How To Handle Camera Citation Ticket

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You lot check your postal service to detect a notification that a camera has caught you speeding, or running a ruby-red light. The camera took a picture of your auto and your license plate, and now you're expected to pay several hundred dollars. However, traffic cameras have an uneasy and controversial position in many jurisdictions across the country – for example, if you get a red-light camera ticket in L.A. County you can merely ignore it without penalty^[1] – which means disputing your traffic camera ticket may be easier than you idea.

1
Bank check the date, time, and location of the ticket. Considering photographic camera tickets are sent to the owner of the motorcar, not the driver, make certain you lot actually were driving the car when the ticket was issued.
- By and large, the prosecutor must prove that you were driving at that place at that date and fourth dimension. If someone else borrowed your car, you can't exist prosecuted.^[ii]
- However, sympathize that some states such as New York treat scarlet-light camera tickets like parking violations, holding registered owners liable rather than the commuter specifically.^[3] Brand sure you cheque the red low-cal law in the jurisdiction where you got the ticket.
- If you lot were driving your car, effort to reconstruct the scene and call back what yous were doing or what was happening at the time, and write down whatever details y'all remember. For example, you may have been making a legal right turn on red when the camera took the photo. If you were making a legal maneuver y'all should be able to get the ticket dismissed.^[4]
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Brand annotation of the verbal lawmaking department y'all're cited for violating. Read the law and make sure yous empathize both its elements and the penalties for violation.
- Make sure if penalties are listed in the code department that they match the fines or penalties assessed on your ticket.
- Call back that information technology is the prosecution's burden to show each element of your violation – it's non your responsibility to prove that yous didn't do it.
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Review the photos. If the notification yous received included photos, review them to ostend that its your car in the photograph, and that the photo is clear.
- Your best defense may plow out to be the blurriness of the photo. If the license tag isn't clearly visible, it may be difficult to ostend that the car is yours.^[5]
- If there'southward no clearly identifiable photo of you lot in the driver'due south seat, this may present another avenue of defense. You will exist under oath, and then yous tin can't argue that you weren't driving if yous were – however, you can debate that the prosecution tin't evidence you were driving, or has no show that you were driving. This will get you off the hook if you live in a jurisdiction that requires tickets follow the commuter, not the registered owner of the car.^[half-dozen]
- If photos were not included with your citation, you may need to wait until after your trial is scheduled to request copies from constabulary enforcement.^[vii]
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1
Plead by mail or online, if possible. Some jurisdictions allow you to reply to the citation either by mail or online, rather than going to a live arraignment in traffic court, for less serious traffic violations such as speeding or running a red light.^[viii]
- Yous must plead not guilty if you want to dispute the traffic camera ticket, and you can't pay the fine listed. In some jurisdictions, paying the fine is considered an admission of guilt.
- Cheque your citation and brand sure yous plead not guilty earlier the deadline. Typically you'll take 30 days to dispute the ticket, only the time period may be shorter.
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Appear at arraignment. If you take no selection merely to appear in traffic court if y'all intend to plead not guilty, bear witness upwardly at the engagement and time listed on your commendation.
- This also may be called a first appearance or a notice hearing, depending on your jurisdiction.^[9]
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Request a formal hearing. When yous plead non guilty, demand a full formal hearing or trial.
- When you asking a full trial, you lot also may exist required to attend other hearings such as a pre-trial hearing or mediation. Attend those as required, only don't accept annihilation less than a full dismissal of your traffic camera ticket.
4
Asking production of documents. Now that you have a court date, recall the local police department or other law enforcement bureau in accuse of the photographic camera used to issue your citation.
- If photos were not included with your citation, you'll need to request copies of them.^[10]
- Yous also should request full maintenance records for the camera and the traffic lite or speed monitoring system to establish that they were regularly monitored and maintained. If their accuracy wasn't tested inside a short period of time earlier your ticket was issued, the photo is potentially unreliable as bear witness.^[xi]
5
Inquiry the applicable police. Look for cases in your city or county well-nigh traffic cameras, and see if whatever appellate court decisions have ruled on the legality of traffic camera tickets.
- Bated from the camera itself, there may be other defenses that are recognized past law. For instance, some states have specific rules nearly where warning signs must exist posted for traffic lights. If the warning signs were obscured or not nowadays, yous'd have a defense.
- Some states recognize a necessity defense force for speeding. Since obviously a photographic camera cannot tell why you were speeding, you may be able to get out of the ticket this way.^[12]
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1
Appear at your scheduled hearing. Make it at the courthouse on the mean solar day of your hearing with copies of whatever documents you intend to employ equally testify in your defense force.
- Make sure annihilation you bring with you is organized and you lot have a clean, professional appearance. Treat the approximate and all courthouse staff with respect. Don't do annihilation to give the judge the opportunity to brand a snap judgment that yous are untrustworthy or accept an mental attitude trouble.
2

Listen while the prosecutor presents the case against y'all. The prosecutor will have the first opportunity to speak in your case. Listen quietly, making notes where something is said that you want to bring upwardly after, but do not interrupt or speak directly to the prosecutor.^[thirteen]
3
Challenge the admissibility of the photograph as hearsay. In some jurisdictions such equally Broward Canton, Florida,^[xiv] a red low-cal camera photo is considered hearsay.^[15]
- Basically, hearsay is defined as an out-of-courtroom statement presented in court to show the truth of the matter asserted.^[16] In this case, the photograph is an out-of-court "statement" that prosecution is attempting to use to prove you violated the traffic law.
- Hearsay evidence is inadmissible unless it fits into i of the exceptions carved out of the rule. Yet, there are more two dozen hearsay exceptions.^[17] Some courts accept fit traffic camera photos into these exceptions, simply others have non. Enquiry the issue to find out if this objection is available in your jurisdiction.
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Assert your right to confront witnesses. The Sixth Subpoena of the Constitution guarantees you the right to catechize witnesses.
- Unless a witness appears who maintains the record and system associated with the photographic camera, y'all do non have this opportunity.^[18]
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Dispute the authenticity of the photograph. If no one from the company that maintains the photographic camera shows up to testify, object to the use of the photographs for lack of foundation.^[19]
- Likewise, if you have a camera ticket for speeding, the company or officeholder who maintained the camera and the speed detection equipment must announced in courtroom to prove or the photo has no foundation to be admitted into testify.
- For the prosecution to rely on the photos, it must nowadays bear witness that the camera that took the photograph, the system that connected information technology to the traffic light, and the traffic lite itself were functioning properly. Without establishing this foundation that all of these machines are reliable, the photo is not reliable and cannot be admitted into show.^[twenty]
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Attack the lack of bear witness. If the photos are clear and the guess allows them, but none of them clearly show yous driving, you have a defence force that the prosecution cannot prove it was yous driving the motorcar.^[21]
- The photo also provides no proof that the traffic light was functioning properly. If prosecution can't prove the traffic low-cal was functioning properly, they can't prove that you ran the ruby-red calorie-free.^[22]
- These same arguments apply if you lot take a camera ticket for speeding. Prosecution must prove that the speed detection system was functioning properly for the photo to be evidence that y'all were speeding.
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Raise any other possible defenses. If your attack on the photographic camera fails and the photos are admitted as bear witness, utilise whatever other defenses you lot may have found in your inquiry that applied in your case.
- You don't have to deny guilt for many of these defenses to work. For example, if y'all use the defense that you acted out of necessity to avoid damage to yourself or others, you lot're basically saying that you committed the violation just it was for a good reason.^[23]
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Article Summary X

To dispute a traffic photographic camera ticket, plead non guilty by writing to your traffic courtroom on the accost provided. If you take to attend an arraignment, plead not guilty and request a formal hearing. While y'all're waiting for your hearing, research the law in your surface area to build a legal defense. For case, some states require conspicuously visible warning signs for cameras to be posted before a traffic lite. If the alarm signs were obscured or not present, you might non accept to pay the fine. Some states besides recognize a necessity defense for speeding, so if you were driving to the hospital in a rush, you lot might too accept a defense force. When you arrive at court, present your instance, using any evidence to support your claim. For more tips from our Legal co-author, including how to contend that speeding photographic camera photos are hearsay in courtroom, read on!

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