Being above the law

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:
From: dewayne () warpspeed com (Dewayne Hendricks)
Date: April 5, 2008 5:21:46 PM EDT
To: Dewayne-Net Technology List <xyzzy () warpspeed com>
Subject: [Dewayne-Net] Being above the law

[Note:  This item comes from friend Ken DiPietro.  DLH]

From: ken <ken () new-isp net>
Date: April 5, 2008 12:12:28 PM PDT
To: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne () warpspeed com>
Subject: Being above the law.

Special license plates shield officials from traffic tickets
By JENNIFER MUIR
THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

It's 1:45 p.m. on a Wednesday in February and a Toyota Camry is driving
west on the 91 Express Lanes, for free, for the 470th time.

The electronic transponder on the dashboard – used to bill tollway users
– is inactive. The Camry's owners, airport traffic officer Rudolph
Duplessis and his wife, Loretta, have never had a toll road account,
officials say.

They've never received a violation notice in the mail, either. Their car
is registered as part of a state program which hides their home address
on Department of Motor Vehicles records. The agency that operates the
tollway does not have legal access to their address.

Their Toyota is one of 996,716 vehicles registered to motorists who are
affiliated with 1,800 state and local agencies and who are allowed to
shield their addresses under the Confidential Records Program.

An Orange County Register investigation has found that the program,
designed 30 years ago to protect police from criminals, has been
expanded to cover hundreds of thousands of public employees – from
police dispatchers to museum guards – who face little threat from the
public. Their spouses and children can get the plates, too.

This has happened despite warnings from state officials that the
safeguard is no longer needed because updated laws have made all DMV
information confidential to the public.

The Register found that the confidential plate program shields these
motorists in ways most of us can only dream about:

•Vehicles with protected license plates can run through dozens of
intersections controlled by red light cameras and breeze along the 91
toll lanes with impunity.

•Parking citations issued to vehicles with protected plates are often
dismissed because the process necessary to pierce the shield is too
cumbersome.

•Some patrol officers let drivers with protected plates off with a
warning because the plates signal that the drivers are "one of their
own" or related to someone who is.
[snip]

The entire article can be read here:
<http://www.ocregister.com/articles/dmv-police-confidential-2011354-program-records# 
>

This tinyURL is provided for cases of word wrap: <http://tinyurl.com/6rc883 
>



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