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RED LIGHT
CAMERAS
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www.highwayrobbery.net
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Added 12-12-04
Appeals Decision - Bohl This case is
an example of a hearsay defense.
This Sacramento defendant won his appeal. There
is an exception to "hearsay" exclusion, for documents created by a
government employee - but many of the documents the police may present
in court have been created by a private company's employees, who have
no official duty to report accurately. This decision addressed the hearsay issue. Because it is an unpublished decision, the Bohl decision cannot be cited as precedent in most California courts, except maybe in Sacramento County. And, because the decision came from a lower-level appeals court (appeals of infractions are typically handled by an Appellate Division within the county's Superior Court, whereas appeals of felonies are handled by the District Court of Appeals, a separate entity), its weight is further diminished. But there is nothing stopping other defendants from using the same arguments Bohl did or from citing the same published cases the Appellate Division relied upon.
The appeal decision was re-typed from the original document.
Edits or explanatory notes by the editor are in double square brackets [[ ]]. This transcript may be freely copied and distributed, so long as credit is given to highwayrobbery.net . Other transcripts are available at: WeHo Trial Transcript , Culver City Documents, and Sacramento Left-Yellow Appeal. Shortly before he died, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter Gary Webb wrote about Sacramento traffic court and the Bohl case. His Nov. 25, 2004 article, "Red Light, Green Cash," is available by typing "Bohl" into the search box at: http://www.newsreview.com/sacramento/Home . Also, read the Moore case, another successful appeal of a Sacramento ticket.
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