​Arnold councilwoman Doris Borgelt doesn't know what to make of the emails sent to her from John Baine, co-founder of the somewhat controversial speed-camera company B&W Sensors. On the annoying spectrum, the electronic messages seem to fall somewhere between Viagra deals and spam emails to join Classmates.com.

"I wouldn't call them irritating, per se," says Borgelt, who's received a half-dozen electronic sales pitches from Baine since she took office last May. "But they're certainly unusual."

Case in point is an email she (and presumably all members of the Arnold city council) received last week for the Sunset Hills-based company. The email contained the image above and was titled: "How can We provide a "NO" Cost solution to the enclosed picture?"

The rest of the folksy message read: More >>

​According to statistics the police have gathered during the five years that red light cameras have been operational in St. Louis, 88.5 percent of the drivers who received a fine in the mail are first-time offenders. An additional 9.5 percent of drivers are cited twice for running red lights.

These data lead St. Louis Director of Operations Captain Sam Dotson to state to KMOX news' Brian Blume that, "Red light camera systems, photo enforcement systems, are designed to change behavior. And in 98 percent of the time, it looks like we're changing behavior."

The operational words there are "looks like."
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Red-light camera vendor American Traffic Solutions just sent along the following video of collisions captured on its Missouri-based cameras this year.

Whether you love the cameras or loathe them (Daily RFT generally falls into the latter camp), the following clip provides ten reasons why blatant red-light running is a serious concern.

​The Missouri Court of Appeals handed down a ruling today to a case heard earlier this month involving a St. Louis County woman who challenged the red-light camera ticket she received in Creve Coeur in August of 2009.

Mary Nottebrok had lost two previous decisions in municipal court and St. Louis County Circuit Court before the Court of Appeals took the case. In arguments October 5 before the appellate justices, attorney Bevis Schock argued that Creve Coeur's ordinance allowing for the cameras violated his client's right to due process by automatically assuming that the owner of the vehicle was guilty of running a red light and not the actual driver.

Schock also argued that Creve Coeur's ordinance violated state law mandating that points be assessed against a person's driver license for any moving violation. As Creve Coeur's law is written, a person is not cited for running the red light but for the non-moving infraction of having his or her car in the intersection when the light turns red.
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​Appellate judges for the Missouri Court of Appeals - Eastern District heard arguments this morning in a lawsuit challenging Creve Coeur's red-light camera ordinance.

The Creve Coeur municipal court and St. Louis County Circuit Court have both ruled against plaintiff Mary Nottebrok, of St. Louis County, in previous trials. Her attorney, Bevis Schock, hopes that this time a panel of three appellate judges will deliver the ruling that he and his client seek.

Schock argued today that the Creve Coeur law violates a person's right to due process, as it automatically assumes that the owner of the car was the person driving the vehicle at the time of the infraction. Schock ran a scenario by the judges: Under Creve Coeur's law, if a son ran a red-light while borrowing his father's car and the son went to court and admitted running the light, it wouldn't matter. The citation would still be issued in the father's name.
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Matt Hay and Ryan Keane at "Stop the Scameras."

​Daily RFT stopped by the Off Broadway last night where opponents of red-light cameras were hosting their "Stop the Scameras" fundraiser.

State senator Jim Lembke, the emcee of the evening who's fighting his own red-light ticket in St. Louis, was already gone by the time we got there. Still, a smattering of folks were still present, including musician Jesse Irwin who, along with Ed Martin, first launched an organized drive to ban red-light cameras in Missouri back in 2009.

Also on hand was organizer Matt Hay, of the website wrongonred.com, and attorney Ryan Keane, who this year has filed lawsuits against Florissant, Hazelwood, Ellisville, Kansas City and Creve Coeur to get rid of cameras in those municipalities.
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mosaferroads.com

Hazelwood Police Chief Carl Wolf launches Missouri Families for Safer Roads in 2009.

​A lawsuit filed last week against the City of Hazelwood suggests that camera vendor American Traffic Solutions (ATS) secretly funds multiple non-profit "sham" organizations created for the "sole purpose of manipulating research and public support" in favor of red-light cameras in Missouri.

The suit filed last Wednesday looks to ban the use of the controversial cameras in the north St. Louis County suburb and is one of several lawsuits that Clayton attorneys Ryan Keane and John Campbell plan to file against St. Louis municipalities this year. Impetus for the lawsuits sprung from Judge Mark Neil's partial judgment in May in St. Louis Circuit Court, which found the city's camera ordinance to be illegal. (ATS also holds the contract with the City of St. Louis.)

In the Hazelwood suit, the attorneys take their argument a step further, claiming that not only are the cameras illegal but that ATS also formed two non-profit organizations that bill themselves as grassroots citizens' movements but are really under the control of the red-light vendor. One of those groups is headed by Hazelwood Police Chief Carl Wolf.
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Houston red-light saga becomes absurdist comedy

​Many St. Louisans are eagerly awaiting the outcome of a court case that, in a partial ruling earlier this year, seemed to nullify the city's ordinance allowing red-light cameras.

But if Houston is any indicator, opponents of the cameras in St. Louis should be careful just what they wish for. Houston has a contract with the same camera company that St. Louis (and many other Missouri municipalities) uses to monitor its traffic lights, American Traffic Solutions.

Last year, 52 percent of Houston residents voted to end the city's contract with ATS and do away with the cameras.

But not so fast. ATS then sued the city for breach of contract, noting that the city signed an agreement with the camera vendor until 2014.
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​A judge's opinion questioning St. Louis' red-light camera ordinance has prompted a handful of new class-action suits against other Missouri municipalities who use the controversial traffic technology.

This month, attorneys Ryan Keane and John Campbell with the Simon Law Firm filed class-action suits against Creve Coeur, Florissant, Ellisville, Arnold and Kansas City arguing that red-light cameras in those cities violate Missouri law. The suit also names as a defendant the camera vendor for those cities -- American Traffic Solutions, aka ATS.

Keane and Campbell base their argument on the "partial judgment" Judge Mark Neil made May 20 in a class-action suit filed against St. Louis that continues to wend its way though court. In that decision, which is under appeal, Neil wrote:
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Prosecutors have now postponed Lembke's trial on two occasions.

​State senator Jim Lembke was due in court this morning in downtown St. Louis for a jury trial to consider his guilty appeal on a red-light camera citation issued to him in January.

The Republican from south St. Louis County tells Daily RFT this morning that city prosecutors have now postponed the trial for a second time.

"I got a call on Thursday that it was being continued," says Lembke. "They don't want to do anything while the case regarding the legality of the city's red-light camera ordinance remains in limbo." Lembke's trial was originally slated for trial June 6 but remains on hold following a preliminary ruling in another lawsuit challenging the city's red-light camera ordinance.
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