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Comment by SteveNuts | Hacker News Reader

Good. These should be ruled unconstitutional everywhere.

Maybe it's just where I live but it seems like law enforcement is more focused on revenue generation.

I'm curious to hear why you think it's unconstitutional. It's unobtrusive surveillance in a public setting, so there's no expectation of privacy. It's punishing people for breaking a public-safety law. In most cases they even have signs alerting you to the presence of an enforcement camera.

Now I can definitely see how automated enforcement ripe for abuse when there are revenues to be had, and it's concerning when operations like this are given to private companies with little to no transparency. But given those concerns can be resolved, what's the problem at a constitutional level?

> why you think it's unconstitutional

They didn't say they thought it was unconstitutional. They said they thought it should be unconstitutional.

> I'm curious to hear why you think it's unconstitutional.

Most of these cameras can't demonstrate that the owner of the car was the one driving at the time. In a criminal court that'd be plenty of reasonable doubt, but red light tickets (at least around here) are handled as civil manners that go to collections agencies if unpaid to circumvent that issue.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confrontation_Clause

I don't get that argument. How is a red light camera different than surveillance footage that show a murder? It's not a witness, it's evidence.

the surveillance footage is evidence, not an accuser.

in your murder example, you would still need to be arrested by a physical person in a police uniform, you would have some interaction with an agent of the state.

when you get a ticket in the mail, who is your accuser? Whose name is on the ticket? what is their badge number? how do i lodge a complaint against this officer? Who is expected to show up in court to prosecute this case?

A murder case would require proving that the person on camera is the accused.

A red light camera generally can't prove you're the person driving your car - they usually don't have the resolution nor the angle to show the driver.

So if the only evidence linking me to a midnight bank robbery is camera footage clearly showing me breaking in and stealing money, I'm in the clear?

A camera isn't a 'witness', it's evidence, and the relevant authorities can serve as a witness.

Perhaps not the strongest possible, but I've heard the argument in the past that it violates the confrontation clause of the 6th amendment – that you are unable to face your accuser, since your accuser is simply a timed camera.

OTOH, since you can sue property (for example in asset forfeiture cases), that might not hold any water.

The camera isn't your accuser. The municipality is your accuser, using the evidence from the camera as proof of the law being broken.

If you break into a building and get busted by an automated silent alarm, the alarm isn't the one accusing you.

If i get pulled over by a cop and he doesnt show up to court, my ticket is dismissed.

When i get mailed a ticket from a corporation, who is expected to show up in court to be my 'accuser'?

A local prosecutor, at least at the one RLC challenge I ever saw in person in Denver. Going by memory, the guy ended up getting out of the ticket because the law required cammed intersections to be clearly labeled, and the sign was obscured by a bush, a tree, or something else.

Some cursory googling turns up this as pretty common, occasionally it will be a police officer.

Aren't RLC tickets civil (unless served by a LEO) in CO?

People talk about running government like a business, not thinking about the implications of trying to turn cost centers into profit generation in that sphere.

Devil's advocate though : you can choose to not be affected by them by simply not running red lights. So.. while I agree on the unconstitutional part (im on your side), the other side of this, its an opt-in system, in practice

Except for the times when it's "malfunctioning"

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-red-light-camera-ticke...

If you search around, there's tons of cities that were caught manipulating the timing on the cameras to increase the number of tickets.

Are you going to call the camera into court for questioning? Are they going to let a third party audit the code that runs the timers?

Breaking any absurd law, by that logic, is "opt-in".

And it is.

Every single action you take is opt-in, right?

When a city prioritizes revenue over safety, everyone is affected. Even if you don't run a red light, you'll still be stuck in traffic when someone else crashes in the middle of the intersection.

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