Free Republic

865 drivers in the space of 24 hours have been detected going over the speed limit on National Slow Down Day. Each of the drivers will now receive a €160 fine and have three penalty points applied to their driving licenses, An Garda Síochána have said. The detections were all recorded between 7 am yesterday morning and 7 am this morning. Garda members and GoSafe Safety Cameras were deployed in a bid to encourage drivers to reduce their speed, and a total of 149,488 vehicles were checked. Gardaí gave a number of examples of “motorists putting themselves and others at...

The village of Ludowici, in the deep piney lowlands of southeast Georgia, got its name from a German fellow who came there in 1904 to manufacture clay roof tiles. But it was not his accomplishments that made the town famous. Rather, it took thousands of inhospitable acts toward thousands of out-of-town visitors to put Ludowici on the map—to give it a national reputation as one of the most venomous of a particular breed of Southern hamlet. In short: Ludowici was a classic speed trap. Yankee snowbirds were routinely nailed by, among other things, a twin set of rubber hoses laid...

TRAFFIC COURT PROCEEDINGS

A federal judge in Missouri ruled this week held that drivers have a First Amendment right to flash their headlights to warn other motorists of nearby police and speed traps. The order by U.S. District Judge Henry E. Autrey in St. Louis on Monday stems from a lawsuit filed by Ellisville resident Michael Elli. In 2012, Elli flashed his headlights to warn oncoming vehicles of a radar set up by police in the town of Ellisville. A flash of headlights is a common way motorists communicate to oncoming drivers of either a dangerous situation or the presence of police —...

ST. LOUIS — The American Civil Liberties Union is hoping that a federal judge’s ruling Monday that temporarily barred a Missouri city from punishing drivers for using their headlights to warn others of speed traps will itself serve as a warning to other cities who try to do the same. ACLU Legal Director Tony Rothert said Monday that it was the first federal court ruling on the issue anywhere in the country. “It is legal in Missouri to communicate in this manner,” he said, “and detaining, ticketing or arresting someone for the content of their speech is illegal. “ U.S....

What do speed traps, parking tickets, toll roads, speed cameras and red light cameras all have in common? They are all major revenue sources for state and local governments. All over America today there are state and local governments that are drowning in debt. Many have chosen to use "traffic enforcement" as a way to raise desperately needed revenue. According to the National Motorist Association, issuing speeding tickets raises somewhere between 4.5 billion and 6 billion dollars in the United States each year. And the average price of a speeding ticket just keeps going up. Today, the national average is...

There is no Florida law that prohibits light-flashing, said Oviedo attorney J. Marcus Jones. He claims officers are simply twisting a law that was designed to prohibit drivers from adding after-market emergency lights to their vehicles. When officers write those tickets, he said, they violate a driver's constitutional right to free speech. If motorists want to flash their lights to warn about a speed trap ahead, they are free to do so, according to his suit.

Speedtrap.org is a place to find, share, and discuss speed traps.

National Motorists Association names the seven worst locations to be a caught driving on Labor Day. The National Motorists Association (NMA) released its list of the top seven locations to avoid over the Labor Day holiday. This year, the drivers' rights group highlighted areas where heightened use of automated ticketing machines threaten those who are just passing through. Chicago, Illinois The Windy City's network of red light cameras operated by a for-profit Australian company, combined with short yellow warning times at intersections, has already generated $110 million worth of tickets. The city plans to double the installations and push the...

Area drivers looking to outwit police speed traps and traffic cameras are using an iPhone application and other global positioning system devices that pinpoint the location of the cameras. That has irked D.C. police chief Cathy Lanier, who promised her officers would pick up their game to counteract the devices, which can also help drivers dodge sobriety checkpoints. "I think that's the whole point of this program," she told The Examiner. "It's designed to circumvent law enforcement -- law enforcement that is designed specifically to save lives." The new technology streams to iPhones and global positioning system devices, sounding off...

Area drivers looking to outwit police speed traps and traffic cameras are using an iPhone application and other global positioning system devices that pinpoint the location of the cameras. That has irked D.C. police chief Cathy Lanier, who promised her officers would pick up their game to counteract the devices, which can also help drivers dodge sobriety checkpoints. "I think that's the whole point of this program," she told The Examiner. "It's designed to circumvent law enforcement -- law enforcement that is designed specifically to save lives." The new technology streams to i-Phones and global positioning system devices, sounding off...

Mark Zaid was driving to a baseball game recently when a driver coming in the opposite direction flashed his lights. It was a warning: Montgomery County police had set up an enforcement zone. As a common courtesy, Zaid says, he flashed his lights back. A police officer saw it and issued him a $50 citation, telling Zaid that it was illegal in Maryland to flash headlights while driving and that he could actually be charged with something worse: "obstructing a police investigation." That officer might have picked the wrong guy to ticket: Zaid, of the District, is a lawyer who...

No indictment in death of police officer 03/13/08 By Mike Santa Rita After the death of Officer Scott Wheeler in June 2007, his photo was placed at the foot of a statue at county police headquarters. Family and colleagues of Howard County police Cpl. Scott Wheeler reacted with disappointment to a grand jury's March 5 decision not to indict a Columbia woman in connection with Wheeler's 2007 death as he worked a speeding detail near Savage. "I think that the end result in terms of charges is in no way proportionate to the loss," Howard County Police Chief William McMahon...

North Texas toll roads ignore safe engineering standards to allow the state to set up speed traps. Toll road operators in North Texas are ignoring state law by imposing arbitrary speed limits that are set far below the safest level suggested by engineering surveys. A WFAA-TV investigation discovered that the North Texas Tollway Authority set speed limits on portions of the Dallas North Tollway and all of the Bush Turnpike without performing the scientific studies required by state and federal law. "Statistics show that 85 percent of the people drive at a prudent and reasonable speed," Kelly Selman, TxDOT director...

EditorialSecond Thoughts By: William W. Lawrence 11/11/2003Immediately following his landslide victory, Mayor John Street decided to cap the city's Safe Street money pit. Police district commanders received a memo the day after the election which stated, "Effective today, the Safe Streets overtime budget has been drastically cut."This could mean an exodus of honest folks leaving a crime-ridden city.*** Now that the election is over, the G-men may decide to cuff some white-collar criminals whose voices were heard on the famous bug in hizzoner's office. Look for overcrowding at Allenwood.***A special note to my good buddy Charlie Sexton. Congratulations on the...

CAREFUL driver Joanna James was clocked speeding in her ageing Austin Maestro - at an amazing 480 miles an hour. Joanna, 28, was stunned to be hit with the supersonic speeding ticket in her 14-year-old runaround car bought for just £100. The 480mph speed in the G-reg Maestro was faster than supercars such as Ferraris and Lamborghinis - and twice the take-off speed of a Boeing 737 jet. Mother-of-three Joanna said, "I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw the ticket said I was doing 480mph. "I can barely reach 48 miles an hour in my old car never mind...

A Williamson County judge has dismissed a Franklin police citation against a man who warned other drivers of a speed trap. He flashed his lights at them. Harley “Bill” Walker says it cost him about a thousand dollars to appeal a City Court judge’s ruling against him. County Judge Russ Heldman yesterday ruled Walker was right about the citation violating his free speech guarantees. Officer Chris Marlowe wrote him a ticket for interfering with a police officer’s duties on August 14th. The Franklin city police chief has now written a memo to officers, telling them not to cite drivers for...

<p>Honolulu police aim to issue more than 6,000 traffic tickets through a special seat-belt enforcement program beginning today, but officers do not have to meet any specific ticket quota per shift, officials say.</p> <p>The goal of the "Click It or Ticket" program is to increase the percentage of drivers and passengers who wear seat belts, rather than to issue citations, Honolulu Police Department spokeswoman Michelle Yu said.</p>