There are a few strategies that I’m afraid to email but I’m fine putting up on the website since the website is protected on First Amendment grounds.
If you get a photo ticket, there is one really good strategy for beating it: blame it on someone else. Here’s how this works:
1. You say it wasn’t you, it was your friend John.
2. John gets your ticket in the mail
3. John fights the ticket on the grounds that
• he is not the one in the photo,
• was not driving that car at the time, and, most importantly,
• the ticket arrived after 15 days past the violation.
In order for this to work, follow these rules:
It should be a friend! A loyal one!
You MUST make sure you warn them so they don’t panic when they get the ticket in the mail. You should let them know you’re doing it, and you should let them know that they won’t have to pay it. Obviously, if you do this, you’re going to have to help them challenge the ticket with a written declaration. No problem there. Just use this site. Fighting a camera ticket where you are clearly not the one in the photo is the easiest ticket in the world to beat.
Whomever you pick should be someone who CLEARLY does not look like the person in the photo. For example, you could ID someone of the opposite gender, two decades older or younger, and also a different race. When they get the ticket in the mail, they can contest it on the grounds that it is *obviously* not them in the photo. Just remember, none of this will work if you pick someone who looks just like you: same race, same age, same gender, same haircut, etc.
Very important: you MUST DELAY ALL PAPERWORK. Wait as long as possible before brining in your Written Not Guilty Plea to the court WITHOUT missing the deadline. And then wait as long as possible (WITHOUT missing the deadline) before turning in your TR-205 Trial by Written Declaration paperwork saying it was whomever. By waiting as long as you can, whomever it is who’s getting the ticket can ALSO challenge it on the grounds that they are receiving the citation in the mail more than fifteen days after the alleged violation, which invalidates the ticket. See here for the language.
Some of you reading this will note that in your particular jurisdiction, you have to sign the form and swear, under penalty of perjury, that everything is true. Our official policy on this site is to NEVER encourage anyone to commit perjury. Never ever. But in the age of Trump, “true” doesn’t seem to mean anything, so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯