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CA City Mulls Evading the Law On Red-Light Cameras

TechDirt is running a piece on Corona, CA, where officials are considering ignoring a California law that authorizes red-light cameras — cutting the state and the county out of their portion of the take — in order to increase the city's revenue. The story was first reported a week ago. The majority of tickets are being (automatically) issued for "California stops" before a right turn on red, which studies have shown rarely contribute to an accident. TechDirt notes the apparent unconstitutionality of what Corona proposes to do: "The problem here is that Corona is shredding the Sixth Amendment of the US Constitution, the right to a trial by jury. By reclassifying a moving violation... to an administrative violation... Corona is doing something really nefarious. In order to appeal an administrative citation you have to admit guilt, pay the full fine, and then apply for a hearing in front of an administrative official, not a judge in a court. The city could simply deny all hearings for administrative violations or schedule them far out in advance knowing full well that they have your money, which you had to pay before you could appeal."

9 of 366 comments (clear)

  1. Ahhh by some_guy_88 · · Score: 5, Funny

    That slashdot outage was terrible. I almost got some work done..

  2. amused... by madenglishbloke · · Score: 5, Funny

    Please tell me I'm not the only one amused by the whole "best built on Debian or Ubuntu, 'cos thats what we use" part of the README...

  3. Windows vs Mac by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    When Microsoft wonders why Mac is perceived and cool and Windows isn't take a clue from their naming conventions. Barrelfish vs Snow Leopard. Can you spot the cooler name? After Vista flopped the marketing department went out and got drunk and said "aw fuck it, we'll just call the next one Windows 7". Just kind of feels like they really aren't even trying.

  4. I'm shocked by bcmm · · Score: 4, Funny
    From TFA:

    This web page was brought to you by a server running Barrelfish.

    At last a TFA which is actually hosted on the system it's talking about, and it refuses to break so we can make "It must be running Barrelfish" jokes. Maybe it really is efficient.

    --
    # cat /dev/mem | strings | grep -i llama
    Damn, my RAM is full of llamas.
  5. Re:Slashcode is Farked... by emm-tee · · Score: 5, Funny

    How did I end up in the Windows 7 thread from the "CA City Mulls Evading the Law On Red Light Cameras" article? It even shows that in the address bar, so I'm not crazy here...

    I don't know, but I suspect the "duct tape programmer" story might be related somehow..

  6. Re:Wrong comments? by sopssa · · Score: 5, Funny

    Everyone decided it was uninteresting and now we're talking about Windows 7 and Microsoft instead.

  7. Two stories beat as one by Shimmer · · Score: 4, Funny

    I've seen many spectacular Slashdot screwups over the years, but this is a new one. Well done, guys!

    --
    The most rabid believers in American Exceptionalism are the exact same people whose policies are destroying it.
  8. Pre-Taped Call-In Show by tholomyes · · Score: 4, Funny

    "Look, if you wanted to talk about pet care, you should've called two weeks ago when our show on racism was airing. Okay, I'm doing a show about the elderly right now, which of course, to people watching means: call in about cooking..."

    --
    When did the future switch from being a promise to a threat? -C. Palahniuk
  9. I'm outraged! by KingSkippus · · Score: 4, Funny

    This just goes to show, you can't count on big companies to do what's right. If there were more freedom and openness, we'd be a lot better off. Between Microsoft's FUD and Apple's fanboys, it's a wonder anything gets done.

    Hopefully, once people realize what's going on and the Pirate Party gains ground and push back the anti-evolution religious nuts, everything will be much better.

    There, that should milk a few karma points no matter what Slashdot article this comment ends up under.