TICKET TYRANNY
‘It’s a ridiculous setup,’ fumes driver given 6 automatic $135 tickets visiting mom – now she’s fighting the city
Drivers can see a check of up to $330 addressed to the ticket holder
CITY lawmakers have done away with an automatic ticket program after a lawsuit was filed - drivers were cited unfairly.
An automatic traffic ticket program only lasted a few months before it was canceled.
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Drivers in Tuskegee, Alabama rejoice as a 20-page lawsuit puts the speeding camera program on hold in late July, according to NBC affiliate WRBL.
The lawsuit was filed against the city and those who oversaw the speeding cameras.
The program was initiated earlier this year, and was installed on three roads close to schools - Franklin Road, Montgomery Road, and Chappie James Drive.
Because the cameras were in a school zone, or close to one, several drivers were cited for traveling over 20 mph the speed limit.
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Some fines were as high as $330 per ticket.
Tuskegee's Mayor, Lawrence Haygood, cited "procedural oversights" of the program before halting the program.
The lawsuit includes nine plaintiffs, but many others were included in the batch of drivers that were unfairly cited.
Until the lawsuit is concluded, the city said any unpaid tickets from the cameras are void.
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Those who already paid their fines will be fully refunded.
Jenae Whitfield lives close to one of the cameras and took to Facebook to air her grievances with the program.
Drivers warned of automatic fines up to $1,000 with new cameras in effect from July 1 – state can even take tax refund
She reposted an announcement of the impending refunds and included her own story.
"If you paid a ticket for the traffic cameras in Tuskegee, they are sending refunds out via a check to the person that had their name on the ticket," her repost read.
Whitfield then told her friends and followers how many tickets she received from the cameras.
"These jokers sent me six tickets!" she wrote.
"They were going to have to come find me in Montgomery because I wasn't paying. It was ridiculous."
She said it felt as if the city was looking for ways to bring in additional revenue with unfair means.
How to fight a speeding ticket
According to a legally reviewed post, there are five effective strategies to fighting a speeding ticket if it was wrongfully issued.
- If pulled over and issued a ticket, drivers can argue or dispute a driver's personal opinion. When issuing a speeding ticket, an officer is required to write their opinion and come to an "objective" conclusion. If the ticket was written based on that judgment, it can be contested. An example would be if you were going 75 mph in a 65 mph zone because others were traveling at the same speed, you could argue that it would be more dangerous to travel at 65 mph.
- You can dispute the officer's presentation of evidence. If you were ticketed for something like running a stop sign or making an illegal u-turn, you can't contest that if an officer saw you, but you can call things into court like eyewitnesses, diagrams, or photos.
- Argue that the ticket was issued by a "mistake of fact." This is tricky, but a "mistake of fact" is a mistake made by a driver about a situation that was beyond their control, or if a driver legitimately did not know they were violating the law. For example, you were driving in two lanes because the lane markers were so worn down that you could not see them.
- You could say circumstances justified your driving. You could say you were speeding to pass a possibly drunk driver, or avoiding an accident by rapidly changing lanes. However, the argument won't work if there's proof you continued to speed after passing.
- Similar to the above, it could be argued that speeding was necessary to avoid harm. The key is to argue that if you weren't speeding, you or someone else could have been harmed.
- Consult a traffic attorney, if all else fails. Many have free consultations to decide whether or not there's a case.
Source: FindLaw
"It was a setup to get revenue from unsuspecting people like myself," she continued.
"I'm glad the citizens came together to get them taken down."
In the comments section, she wrote that half of the tickets she got were issued when she was visiting her mom.
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"I got a pair of tickets on three separate trips to visit my mom," she explained.
"One ticket going and another when I left. Each one was $135. I normally try to do the right thing but they had me messed up real bad."