Court Decisions Former judge appeals traffic camera ticket, exposes flaw in system
Former judge appeals traffic camera ticket, exposes flaw in system
By Tony Lystra / The Daily NewsThe Daily News Online | Posted: Sunday, January 15, 2012 8:30 pm |
A retired Cowlitz Superior Court Judge is challenging Longview's school-zone traffic camera system, saying a speeding ticket he and his wife received in May should have been thrown out because video footage failed to identify who was driving the offending vehicle.
Judge Jim Warme, who left court last year, also said in court documents that a Longview Municipal Court judge erred when, because footage of the car showed no driver, she found both Warme and his wife guilty of speeding in a school zone.
The appeal stands out because it comes from a judge with two decades of experience on the bench and points out what may be a fatal flaw in the city's controversial traffic camera system. In essence, the case asks how two people can be guilty of simultaneously driving one car too fast.
In a brief filed this month with the Superior Court, Warme said that on May 16, a silver Honda Pilot registered to him and his wife, Paula, was captured by a Longview traffic camera driving 31 mph in a 20 mph school zone at Columbia Valley Gardens Elementary school on 30th Avenue in Longview.
The Warmes admitted the car was speeding. However, during a Sept. 21 court hearing, Warme pointed out that the traffic camera system does not photograph the faces of drivers, and there is no way to prove who was driving the Honda.
Heidi Heywood, a Skamokawa attorney who was acting as a judge pro tem in Longview Municipal Court, "acknowledged that no driver had been identified," Warme said in his brief. "Then in the absence of any evidence of who the actual driver might be, (Heywood) found both defendants guilty of the infraction and entered a judgment against both defendants."
In addition, Heywood said that Longview's traffic camera ordinance "made all registered owners liable for an infraction if no one could be identified as the actual driver."
Warme said the ticket should have been dismissed because police can't say who was driving the car when it sped through the school zone. In addition, Warme said Heywood's understanding of the city's ordinance is wrong: The ordinance does not hold all registered owners of a vehicle liable for violations committed in the vehicle.
"There is simply no statutory authority to make the registered owner of a vehicle responsible for an infraction," Warme wrote.
Longview's traffic camera ordinance does not allow drivers' faces to be photographed. "Why the city adopted such a restriction is beyond my explaining," Warme wrote in his brief. Yet, he wrote, "The burden of proof is on the city to establish by some evidence who the vehicle operator was."
Warme did not return a phone call placed Friday to his residence.
Traffic cameras were installed at some intersections and school zones in February and have helped the city issue thousands of tickets since. The program has drawn vocal opposition from some community members who, with the help of political activist Tim Eyman, put a ballot initiative aimed at removing the cameras on November's ballot. Voters favored the removal of the red light cameras but decided the school zone cameras should stay.
The traffic signal cameras are expected to be removed next month. The school zone cameras will remain at least through May.
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