2.   The stop sign was shrouded. – If the stop sign was difficult to see for any reason, such as being covered up by branches, painted on by kids, bent in a hard-to-see direction, or anything that disallow a clear view of the stop sign will be a good defense to make. Again, take a photograph of the sign with your camera at the position you would be sitting as a driver and bring it to court.

 

3.   The stop sign was just newly established. – If the stop sign was just recently installed, you may not have been aware that it was there. What you can do is go to the place of the incident with a notebook and take a recording of the number of vehicles that had to go through that stop sign within 30 minutes to an hour and record the number of vehicles that went through the sign without stopping, and the number of vehicles that came to a dangerous a stop before realizing the sign was there. Bring your results to court and make your case.

 

4.   The Limit Line was obscure. – If you stop too far ahead of the limit line, you can make a defense that the limit line was hard to see. This is usual because these lines fade after a period of time. Again, take your camera and photograph a few pictures of the limit line from a driver’s point of view and bring them to court.

 

Failure to stop at a Red Light

 

 

This one is easy to understand. This offense is when you failed to stop at a red light.

 

Again, it is imperative that you draw out good diagrams of what happened. The two main good defenses that you can make in this sort of case this is as follows:

 

1.   You had a better view of the stoplight than the officer. – The only time when the officer has a clear view of the sign is when his patrol car is situated by your side, with no other vehicles in front of his view. If he was not situated right by your side, take a camera and come to the point of incident, where the officer would be sitting at, and take a picture of your stoplight from his view. Show this in court that it is not clear for the officer to see your stop light from his point of view. You can also time to see the time it takes for a yellow light to turn into a red light and ask the officer in court to see if he knew how long it took for the yellow light to turn red. If he fails to answer correctly, say in your concluding statement that the officer’s ability of observation is poor.

 

2.   The lights were not synchronized. – There is a possibility that the lights were not properly synchronized. The officer may see a green light and assume that your light has turned red. Or he may see a red light in his view and assumed that your light has turned red also. You can come back to the scene and see if the lights are properly synchronized. When cross-examining the officer, ask him if he had checked to see the lights were properly synchronized when he ticketed you. He most likely did not. In that case you can raise uncertainty whether or not the lights were correctly synchronized.