LA Daily News 

Kerry Cavanaugh: If you were caught by L.A.'s now-defunct red-light cameras, do you still have to pay?

By Kerry Cavanaugh, Columnist

Posted: 09/13/11, 12:01 AM PDT |
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To those gamblers who took a chance and ignored their red-light camera tickets and have since received menacing collections notices: Rest easy, for now.

The Los Angeles Superior Court has not -- and will not -- let its collection agency garnish your wages or put a lien on your house or follow through on any of the threats outlined in collections letters.

This is one more example of the fatal flaw in enforcing Los Angeles' red-light camera program.

I wrote last month about a co-worker who chose to ignore his red-light camera citation after the City Council said that paying the fine is essentially voluntary. That was the main reason the council voted in July to cancel the red-light camera program.

My co-worker had received a letter from a collection agency, GC Services, demanding $780 for failing to appear in Los Angeles Superior Court about his ticket. The agency threatened to garnish his wages or file a lien on his house if he didn't pay up.

Pretty scary. But it's an empty threat.

Court officials won't say that explicitly. But a statement issued last week by court spokeswoman Mary Eckhardt Hearn indicates the court's judicial officers have not authorized GC Services to garnish wages, attach bank accounts or file liens against people who ignored the red-light ticket.

The reason is that citations are mailed to the vehicle owner of record. The owner may not be the person driving the car when it was photographed going through the red light. There's also the possibility that the licence plate wasn't read correctly.

"Just as there is concern about requesting that the Department of Motor Vehicles place a hold against the license of a person who is not responsible for the red-light camera violation, the same concern applies to authorizing severe collections methods against a person who may not be responsible for the infraction," Hearn wrote.

"In situations where sufficient ambiguity exists, our judicial officers must not impose a judgment that is not supported by the facts or the law," she added.

So if the court won't authorize harsh collection penalties for scofflaws, why does GC Services continue to send these threatening letters?

Because there are legal options that could be pursued if a judicial officer ever gave the OK, Hearn said.

And that's why red-light scofflaws are only in the clear -- for now.

Ignoring a red-light camera ticket is not completely without risk. The "failure to appear" on the ticket remains on the court record and you may have to explain it to the judge if you get a traffic ticket in the future.

But there are probably a lot of gamblers out there who are willing to take that chance.