• An Ohio town that charged drivers a fee to contest traffic camera fines has ended the scheme.
  • Drivers were required to hand over $25 before contesting fines ranging from $150 to $300.
  • Civil liberties group Institute for Justice accused Willoughby Hills of denying fair due process.

Most of us have been caught speeding at some point, and usually we’ll cough up the cash for the fine and admit we were in the wrong, even if we don’t believe we were driving unsafely. But the one thing we expect – and the one thing a small Ohio town denied drivers – is a fair chance to contest those charges.

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Willoughby Hills in Lake County has just axed a controversial policy in which drivers wishing to fight a traffic camera fine had to hand over a $25 ‘filing fee’ simply to log an appeal. It was a lose-lose situation, and one civil liberties groups believe must have discouraged some drivers from appealing, even though the upfront payment was considerably smaller than the fines, which ranged from $150 to $300.

Policy Under Fire

Greedy Ohio Town Just Had Its Cash-Grab Speeding Scam Shut Down
Willoughby Hills PD

The Institute for Justice, a nonprofit law firm focused on civil liberties, called the fee unconstitutional. “The Constitution protects the right to due process of law before citizens are deprived of their property, including money,” said attorney Bobbi Taylor, who represented the group.

“Forcing someone to pay a fee to prove their innocence goes against this principle,” added Taylor, whose letter to Willoughby Hills regulators brought about the climbdown. The Institute for Justice has already successfully fought similar speeding policies in Peninsula, OH, and its work on the Peninsula case led it to this latest one.

Officials Respond

Chief Matthew Naegele of Willoughby Hills Police Department told Cleveland the fee came from Willoughby Municipal Court rather than the city and denied the scheme incentivized officers to pump out traffic violation tickets.

But Bobbi Taylor argued that even if the sole purpose of the cameras was to reduce the number of accidents, American drivers still deserved their right to contest tickets regardless of their financial ability to fight.

“Although public safety is an important goal, it cannot come at the expense of constitutional rights,” Taylor told reporters.