Traffic Tickets And Municipal Code Violations: Promoting Safety Or Skewing Justice?
Do traffic tickets and cameras promote safety or are they just a convenient cash-grab for the state?
A recent lawsuit that was filed in Atlanta, against the city of Doraville, shines light on how these "traffic safety" systems and tickets over municipal code violations, have the potential to be used unfairly by the government in order to raise money.
The lawsuit is arguing that the city has an excessive reliance on fines and fees that are coming from traffic stops and municipal infractions, and that because of their reliance on collecting this money they suggest that it skews the justice system.
The fight is drawing attention the vast amount of revenue that the state is able to collect in various regions as a result of numerous fines and fees that people have been ticketed with.
In other words, they're allegedly planning on paying for their various projects by using money from tickets that haven't even been given out yet. Which makes it look like authorities might have an incentive to target and convict people for various non-violent and trivial violations.
As one attorney from the Institute for Justice points out, the organization behind the lawsuit, the people don't have due process if the judge presiding over their case has a financial bias against them from the beginning. Critics might say that people should simply follow the law and they wouldn't receive a fine, however for some jurisdictions that rely heavily on this financing they would essentially be close to bankruptcy if they didn't have the money coming in from this scheme.
The city of Doraville is being criticized for being one of the most prolific ticket writers in the entire nation and those behind the lawsuit are saying that the city is guilty of engaging in unconstitutional policing for profit practices.
The city has allegedly been making plans that involve having between 17-30 percent of their funding come from potential tickets and fines that will be issued from code inspectors and police officers.
This isn't the first lawsuit of its kind that's sought to fight the state over their seemingly corrupt practices of policing for profit in various regions around the country. When residents are being fined excessively and threatened with jail time over non-violent offenses, it's hard to see how that promotes their safety or well-being.
One sheriff from Humboldt County was previously accused of having confiscated more than 60k from drivers that had never been charged with any crime.
Pics:
Pixabay
Sources:
https://www.app.com/story/news/investigations/watchdog/government/2018/06/04/revenue-over-justice-municipal-courts-still-cash-machine/599080002/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/tripping/wp/2018/06/05/lawsuit-shows-how-traffic-tickets-and-other-municipal-fines-may-skew-justice/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.f827a298a17c
https://abcnews.go.com/US/red-light-camera-backlash-cameras-causing-accidents/story?id=13925887
http://www.mdjonline.com/neighbor_newspapers/dekalb/news/doraville-officials-respond-to-lawsuit-accusations-of-policing-for-profit/article_92df9270-68fb-11e8-9220-4b271f4ccfc6.html
https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/vvapy4/man-fined-dollar500-for-crime-of-writing-i-am-an-engineer-in-an-email-to-the-government
https://www.forbes.com/sites/instituteforjustice/2014/03/12/cops-use-traffic-stops-to-seize-millions-from-drivers-never-charged-with-a-crime/#71e30592f54b
http://ij.org/case/doraville-ticketing/
https://www.forbes.com/sites/instituteforjustice/2017/11/08/tiny-alabama-speed-trap-seizes-cash-impounds-cars-to-fund-police/#6c086c7f3317
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20180125/11574439087/ohio-appeals-court-says-speed-trap-town-must-pay-back-3-million-unconstitutional-speed-camera-tickets.shtml
https://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2014/09/06/stop-and-seize/?utm_term=.19df20825739
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I really disbelieve of the organism that is doing something in virtue of improvement or for the good of the people in the improvement of the traffic, I smell more to collection to be able to profit with them.
Thank you very much dear friend @doitvoluntarily for sharing this news
I miss you a great day
Many are doing this to meet their daily quota of a certain number of tickets per day in addition to greed.
So totally agree with fines being a money raiser for the government.
There are abusive police and municipalities, there are abusive drivers and speeders, and yellow light runners. We all need to a moral soak in ethics and reason. It gets worse everyday instead of better regardless of the technology. Thank you for your post. Be careful out there.
Very good your post my friend
wowww that incredible, hahaha, I would never have thought that, with the security cameras for the traffic would raise so much money, but now that I read this, it seems very logical, because they could see the slightest infraccion and puffff a fine. I always thought that the security cameras, were precisely to provide more tranquility to the inhabitants, but now I see that, they have a disguised motive. hahahaha how sad.
Here in Texas, minicipalities freely admit in writing that they are not operating a constitutional government, but rather a defacto, customary one. So in response, I refuse to respond to their fake summonses and will gladly spend time in their gulags if kidnapped. I have so far spent a 24 hour stint in the gulag of the criminal municipality known as "Lake Dallas", where I was robbed of personal property, deprived of necessary medication, starved, and subjected to 24 hour bright-light torture. I had fully informed them of my PTSD and other health needs and they went ahead anyway. Guess how many dollars they got? None. I do not care. Fuck them. I can't wait for them to get justice which can only come from Creator. I will get to watch and that will make it all better. Anyone reading this who works for any crime syndicate, including the ones falsely called government is a parasite and you really need to JUST FUCKING STOP!
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