O’Scanlon: Redflex Indictment Should Surprise No one

 

Karen Finley, former CEO of Redflex Traffic Systems Inc, one of two Red Light Camera companies operating in New Jersey, was indicted by a federal grand jury in Chicago last week on bribery charges.

Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon, New Jersey’s fiercest opponent of Red Light Cameras, says that is not a surprise:
“Well this is a shocking turn of events, said no one! If cameras actually increased safety no one would have to bribe anyone for business – we’d all be lining up!  How any public entity can continue to do business with Redflex in particular, but really any of these companies pitching these ineffective, thieving cameras is beyond me.  Is the lure of fast cash so strong we have decided that morality doesn’t matter?  We now have multiple pieces of evidence of corruption reaching the highest levels of one of the two companies operating these cameras in New Jersey.  Both companies are guilty of blatantly lying about their products and misrepresenting data.”

 

In the winter a former top salesman for Redflex admitted to bestowing gifts and bribes on …officials in dozens of municipalities within, but not limited to the following states: California, Washington, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Colorado, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Florida, New Jersey, Tennessee, Virginia, and Georgia. He said Redflex bribed local officials with meals, golf outings and tickets to professional football and baseball games. The expenses were listed as categories such as “entertainment” and “celebratory tokens, according to a law suit filed in Arizona this February.

“This type of practice is apparently standard operating procedure for these guys.  The fact that the indicted executive said he had first hand knowledge of bribes and/or gifts given to local officials in New Jersey municipalities can’t help but destroy the credibility of any local official trying to make the case that the program is effective.

“The entire, tortured supposition of the red-light camera programs is that the cameras increase safety, we know that’s not true, so outright corruption isn’t that much of a stretch. This is exactly why we need to protect New Jersey drivers from these government-sponsored-scams in other jurisdictions! The cameras in New Jersey are bad, the cameras in Chicago are bad, they’re all bad, and there is no exception to that rule. December 16^th – the day the camera program in New Jersey will come to a merciful end – can’t come soon enough.”

Posted: August 19th, 2014 | Author: Art Gallagher | Filed under: 13th Legislative District, Crime, Crime and Punishment, Declan O'Scanlon, Monmouth County, Red Light Cameras | Tags: Assemblyman Declan O'Scanlon, Bribery, Declan O'Scanlon, Indictment, Karen Finley, Red Light Camera Program, Red Light Cameras, RedFlex, RLCs | 1 Comment »

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