A woman drives with both hands on the wheel. Her phone sits face-down on her lap. No officer pulls her over. No lights flash. Weeks later, a $1,251 ticket arrives in the mail. The evidence: a single frame from a Camera surveillance app. The charge: phone use while driving.
Automated camera companies market their devices as automated license plate readers — tools for catching stolen cars, flagging warrants, and aiding serious investigations.
Sold as a Crime Tool. Used as a Fine Machine.
An example of what people in positions of authority think is perfectly acceptable:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robbins_v._Lower_Merion_School_District
School authorities surreptitiously and remotely activated webcams embedded in school-issued laptops the students were using at home. After the suit was brought, the school district, of which the two high schools are part, revealed that it had secretly taken more than 66,000 images.
A lawsuit wasn’t enough, the administrators should be branded as sex offenders and the parents should have taken them out behind the school and beat the crap out of them.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), U.S. Attorney’s Office, and Montgomery County District Attorney all initiated criminal investigations of the matter, which they combined and then closed because they did not find evidence “that would establish beyond a reasonable doubt that anyone involved had criminal intent”.
If I don’t have intent to commit a crime but I break the law, it’s not an excuse that a cop or judge will buy. Holy fuck.
I seem to recall something about a story where, like, a kids mom didnt know the camera was remotely turned on and walked through the room naked, after having just gotten out of the shower, and there was some kind of CPS investigation about it?
or is my brain mixing up several different school district voyeur stories together?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robbins_v._Lower_Merion_School_District
The school took 66,000 pictures of students in their bedrooms. School administrators should be listed as sex offenders but that doesn’t happen in the U.S. Case in point - our child rapist in chief.
Nope, that happened. If the institution spying on you in your home sees you naked, in your own home where you foolishly expect privacy, you’re a criminal.
Why did they even have the ability to do that in the first place? Holy fuck dude
Traffic cams violate our constitutional right to face our accuser in court.
Wouldn’t you just need a police officer to go to court and say they are accusing you based on said evidence and then you still face the accuser
The huge invasions of privacy seem like a much bigger issue but I am also not a legal expert
The police officer didn’t witness the crime. They’re making that Judgement based on evidence provided by a third party.
If my house were broken into, and I managed to capture video of the incident, I can’t just hand that to the police and call it a day. The accused has a constitutionally protected right to face me in court, not just the video or the officer I gave the video to, so that their defense can interrogate it fully. What if there is additional context that undermines the narrative presented by this single piece of evidence? If I know the accused and had a reason to see them convicted (such as getting a kickback from any fine they pay), now my clear evidence becomes a little more suspect. Now there’s a very clear motive for me to skew, misinterpret, or completely fabricate the video.
That’s what OP is referring to. If a company is going to install cameras and claim their cameras caught me doing something I shouldn’t have, I have a right to ask that company for more details regarding their claim. Ideally in a public court, with a representative of the company under oath.
Or more concisely: the government should never contract out law enforcement to private companies.
Have you ever fought a traffic ticket? You’re not on trial. You’re not pleading guilty/not-guilty. It’s an administrative/civil thing.
Every traffic ticket in the US I’ve seen requires you to check a box to plead before you pay it (assuming you aren’t fighting it). When you pay it, you are either pleading guilty or no contest. If you go to your court date instead you get asked to enter a plea and it can be not guilty.
Granted, I haven’t been ticketed in all 50 states… yet.
Edit: Apparently the click-bait headline is referencing a person from Australia, despite the rest of the article talking about US law… No idea how traffic tickets work there…
#lifegoals
To be clear I live in Texas so maybe we do things differently wherever you live. We definitely go to court and plead for traffic violations.
MA. Tickets have “I’d like to pay” or “I’d like a hearing”. No mention of guilt.
Hearings are civil, not criminal, and you represent yourself in front of a magistrate (baby judge). If you tried to represent yourself in a criminal case, the judge would give you a very hard time about that choice. Either way, you don’t call witnesses, there’s no cross examination, and no discovery.
I don’t get where people are going full Law&Order, demanding to see their accuser.
Traffic violations are rarely criminal cases.
It doesn’t violate constitutional rights as long as whatever the camera can detect/see would be the same as a police officer. If it has a license plate reader and face detection or whatever it’s unconstitutional because an officer probably wouldn’t have been able to issue a ticket if it were a person there instead of a camera. If it’s something like an obviously missing seatbelt or phone use seen through the window at a reasonable angle it’s constitutional.
I don’t understand the “face an accuser in court” argument. It’s a photo. You argue about the photo with the judge. The photo is your accuser.
No
The company sending the letter is the acccuser.
They need to explain how they interpreted the photo
Did you ever have a misunderstanding with someone that simply explaining it to each other cleared it up? How can a camera explain what it saw. The police officer wasn’t there and isn’t a witness. Also these cameras are not owned by the police. It’s a third party company that has a lease with them. So someone with no authority to make traffic stops is taking pictures of you and sending the bad stuff to police for money. Doesn’t that sound like a conflict of interest?
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Would be funny if it was a more modern vehicle, with a massive ipad that’s nearly bolted to your forehead and has displays on the back of every headrest.
For your safety.™
Great. Let me make sure my phone sits somewhere that hides it from view overhead when im not using it.
Ive been leaving my phone home more and more when I go places. I can’t wait until I get a citation for not having a phone.
Wow, it sure must take a lot of processing power to go through that much surveillance data.
“Take cops out of the equation for traffic enforcement.”
“NO, not like that!!!”
Correct… Not like that
“Law enforcement should be conducted specifically in the way that I imagine, not in the way that people vote for.”
- Someone speaking unironically, believe it or not.
ACAB. This isn’t the place to try to garner sympathy for your threats against society from the ruling class, traitor.
I’m just glad the Lemmy devs didn’t set a maximum block limit so I don’t have to pick and choose which bad-faith attackers like yourself I block.
Alternate viewpoint, it’s not about doing it a specific person’s “way” but more about not doing it the objectively stupid way.
One person’s opinion is another person’s “objectively stupid.”
I have yet to see a reasonable proposition on how to do traffic enforcement that seems to sit right with the vast majority of people.
My point in making the above joke(s) is that this is the alternative that many people cried out for. It feels like goal-post moving when every way to enforce the law is “but not this way, a different way.”
My guess at the common denominator that cannot possibly be objectively confirmed is that people simply don’t want to be met with consequences for breaking the law, and no matter how that’s done it will be rejected.
In other words, every way to enforce traffic has downsides - every single one. This is the one that does not involve cops. As you see, this is the downside. It’s laughably easy to “THIS IS BAD” at it while proposing no alternatives, and very amusing when an alternative (like this one) is eventually picked apart for being “objectively stupid” when its downsides inevitably crop up.
I dunno man you come off as pretty objectively stupid, but whatever
Nice cop-out!
If it makes you feel better I feel the same way about you, given you appear to be in love with ad hominem.
3/3 of your comments were intellectually lazy, 2/3 were ad hominem. Do you ever contribute anything meaningful or am I good to block you?
Edit:
Wait, why wait for your answer? Someone doing an ad hominem multiple times in a row is obviously not worth chatting with further. Seeya!
Lol what fraction of your comment do I not give a fuck about hahaha
It wasn’t even in her hands or at the very least distracting her and they still send a ticket? Lmao
I misread this at first and thought her head was down looking at her phone and I was like, “yeah she deserves a ticket but that doesn’t make the surveillance state good” but you’re right: she wasn’t even looking at her phone! This is fucking dystopian
The moments I had my phone, face down and on my lap or between my legs, were the moments I had used it on traffic while at a stop light and had to go before I was done.
I see this as a valid charge.
The amount is a little bit extreme but still valid.
I would be mad af but couldnt argue against it.
i keep mine in the space between the console and the seat not quite resting on my leg just sitting there unused and charging. the case on it kinda keeps it from looking like a phone as well
im glad she was fined, but i hope there is someone auditing the fines, and checks the pictures
Her phone was face down, she wasn’t looking at it that we can see. All we know here is her hands were on the wheel, she was in her lane, and she wasn’t looking at her phone right then. Anything else is speculation without evidence.
where did you see the pics?
Kazumara posted a video frame: https://lemmy.world/post/49325290/24732388
yeah, the back cover case usually dont have a status bar on the top.
Status bar? I see the opening in the back of the case for the for the camera, but no status bar.
Sure then but why is her phone face down on her lap? Cause she was using it. Cops going to give you a ticket also if he sees that.
Nah, if a cop charges her for that, she’d be right to contest it. Maybe it had fallen, and she tucked it in her lap to let her get safely clear of traffic before stowing it properly. Doesn’t matter if it’s likely or not, the burden of proof is on the accuser, and it’s not met here.
Let’s not let the police assume lawbreaking without clear proof, and lets especially not let them automate that accusation process!
You understand that most women’s clothing don’t have pockets, right?
Yes, but you slam on the brakes or maybe brake too sudden and it flies off and onto the floor. It could potentially slide under a pedal (like the brakes), hindering its function.
Is it likely? Probably not, but it is a dangerous hazard waiting to happen.
Okay - so charge her with having an unsecured object in her vehicle.
The fine was for use of a phone while driving, when the phone was not in use. Not for having unsecured items in the vehicle. Not saying it’s a good idea to drive that way - it’s pretty clearly not - but that’s not the actual issue here
you slam on the brakes or maybe brake too sudden and it flies off and onto the floor. It could potentially slide under a pedal (like the brakes), hindering its function.
That’s nothing but speculative and hypothetical, and not a violation of any statute. That might happen with a lunchbox or a bag of groceries. Your phone might fall out of its window mount suction cup if you brake hard too. Your floor rug might scoot up over your accelerator pedal and cause an accident. If any of those happen, they might be the “reason” for an accident but the fact that the potential exists isn’t a violation. You might wish that were so but it’s not.
I’m not sure the evidence that’s available here is proof enough she was distracted driving.
Pictures of crime are valid evidence. Get off your fucking phone when you are driving.
Don’t care if you kill yourself with your dangerous driving but you are just as likely to kill someone who doesn’t deserve it too.
Glad somewhere is actually giving out proper fines for it. Here its a token fine, although they do eventually remove your license if caught multiple times.
She wasnt on her phone. It was on her seat, under her leg, face down, with her hands both on the steering wheel, and the camera simply spotted the top of the phone at an angle no human being could have possibly seen, nor would be able to claim she was operating it.
The pictures others have posted here show the phone clearly on her lap.
Let’s be sure to name and shame, for anyone who missed it: Georgia and Florida.
Company is - you guessed it -
Flock.(Mention of Flock in the article has been removed with a correction.)Flock is shit, but apparently not the one who did this. Ig they could be lying?
Flock Safety reached out to us to clarify that our information was wrong. Flock cameras were not involved with the woman driving with her phone story. Alexandra Parade, where the incident took place, is a well traveled coastal highway with systems operated by state revenue programs. We have corrected that and removed any mention of Flock being involved with that story.
When I first heard of the amputee story (a bodycam video/audio of the initial encounter) it sounded to me like this was good old-fashioned police work, followed up with a typical harassment citation to send the citizen they didn’t like’s attitude to court if they wanted a chance to prove that they weren’t holding a phone in their amputated hand.
I think people are rightfully referring to mass surveillance system cameras as Flock cameras.
Even if the company folds, the cameras will still be operated. It doesnt matter what the brand is that makes em.
It matters people know what they are.
Queensland, Australia.
Two states?
Washington is mentioned, but not with enough context to determine that Washington uses the cameras.
Which is weird, and other comments mention the whole article may be AI slop, rehashed from somewhere else. :(
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Unconstitutional. Get that stupid ass shit dismissed in court.
Get it dismissed, and then sue the department that sent the fine.
Good luck with that.
Plenty of lawyers that work on contingencies if they think you have a worthy case.
Might have more luck suing the company running the camera software which flagged it.
Fuck it, sue them too.
YOU get a lawsuit! And YOU get a lawsuit!
EVERYONE INVOLVED IN THIS STUPIDITY GETS A LAWSUIT!!!
Too bad they’ll all be thrown out of court after the company pays off the judge…Ya know, it used to be when I’d say things like that, which I knew were always true, that people would say I’m crazy. That businesses can’t just BUY their way out of a lawsuit.
And now, the corruption is just out there. Everyone can see it now. Which kind of validates me, but also it means that things have gotten so much worse though out there. Now they feel no fear in basically telling the public “We run this shit, not you.”
Now for the next thing people will think I’m crazy for. Once they have it well established that they have bought and own the government, they’ll begin taking things away. I’m not talking about healthcare, or important things. That’s already started. They’re in the process right now of gutting programs like SNAP, and Medicaid. They began that about a year ago.
What I’m talking about is, right now you have no reason to believe that you can’t go down to your local ice cream parlor and get an ice cream cone. Nothing wrong with that. No reason to believe you’ll be denied. Give it time. There will come a day where you go to get ice cream, and they’ll tell you no. You’re not part of the in group. You’re not allowed to have ice cream.
And I’m not saying this about just ice cream. That’s just one example of something that is an affordable luxury, that has zero importance in life but it makes you feel good. It brings you joy.
Those are the types of things you’ll start being denied as they take more and more for themselves. They’ll want movie theaters to no longer allow the common man. They’ll want public pools closed, and renovated into private pools with private entry. They’ll want everything for them, and for you to beg to get common luxuries.
For them, it’s not about having vs not having. It’s about power. The ability to lick an ice cream cone, as they watch you go without, and laugh. They want the status of being able to tell you what to do. They want the world for themselves. That’s where this whole epstein’s island comes from. Some of them might actually be attracted to young kids, but really the thrill for them is to be able to take your sons and daughters dignity. They want what society says they can’t have, and is wrong for anyone to have. They want that. They want the taboo. They want the power to say they can have it anytime they want. Regardless of how wrong it is. To them it’s a show of power, and that’s all they’ve ever cared about.
Call me crazy, but in 20 years, when there’s an entire generation who’s never tasted ice cream in their lives, maybe you’ll remember this post. Probably not, but I will. Just like if I knew where my 1st grade teacher, Mrs Huey was, I’d go tell her the conversation we had 30+ years ago. The one in which she claimed that I’d grow up, and stop playing video games. I told her that on my death bed, I’d be playing video games no matter how old I got. I’m 42 now, and I’d ask her “At what point am I going to grow out of video games? When does the growing up happen? I’m older today, than you were the day you said that.” And she, in turn, I assume would tell me it’s not important, and that it was 30 years ago. Which is frustrating because 30 years ago she wouldn’t believe me, and now, she won’t care. Anything to avoid saying you were wrong I suppose. Which is weird to me. I have no issue when I’m wrong. Happens quite a bit. When I was 8, I thought I’d grow up to be one of the ninja turtles. Which, just conceptually makes no sense. The turtles became the turtles because they were already regular turtles, and then mutated when they got covered in toxic waste. If anything, I’d just be a really big mutated human. Think about it. The turtles were little regular pet store turtles. Maybe 7 inches tall if held upright. Then they get splashed with ooze, and they’re like 7 feet tall. So as a kid, I was probably 4 feet tall…so I’d be like 30 feet tall I guess? I mean, that would still be cool, but also, we’re ignoring the medical problems of being mutated. I’d probably get cancer again.
What was I talking about again?
I read this entire comment and I don’t regret it.
I have no idea, but username checks out
Yes, but the process is also a punishment.
What’s unconstitutional about it? Genuinely asking.
The Constitution guarantees the right to confront your accuser in court, which you can’t do with an automated camera. It used to be a guaranteed win if you showed up at all because the camera itself couldn’t hire a lawyer and present an argument.
It doesn’t have to. They send a representative from the camera company whose job it is to show up in court and rationalize their bullshit at the judge. I know this because I actually had to go through this process once, many years ago, to fight a clearly fraudulent ticket from one of these damn fool things in our local downtown.
Do you happen to live in the area the company is headquartered? Because I can’t imagine them flying a representative out for every ticket being contested.
These guys know how it works. They don’t “fly” anyone anywhere. They have low paid lackeys available in any and all of the areas they operate whose job it is specifically to hang around in courthouses and defend their tickets. It’s not like they drop everything and bundle an executive on a plane to go to Podunk, Missouri or whatever to argue about a one-off ticket.
In my case this outfit only operates in our state, to my knowledge. They wouldn’t have to go far.
That’s an insane interpretation of the law. I don’t know or even care what prior jurisprudence says on the matter, it’s fucking dumb if it’s been interpreted that way.
If the camera took the photo and automatically issued the fine, then sure, I agree. But the camera should be taking the photo and passing it to a human to decide if a fine is warranted or not. And in that case, the human (or more to the point, the organisation the human works for) is the accuser. And the fine should stand, unless a defence explaining how the photo misrepresented the situation can be successfully mounted (similar to how a defence could be mounted explaining that the speed camera was incorrectly calibrated).
This seems trivially defeatable by having an officer use the camera footage as evidence when they issue a fine. Then there’s an accuser to be confronted in court - the officer
Not sure why you’re being downvoted.
It’s the sixth amendent.
For of such a short document it is ridiculous for any American not to know their rights. Unfortunately the internet has been taken over by the ignorant.
I mean, we should certainly take the time to learn our rights, but I wouldn’t say that it’s ridiculous to not remember everything contained in 40+ pages.
When traffic cameras are found to be unconstitutional it’s generally under the fourth amendment (unreasonable searches and seizures, requires probable cause for a search warrant). I don’t know if that’s how this case would shake out, but a ticket issued by a robot for having a phone in your lap face down is dumb as hell even if it’s not unconstitutional.
4th Amendment violation
That surely fails the Katz test
I remember the NSA massive surveillance machine during the George W. Bush administration and Obama administration that tracked phone metadata and internet traffic that left or entered the US (which was used to justify a lot of surveillance of US citizens). Even after the Snowden disclosures of 2013 we were promised that the system was only meant to track foreign terrorists.
Then we learned that DEA had full access to it, and that NSA was sending hints to law enforcement about large amounts of cash in transit so it could be intercepted for purposes of asset forfeiture, what is nothing short of robbery of civilians by law enforcement officers.
This is an example of mission creep, in this case how it affects the surveillance state. Once we allow a method or technology to be used for major crime (like terrorism), it will eventually be used even for minor crime (like drug possession or distracted driving).
It’s very common for courts to forgive a violation of fourth amendment protections against unreasonable search when the violation presents evidence for a major crime, but then that case will be used as precedent when the same violation occurs and discovers a minor infraction.
This is how, during the aughts and 2010s, the Fourth Amendment was gutted by a long run of carve-outs. Now, a police officer or state agent can violate your privacy without a warrant via a whole range of exceptions:
~ If the crime they discover is significant (SCOTUS suggested controlled substance possession as an example)
~ Using specialized technology, say long-range multi-spectrum cameras, or using a drone.
~ If probable cause can be established. A favorite is a detection dog that signals on anything and has a 90%+ false positive rate.¹ (This is a particular beef of mine, since fake detection dogs are now more common than actual detection dogs, and dogs are losing their presumption of regularity as a result.)
~ If the police officer was acting in good faith, which is obtusely defined and is very hard to disprove.
~ If the suspect is non-white or otherwise suspicious due prejudice. Really, in a lot of counties, law enforcement are allowed to operate on hunches, or have a suspicious activity parameter list that is so encompassing (and often contradictory) that it’s impossible to not be suspicious.If you want to know how we got here these were already problems during the Obama administration when we had allegedly reasonable people in elected offices. And while they discussed the risk of too much power falling into the wrong hands, they felt compelled to keep it.
Whether the One Ring, or the Ring of Gyges, power without consequence is too seductive.
¹ A similar issue is the $2 roadside drug test which reacts to a lot of substances that aren’t controlled, such as glazed sugar off a donut. These were originally supposed to be then verified later in a lab, but instead were used to establish probable cause, and eventually were used as evidence in court.
This is wildly whack:
https://www.propublica.org/article/common-roadside-drug-test-routinely-produces-false-positives
The system must do everything in its power to drive false convictions down to absolute zero.
Blackstone would agree with you.
Many, many people, in law enforcement and the judiciary would disagree…
…especially when it comes to minorities.
