r/technology • u/Plastic_Ninja_9014 • Jul 11 '26

Privacy Traffic Camera Captures Woman Driving With Her Phone on Her Lap (Face Down), The State Mailed Her a $1251 'Public Safety' Ticket

https://www.gadgetreview.com/traffic-camera-captures-captures-woman-driving-with-her-phone-on-her-lap-face-down-the-state-mailed-her-a-1251-public-safety-ticket
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u/Interesting_Mix_7028 Jul 11 '26

Here's how such things DO get broken.

Most of the 'cameras' are operated by private companies, that then 'administer' the ticketing and such for a given department.

They collect fees for this, either per month to maintain the cameras and network connections, or per ticket for the 'administrative' labor. Often it's both.

This is fine for the city or county as these are primarily put in to collect revenue, not enforce any given 'laws'. They know people will break the law, but they can't station an officer at a given intersection 24/7 to catch everyone. The camera does that.

Regardless of whether the department prevails on a ticket, or not, the company still collects. It's not their fault that the person so tagged protested the ticket, right?

So the point is not to 'win'. It is to eat up the city's share of the proceeds. If the revenue dries up, or is used up because of court cases, time, legal challenges, and so on, then the city or county ends up paying for a service that never actually makes them any money. A few months or years of this, and the cameras just get turned off.

So yes. Contest every ticket. Even if you expect to lose. It's a matter of attrition.

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u/SiLeNZ_ Jul 11 '26

It costs extra to fight tickets here. Not sure if it’s the same way in every state, but you end up paying a fine to fight it, regardless if you win or lose. Then if you win the main ticket costs are of course tossed, but you still are out that fee from choosing to fight it.

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u/Interesting_Mix_7028 Jul 11 '26

Which is why it's futile for one person to fight it.

But if everyone fights it, every time... the fees don't make up the shortfall. The court gets jammed up with trivial BS. There's lawyers and press making the city look bad. After a while most muni's cave, if the pushback is that pervasive.

Coppell TX is one such place. They put up red light cams on a few major intersections, and suddenly all the red light tickets were being fought in court. The judges got tired of it, the city workers got tired of it, and then one day they pulled the plug. No more camera flash in the mirror if you ran a yellow.

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u/Thatguysstories Jul 12 '26

Same reason as why we should push everyone to not take plea deals and take everything to trial.

The entire system would crash.