Redflex Corruption

[Jim_H]

I got a ticket in the mail yesterday. Here is the "evidence" against me. If I were doing 79 in the 65 as claimed, I would have been in the trunk of the car in front of me. I am car #2 behind the truck. A car from Colorado is passing me, and he may have been going 79, but I don't know. If he was, it looks like I got his ticket.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HH3NTQrE12k

AZDPS and Redflex are clearly lying about the quality control they claim to do, and they have no problems sending a ticket to an innocent victim to help tighten the budget problem and fatten the corporate profits. If they looked at the videos as they claim to do, I never would have gotten this.

Something tells me I am not the first person to whom this has happened. Is anyone interested in starting a class action lawsuit against a company which gathers evidence for the state without a private investigators license, and has profit as its motive behind "law enforcement"?

[chumley]

@hikeaz
Those HOA board members must've been horribly bullied back in grade school.

[hikeaz]

US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg's plan to 'promote speed safety cameras' is raising the troubling specter of ubiquitous automated traffic enforcement in the style of the UK, where the cameras are widely despised. Buttigieg's 42-page "road safety plan" that was unveiled on Thursday and is backed by $14 billion in funding from the new infrastructure bill that contained only brief mention of the speed camera plan.

[hikeaz]

The city of Alexandria, Virginia, last week admitted the red light camera at the intersection of Duke Street and South Walker Street had illegally issued fines to 4709 drivers over the course of three-and-a-half years! Between January 26, 2016, and October 4, 2019, cars that entered the intersection an alleged 0.5 seconds after the light turned red received tickets in the mail from the city's private contractor, Verra Mobility. Virginia state law mandates a half-second grace period that explicitly prohibits issuance of red light camera tickets in the first 0.5 seconds of the red phase at an intersection. Studies show accidents are essentially non-existent during the first seconds a light is red because cross traffic is held during an all-red phase.

In Pennsylvania, state representatives Frank Farry (R-Bucks County) and K.C. Tomlinson (R-Bucks County) announced on January 27 that the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) erroneously issued photo radar tickets on US Route 1. An estimated 5000 tickets, worth between $75 and $150 each, were issued based on an incorrectly set speed limit in an unsigned work zone, according to the agency. Drivers who were not actually speeding received citations and complained to the lawmakers, who ordered an investigation into the matter. PennDOT's cameras, owned and operated by Verra Mobility (formerly Redflex), have generated more than $50 million since they were introduced two years ago.

These guys remind me of the Wayans Brothers years ago; mo money, mo money mo MONEY!

[hikeaz]

Red light cameras have once again been found unconstitutional in North Carolina following a decision Tuesday by the state Court of Appeals. A three-judge panel unanimously struck down a "funding scheme" the General Assembly and city of Greenville had used a to bypass the state constitutional requirement that money from fines be used for the benefit of local schools. Instead, a third of the cash has been diverted for the use of out-of-state vendors. The court took care to note that the system was set up by an ATS engineer, Robert F. Rennebaum, who, according to the state engineering board, had been "aiding and abetting [ATS] to evade or attempt to evade the provisions of [North Carolina law]." Rennebaum was banned from practicing engineering in the state and fined $5000 in 2019. The state Court of Appeals struck down red light cameras on the same grounds fifteen years ago in a decision upheld by the Supreme Court. When cities learned they would no longer be able to keep the profits from the program, they quickly dropped the cameras. Cary, Charlotte, Fayetteville, Greenville, Greensboro, High Point and Rocky Mount all shut down in the wake of the ruling. Then... in an end-around, the legislature in 2016 began approving local laws with the "funding scheme" to bypass the 2007 court decision.

But no worries....... it's all about 'safety' donchaknow.

[hikeaz]

Tony Ragucci, the former mayor of Oakbrook Terrace, Illinois, on Thursday entered a not guilty plea to federal red light camera corruption charges. In a hearing conducted by telephone before the US District Court in Chicago, Ragucci explained that he understood his rights and wanted to proceed with defending against allegations that he had a role in the scheme orchestrated by Safespeed operatives to install automated ticketing machines in the city to generate revenue both for Safespeed and for Ragucci personally. The deal gave Safespeed's sales agent a $14 cut of every photo ticket issued. The scheme fell apart quickly. Ragucci signed a contract with Safespeed in 2012, and the cameras were installed in August 2017. By January 2018, Safespeed co-founder Omar Maani cut a deal with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, agreeing to turn informant against the public officials he had been bribing in return for staying out of prison. That information triggered a raid on Ragucci's home from which federal investigators seized nearly $60,000 in cash. Safespeed's sales agent offered to put Ragucci's relative on the payroll in return for his support of the photo enforcement plan. Instead of hiring the relative, however, the agent just paid him $3500 per month in an amount that increased if the number of photo tickets issued in the city also went up.
Likewise, Ragucci allegedly pocketed a monthly sum from the sales agent, who was not named. After the salesman died in January 2018, family members took over sales job. On July 19, 2018, Ragucci demanded a $5000 bonus from them for renewing the red light camera contract from Maani and he received it two weeks later. The following year he allegedly asked for a $7500 renewal bonus. Safespeed on September 14, 2018, wired $100,305 to the sales company that distributed the bribe payments.

But it's all about safety; right?
Whevever you are robbing Peter to pay Paul, you can always count on the support of Paul.

[hikeaz]

Anti-tyranny citizen(s)in Albuquerque, New Mexico swiped the speed camera that had been issuing automated tickets at the intersection of Lead Avenue and Cornell Drive on Monday, June 27. The device was cut from its mounting base after having issued automated citations for a little over two weeks. By allowing a private company to install, operate and issue tickets with the devices, the city council defied the will of voters expressed in a 2011 referendum overturning the city's prior red light camera program. The city had its camera operator remove the camera located at Coal Avenue and Cornell Drive to prevent the device from being grabbed. Two other cameras remain in use.

[big_load]

Speed cameras are going to 24/7 operation in NYC starting tomorrow (8/1/22). 2,000 intersections are currently equipped.

[chumley]

@big_load Not sure if they're the same ones you're talking about but the one thing you can give them some credit for is that NYC operates the cameras themselves (as opposed to Redflex or some other 3rd party).

Of course they don't even pretend that it's about safety ... the program is run by the Department of Finance. And of course it's a scam. Like a parking ticket, they don't pretend to cite the driver. Just the car. They don't even care who's driving. A photo of the car speeding it all it takes. And the $50 fine makes it easier to pay than to fight.

[big_load]

@big_load Not sure if they're the same ones you're talking about but the one thing you can give them some credit for is that NYC operates the cameras themselves (as opposed to Redflex or some other 3rd party).

Of course they don't even pretend that it's about safety ... the program is run by the Department of Finance. And of course it's a scam. Like a parking ticket, they don't pretend to cite the driver. Just the car. They don't even care who's driving. A photo of the car speeding it all it takes. And the $50 fine makes it easier to pay than to fight.

I think your response is entirely accurate. I'm still trying to figure out how anyone gets above the speed limit in Manhattan, apart from cab drivers who floor it when the light turns green, and even then only when they're lucky enough to have a couple blocks open ahead.

[azbackpackr]

@big_load
I always thought that no actual real people drive in Manhattan. It's just sort of a bumper car ride. I mean, no one in the City actually has a driver's license, do they?

[big_load]

@big_load
I always thought that no actual real people drive in Manhattan. It's just sort of a bumper car ride. I mean, no one in the City actually has a driver's license, do they?

If they do, it's not the one they show police if they get pulled over. I have driven there a couple times, but it's really not worth the aggravation. After a train or bus ride from NJ, it's faster and easier to walk.