Maryland Speed cameras

[Tweek]

Again, if someone else is driving your car, get the money from them. If they are that big an asshole they won't pay for their ticket, why are you letting them drive your car?

whoa whoa you're complicating things way too much here man please slow down with the logic

[archibaldcrane]

Again, if someone else is driving your car, get the money from them.

How does this make the government fining the wrong person ok?

stop trying to defend this policy, you're just putting your stupidity on display for everyone

[Judai]

They are basically saying, as owner of the vehicle it is your responsibility to make sure the people you allow to operate the vehicle are abiding by the law. If the vehicle is found to be used in a manner inappropriate or against the law it is your responsibility to either pay the fine, get money from those persons responsible or bring them forth and show that they should be held responsible. In this case the vehicle is clearly in violation of traffic laws and those who own it are deemed responsible for it's operation and those they allow to operate it. If those people are unable to resolve the situation themselves, they can take matters to a court of law.

The world needs less assholes getting away with shit because of some bullshit loop holes. I've been to court several times when I was younger and in every case I felt the court and law saw me as guilty and it was upon myself and my lawyer to prove my innocence. The courts don't work like they do on TV or in your minds and if you truly are innocent, you can take it to court and try your luck with some of the bullshit judges we have.

[Salodin]

Why is it the persons responsibility to fix the states mistake for charging the wrong person again? Especially when its almost impossible to say otherwise? (Unlike in something like a murder case berore its bought up again...)

[archibaldcrane]

They are basically saying, as owner of the vehicle it is your responsibility to make sure the people you allow to operate the vehicle are abiding by the law.

and that's a load of shit

The world needs less assholes getting away with shit because of some bullshit loop holes.

Truthfully saying "I didn't do it, and you don't have evidence beyond a reasonable doubt that I did" is not a bullshit loop hole.

[Judai]

If you loan your car to someone and they hit someone and the only evidence is your license plate that fell off, you have to prove to the state it wasn't you that hit them because they will come after the owner of the car first. Same thing, except in one case it's a fine and the other it's serious jail time. You guys must have no actual experience with our police and courts.

[archibaldcrane]

These things are not designed to protect public safety. They are designed to collect revenue. The courts, which should care whether a punishment is just, does not. How is this defensible?

[archibaldcrane]

If you loan your car to someone and they hit someone and the only evidence is your license plate that fell off, you have to prove to the state it wasn't you that hit them because they will come after the owner of the car first.

If they charge a person for a crime with no other evidence than that it was their car, no eyewitness proving who is driving, nothing but a license plate, that is wrong.

They will investigate the car owner first, of course. But barring other evidence that is not enough for a conviction.

[Ksandra]

These things are not designed to protect public safety.

catching people speeding isn't to protect public safety?.................

[archibaldcrane]

catching people speeding isn't to protect public safety?.................

that's not why they're doing it

this isn't "omg there are so many problems with speeders what should we do?!"

this is "fucking budget crunch the economy sucks tax revenue is down how can we increase revenue?!"

[Ksandra]

they are increasing revenue off of people doing something illegal. I don't see the issue there.

I could see that as a defense if it were something like "the law wouldn't exist if it weren't for the revenue"...but really, this is just catching more people doing something illegal.

[archibaldcrane]

they are increasing revenue off of people doing something illegal. I don't see the issue there.

the fact they are prosecuting the wrong people regularly isn't an issue?

what the fuck is wrong with you?

[Ksandra]

parking tickets. Which you haven't even address satisfactory.

You can recoup the money afterwards, I don't see it being that serious. As judai said, stop lending out your car to dumbfucks if they're going to abuse it.

[edit] also lol @ your comment of regularly. You wanna start bringing up some facts as to how often "it wasn't me!" really happens with these things?

[archibaldcrane]

parking tickets. Which you haven't even address satisfactory.

The situation of identifying the parker when they are clearly not present, vs. identifying the driver when they clearly are present makes the situations clearly different.

They aren't even trying to establish something that is incredibly simple to establish. Take a photo of the driver's face, like, ya know, every red light camera in california does. Then when the court situation lines up, the "it wasn't me" defense is extremely easy to determine the validity of - and on top of that you have actual evidence that the actual person you are actually prosecuting actually did something wrong! THE HORROR

[Yugl]

Yes?

Except for the endangering the lives of citizens part, which you just made up.

Keyword: Further. The number of people that speed is staggering. If you have a choice between spending limited manpower on tasks that can, in a majority of cases, be handled by cameras and tasks that require manpower, you would be foolish to indulge in the former. Not to mention that your acceptance of selective issuance of speeding tickets is ridiculous given our experiences with that in drug sweep cases.

So what is your point exactly? My hypothetical was a point about how police officers, during routine traffic stops can discover much a much more serious offense, but that went over your head. Yes, speed camera's are more cost effective(revenue generators) than a police officer.

No, what is your point? I was responding to a quote you made earlier. Your hypothetical has nothing to do with my response to that particular point because the hypothetical was not even introduced within that quote. Furthermore, your hypothetical is a moot point. People can frame other people. People can also evade the law. Elusiveness is not without consequence either as speeding, especially when done recklessly, heightens accidents and leads to injuries and death. That seems to be an issue that flies by you though. You also say that officers could discover greater offenses but if the potential to find crime serves as sufficient justification for implementing a policy, then almost any policy is viable because criminals live and interact within society just like "innocent" people. They could be found at a grocery store. They could be found within your neighborhood. They could be found at your work. The person you agree with, Hey, brought up the issue of a slippery slope. Successful justification of a policy on the grounds that it has the potential to find criminals is an even greater path dependency risk than is the issue you and him oppose.

They do not provide the same benefits. They can both benefit public safety if used properly. I have no problems with camera's, its the enforcement that leaves much to be desired. They do not increase safety the way they are currently being used in many cases. The point Hey is trying to make is that our legal system does not have "Guilty until proven innocent" as a motto.

If they do not work, it's because people want to find ways around the system working. The whole point is to restrict natural but dangerous behavior. That does not change if you introduce officers into the picture. All that does change is the strategy. At the moment, people use GPS systems to evade detection. Under an officer system, people learn to speed while an officer is preoccupied. The proposal isn't cheaper either since the cameras are already up. Finally, the proof is the picture. If a camera does not take a picture of your car, then you are presumed innocent of speeding. If they have a picture of your car (corresponding license plate), then they have a form of evidence. Thus, your accusation of guilty until proven innocent is false.

Your last point: you do understand that a friend driving your car was not what I was talking about, but rather someone else using a system to be dick. A system that has no to little verification.

Again, the post was directed to an earlier post. I don't know why you strawman this argument by bringing up examples not brought up in that particular post. I'll address the two issues you bring up though. An officer system delegates more power towards officers. As I explained to Hey, officers are not infallible. They too can abuse the system and your system only heightens that problem. Not only is abuse possible, but so is preferential treatment. If the entire system is predicated on the word of an officer, then what prevents him from screwing you over royally if he or she wants?

Also, there is nothing in the vein of public safety about this system if I can drive through a speed camera at 100mph, get flashed, and then a few blocks later cause a massive accident. While a police officer would only be able to pursue, they have more options than simply recording the offense for a fine to be paid.

More options? Like throwing themselves in front of your car? If you're speeding and that speeding is going to lead to an accident, manpower will not help. They're not even medics, so they cannot treat post-accident injuries. You probably wouldn't get a quick arrest either since both parties will need attention. You also wouldn't have additional support in the event both parties enter a law suit. People that view the accident can vouch for that. Adding the officer's opinion would bring fallacy to the case in that he or she would most likely presume the speeder responsible since that is whom he was fixated upon at the time of the incident.

The situation of identifying the parker when they are clearly not present, vs. identifying the driver when they clearly are present makes the situations clearly different.

They aren't even trying to establish something that is incredibly simple to establish. Take a photo of the driver's face, like, ya know, every red light camera in california does. Then when the court situation lines up, the "it wasn't me" defense is extremely easy to determine the validity of - and on top of that you have actual evidence that the actual person you are actually prosecuting actually did something wrong! THE HORROR

But Arch, someone trying to frame you would wear a mask! Need to pull them over physically while they driving at 100 MPH!

[Ksandra]

The situation of identifying the parker when they are clearly not present, vs. identifying the driver when they clearly are present makes the situations clearly different.

They aren't even trying to establish something that is incredibly simple to establish. Take a photo of the driver's face, like, ya know, every red light camera in california does. Then when the court situation lines up, the "it wasn't me" defense is extremely easy to determine the validity of - and on top of that you have actual evidence that the actual person you are actually prosecuting actually did something wrong! THE HORROR

if the "it wasn't me" is easy to determine how regularly that happens then please feel free to post the statistics. I'm curious how often these friends are getting caught in other people's cars.

And no, in the case of parking tickets, it's not different enough to say one is ok but the other isn't. The cop could track down who drove the car fairly easily before issuing the ticket. That's a severe waste of time though. This is also saving time.

[archibaldcrane]

You're terrible and should feel terrible.

[Aksannyi]

The only problem I would have about this with the whole "it may not have been me driving" thing would be if one of these tickets gave points on licenses and/or raised my insurance rates. If they do that when my fuckhead friend was driving, I'd be hella pissed. Otherwise, I'd pay the fine and move the fuck on.

That's just my 2 cents.

[Fhqwghads]

The whole "parking ticket" argument fails, since a meter maid issues the tickets. They may be heartless at times, but meter maids are still human. There are neither automated parking ticket enforcement cameras nor robots that issue tickets as far as I know, so there is still a human element involved. I'm sure parking tickets can be contested also. The example I gave in my post was a demonstration of taking everything human out of the equation, with everyone being presumed guilty and no defense possible unless they could provide names and addresses of the person who was operating the vehicle if it wasn't the car's owner. Challenging the validity of the machines (which btw were proven to be defective in other cities) was not allowed.

People who can't be bothered with a precedence being set where machines replace people when it comes to our right for due process will be the same people who allow us to slip further into total government control. Our freedoms are being eroded a bit at a time, and people fail to recognize it as it's happening. By the time everyone wakes up it will be too late.

[Lucavi]

Yeah Arch, you fight the power and fight against the man from behind your monitor! I'm right there with you! Down with a corrupt legal system!