Common Sense For New Hampshire

From St Louis Today:

Class-action lawsuit challenges Hazelwood’s red light cameras

CLAYTON • Three people have filed a class-action lawsuit against the city of Hazelwood and the company that provides the cameras, saying the city’s red light camera ordinance is unconstitutional.

The city and American Traffic Solutions, Inc., the suit says, have “exploited” the city’s ordinance “in an underhanded practice of persecuting and bilking Missourians under the guise and pretext of a public safety program known as red light cameras,” according to the suit.

Hazelwood first installed the cameras in 2007.

The ordinance creates a presumption of guilt, which is unconstitutional, and and shifts the burden of proof on the vehicle owner to prove his or her innocence, the suit also says.

New class action lawsuit filed over red light camera tickets

HOUSTON (KTRK) — A class action lawsuit has been filed against the city of Houston over red light cameras which are currently turned off. The plaintiffs want the city to dismiss all of the tickets that were issued after voters turned down the cameras last November.

 In the lengthy, on-going legal saga, there is another lawsuit. With a class action lawsuit filed on Friday, the controversy simply will not go away.

From The Victorville, Ca High Desert Daily Press:

Class-action suit brewing over red-light cameras

VICTORVILLE • A local attorney has sent notice that he intends to file a class action lawsuit against the city of Victorville and Redflex Traffic Systems unless changes are made with the way red-light cameras are handled here.

Robert Conaway, a criminal defense attorney from Barstow, is demanding that the two parties stop issuing tickets and that Redflex let Victorville out of its red-light camera contract. Otherwise, Conaway said he will sue unless the city begins paying San Bernardino County Sheriff’s deputies to watch the live video feed and issue tickets as they occur, then appear in court to testify regarding the violations.

From The Arnold, MO Patch:

Class Action Lawsuits Against Missouri Red-Light Camera Cities

Simon Law Firm, a St. Louis-based group, has filed a class action lawsuit against Arnold, other Missouri cities that use red-light cameras and American Traffic Solutions (ATS), the maker of red-light cameras.

The suit also names the Missouri cities of Creve Coeur, Ellisville, Florissant and Kansas City, reports Riverfront Times.

Lawyers with the firm said that Judge Mark Neil’s decision to void St. Louis city’s red-light camera ordinance should apply to all of Missouri.

Neil’s decision said the cameras do not enforce the rules of the road or a city’s traffic regulations, the Riverfront Times reported.

The suing lawyers also said the red-light camera tickets should assess points on violators’ licenses if the cameras are for safety reasons.

Currently red-light camera violations in Missouri are considered non-moving violations, the attorneys said to the Riverfront Times.

From NBC San Francisco:

Red Light Camera Maker Named in Class Action Suit

Roger Jones of Fremont got a ticket for running a red light about 2½ years ago. He’s been fighting to bring them down ever since. When Jones heard about a class action lawsuit against the Southern California city of Victorville regarding their red light camera program, he felt validated.

“There are thousands of us, but to know you’re not alone and that there are people, private citizens, showing that these things are not what there are supposed to be is good,” Jones said.

He objects to the cameras on the basis that they exist to increase profits, not safety. The class action suit claims that the evidence collected by the cameras should not be allowed in court because the infractions it wasn’t witnessed by a police officer.  

From Naples (Fla) News:

Judge to consider settlement in Collier red-light camera class-action suit

COLLIER COUNTY — More than two years after a pair of Collier County drivers filed a class-action lawsuit alleging the county’s red-light cameras were illegal, a circuit judge on Tuesday will be asked to approve a roughly $665,000 settlement to end the legal battle.

Of that settlement, the county will pay about half — $345,820, collected from the tickets, not taxpayers — with the camera vendor, American Traffic Solutions, paying the rest.

From nola (New Orleans) .com:

Class-action suit against Jefferson Parish redlight cameras sends notices to those who paid fines

Drivers who ran afoul of Jefferson Parish’s red-light camera system are receiving some news in the mail this week: a notice that the class-action lawsuit seeking to recoup the fines they paid is moving forward.

The notices were sent to about 145,000 people in the two-year-old suit against Redflex Traffic Systems, the Phoenix, Ariz., company that owns the cameras.

“If they got a ticket and they paid it, they’re a member of the class,” said Joseph McMahon, one of the six plaintiffs’ attorneys suing Jefferson Parish.

The notices come after Judge Robert Pitre of the 24th Judicial District Court in Gretna ruled that a suit brought by motorists Earl Falgoust and Kathleen McMenamin should encompass all the complaints against Redflex, including an older case filed by motorists Timothy Morales, Barry Sevin Jr. and Edwin Bernard. The latter group filed their suit in state court in after losing a similar case in federal court.

Those cases allege that the red light system ran afoul of the state’s laws and constitution.

From The Seattle Times:

2nd suit takes on red-light cameras, 20 cities

A second lawsuit taking on red-light cameras alleges that 20 Washington cities and camera manufacturers have written “what amounts to fake tickets” to thousands of drivers.

Steve Rosen and two other attorneys filed a class-action lawsuit Thursday in King County Superior Court against two camera companies and 20 cities.

The lawsuit says the cities entered into illegal profit-making deals with camera manufacturers. Contracts for most of the cities guaranteed enough tickets to cover the cost of the cameras, and cities agreed to share proceeds from additional tickets, an attorney for the plaintiffs said.

A Bainbridge Island law firm filed a similar class-action suit Tuesday. Both lawsuits are still seeking plaintiffs and want the cities to refund ticketed drivers millions of dollars in fines.

Both lawsuits take aim at what the attorneys say is a misinterpretation of the 2005 state law that allows cities to use the cameras. The law says cities should fine car owners no more than what they can fine them for parking tickets.

Instead, cities fine motorists caught on camera running red lights the same amount they would pay if a police officer saw them run the lights.

And from The Ledger, Polk County, Fla:

Lakeland Close to Settling Red Light Camera Suit

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This is just from the first two pages of Google results.  The list goes on and on and on………………………………………