Red Light Traffic Camera Ticket

"Failure to Stop for Red Signal"?  Get out of here.  Tell me do these things even get reviewed before being sent out??  Time for a good ol' LA rant.

If this recent traffic light camera ticket doesn't show that the traffic light cameras setup around LA are messed up I'm not sure what else will.  As you can tell from the first picture I'm clearly stopped at the red light before legally making a right-hand turn on red.  Now I have to pay a $480 ticket upfront, even if I am pleading 'not guilty'?  Oh yea, that's fair.  Last year L.A. City Council publicly said you don't have to pay your red-light camera tickets (and never did) but as one informed citizen writes in the comments…

"If you responded to the citation in any way, then you acknowledged that you received it.  The court will likely treat this differently than if you just ignored it altogether and could put a hold on your license and possibly other sanctions. … Even though there is no hold on your driver's license and the collection agency doesn't put it on your credit report, there is a note in the court record that you didn't pay a citation and it was "written off".  It is unclear who can access this info and whether it shows up in a public search of court records or if it is just an "internal" court record.  So completely ignoring it could have some consequences for some people, there is some risk.  Of course there are about 65,000 people out there that took this route so that may tell you something of how big (or little) a risk it is.  Also, with all this publicity, the court could change their policy at any time.  They have the legal authority to put a hold on your license, they are simply choosing not to do it."

Worst part is, this has been the first month of my life I have no points on my driving record.  FML!