admiralty law" is question it in court. With hundreds of thousands, if not MILLIONS of people joining in the lawsuit, it can't be IGNORED by the supreme court; and it's a no-brainer decision-wise.
michael moore...now if you were visiting from a foreign country and knew virtually nothing about local politics and personalities, and you saw a picture of that SLOB as representing millions of american's political viewpoints, what would you think? I mean, really, the guy is a scruffy-bearded SLOB, he looks like some kind of homeless bum pushing his RV-shopping cart down a trash-strewn street; probably smells like one too.
As a liberal icon/poster boy you gotta wonder, don't you? THIS is what you want running your country via the witch as prez?
You have a lot of guts!
Please add me to the Houston Ping list, thanks.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.