Jun 12, 2007 10:37 pm US/Central
How Do You Know When You've Run A Red Light?
by Bennett Cunningham
GARLAND (CBS 11 News) ―
Throw out the driver's handbook. There's a new rule in town. When it comes to red light cameras there's a special line that drivers can't cross. Where is it? Here's a hint: it's imaginary.
Cameras in the City of Garland caught Noel Hillis running a red light. He went to an administrative hearing to fight the ticket and lost. The hearing officer, a former Garland police officer, found Hillis liable for running the red. Hillis paid a fine but insisted he was innocent.
"My truck crossed the stop line when the light turned red. He (the hearing officer) told me that the stop line is a lateral line parallel to the curb, which is 10 feet farther out (than) where it actually starts," Hillis says.
For red light cameras, the violation line is an imaginary one – so imaginary that it's missing from the Texas driver's handbook. The book states that the stop line is before the crosswalk. Normally to avoid a ticket, if a driver has any part of the vehicle over the stop line before the light turns red – there's no violation.
Hillis says the city expanded the zone, requiring him to reach the imaginary line before the light turned red.
Garland attorney Brad Neighbor walked CBS 11 News through an intersection and explained that city and state violation lines are different because of a quirk in the law.
A red light camera ticket is a civil violation and cities are prohibited from applying the state statute for violating a red light to the civil offense. To combat this, cities came up with their own rule that moves the violation out toward the curb.
Neighbor claims the way the red light camera system and the laws of physics operate, the only way the camera would catch a violator beyond the imaginary line is if that person had already run the red at the stop line.
CBS 11 News did some checking and it appears that every North Texas city that has a red light camera has a similar 'imaginary line' ordinance. That was news to Mr. Hillis who decided to appeal his case to the municipal court. The city abruptly dropped the case and Hillis got his money back.
To eliminate confusion, Governor Perry plans to sign a bill allowing the civil red light ordinance to apply to the state red light law – so the stop line is the true and unequivocal violation line.
A side note – Garland city officials say red light cameras
haven't produced revenue since September 2006, but say state violations are down 80 percent.
(© MMVII, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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