This may be a long shot: I understand, when radar was new technology, the public was not given full disclosure about the use of radar to monitor speed. And, while there may have been a precedent-setting court case in multiple States, how can I find such a case in my State? For starters, is what I am seeking deemed “Case Law”? And, where would I begin to find Case Law cases? If I could cite such a case, it would strengthen my argument in a similar situation. Thanks! 
What state are you in?
Just pay the ticket.
If what you’re looking for is something that makes checking your speed by radar illegal, you’re just going to get laughed at in court, like the sovereign citizen types do when they try to claim income taxes are illegal because of some historical irrelevancy.
(And law enforcement is under no obligation to provide “full disclosure” of their methods and tools in any case.)
Just pay the ticket.
No. You broke the law. Pay the ticket.
Col. Blake says to pay the ticket.
When radar was new technology, there were already various ways to check for speeding. The oner sign I remember most clearly was “Speed Checked By Aircraft.” Yes, the Highway Patrol literally flew over the highway and timed you as you passed mile markers.
The signs were NOT there to make it magically legal to track your speeding that way. They were there to warn you that you couldn’t count on the presence or absence of a police car in your rear view mirror or on the side of the road as a clue that you would be pulled over.
They still do that. Got a ticket about five years ago for speeding. The motorcycle cop writing the ticket said I’d been clocked by a police airplane.
The point of the signs was they make drivers think that cops might be patrolling the road and thus drive more slowly. Most of the time, no one was checking.
How many tickets do they have to write for that to be cost efficient? Rhetorical question.
When RADAR speed was new technology each case had to be proven in court with expert witnesses. After enough cases were proven RADAR was given judicial notice which meant that the court understood that the technology worked. The state still has to prove the case using whatever evidence they present, but not how the equipment works. This point was passed looong ago.
LIDAR was going through the same stage about 15 years ago. I worked with a laser expert who testified for defendants. He used to talk about each case. I guess LIDAR is now proven as well.
Dennis
Since this is about a specific legal case, it’s more appropriate for IMHO.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator
Now that we’re in IMHO:
Just pay the ticket.
But the rhetoric implies an assumption which can be identified and challenged. The return from enforcement of speeding laws is not simply, or even mainly, the revenue from tickets, but the societal gain from increased compliance with speed limits - fewer accidents, fewer deaths, better traffic flow with less delay, reduced carbon outputs, etc. Thus the cost efficiency of the enforcement is only partly related to the number of speeding tickets issued. Indeed, if the enforcement were 100% effective no speeding tickets at all would be issued, but the societal gain would be considerable.
Absolutely true, all of it.
However, :), is it more efficient, cost or otherwise, to patrol from a plane?
Generally when aircraft is utilized enforcement is done in a bulk operation. Several squads are daisy chained on a bridge or entrance ramp. The method of clocking in the plane is usually VASCAR. 10-20 cites per hour can be issued easily.
Except all of those cases, like Honeycutt, were all at state levels. I know of no federal court or SCOTUS ruling on radar that would set a national standard.
Actually, a former coworker did once successfully get out of a speeding ticket by going to court and arguing that because the road where he was stopped did not have “speed checked by radar” signs posted it was illegal for the officer to use radar on that road, which was what he had written on the section of the ticket for how he had measured his speed.
Everyone else at the office thought he should have just paid the ticket, but his argument did actually work in court.
More efficient than what?
(Plus, of course, even when we know the answer to that question, the cost of patrolling from an aircraft crucially depends on whether the aircraft is up there for other reasons, and we only have to reckon the marginal cost of adding traffic speed checks to the operation, or whether traffic speed checks are all it’s down, and we have to reckon the entire cost of the operation. And I don’t think we know the answer to that question.)
:dubious:
Do you know this to be fact or did he just say that’s what happened to his case?
Where did this take place? Is there an actual statute there that mandates the signs be present? As posted earlier those signs are to warn drivers that speed enforcement will take place (and persuade voluntary compliance) and aren’t mandated by law. But YMMV depending on the state.
Explain to the judge that you were traveling not driving.