Constitutional Law

More reason to be glad I'm in Arizona

A Phoenix area Justice of the Peace just ruled speed camera tickets unconstitutional. He found a violation of Equal Protection, since (1) tickets issued by officers have variable fines depending upon how fast the driver was going, whereas camera issued tickets all have one fine ($181.50) and (2) officer-issued citations carry 3 points, whereas camera-issued ones carry none, all for the same offense.

Understand, I'm no lead foot. Been driving 40+ years and have gotten exactly one speeding citation. But the idea of the cameras is irritating. It's so blatantly an attempt to make money, and a good chunk of that goes to the private contractors who lease out the cameras and mail out the citations.

Full post as published by Of Arms and the Law on January 29, 2009 (boomark / email).