To ticket — or not?
On the video, the violation is obvious: A silver Lexus plows through a red light at Olive Boulevard and Interstate 270.
Creve Coeur police Lt. William Funkhouser, nursing a cup of coffee, watches the images on his computer, then re-examines two photos snapped by red light cameras. He then hits the “reject” button, throwing out the violation.
One of the cameras failed to capture the Lexus before it crossed the stop line. Instead, it snapped the photo the moment after it crossed. “I insist that the vehicle be at or before the line,” Funkhouser said. “I’m going to reject this, although it’s a good violation.”
Every day, police officers in dozens of area cities sort through hundreds of red light violations and weed out many of them. A Post-Dispatch reporter spent time at three departments — Arnold, Creve Coeur and Florissant — to see how the system works. The amount of slack that officers give drivers varies by department. But bad weather, funeral processions, mismatched vehicle information, dirty camera lenses — all are common reasons for rejection.
“What would an officer on the scene do?” Funkhouser said, watching video of a silver BMW running a red light at Ladue and Emerson roads. He hit “accept.”
If an emergency vehicle needs to get through the intersection, prompting a driver to run a red light, the ticket should be thrown out, say area officers who vet the violations. When vehicles come to a rolling stop to turn right on red, those typically also get rejected, even though the driver is violating the law. (By law, drivers must come to a complete stop before turning right on red.)
Red light cameras snap photos automatically when they sense a vehicle might run a light. The cameras must photograph the vehicle in front of the stop line after the light turns, and then in the middle of the intersection.
Even with photo proof, getting a ticket isn’t automatic.
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