Want to fight a "turned left on red ligth" citation, need help with defense and law

[ivj]

Hi!

Here's the story of what happened:

I pull up to a "T" intersection at 1:30 AM. I want to go left, it's like a 5 lane road. The traffic light doesn't work property (I'm guessing the sensor is messed up). Sometime the light would take 5 minutes (literaly) to turn on, sometimes it would never turn on. So I ran it (you can see both sides of the road clearly). Actually, I run that light on a regular basis, but this time, a cop popped out of nowhere. I'm pretty sure he was camping that exact light knowing it doesn't work properly.

Any way, I get a $101 citation for "fail to obey traffic control device".

Now I'm in WA, in King County. I want to challenge the ticket and I'd like some help in building a solid defense in this case. Here are my questions:

1) Would the following strategy be any good: non-legal approach basically: take video of that intersection at night. Have my friend pull up to that light, and get a good shot of the light not turning on for like 10 minutes. Then show that there isn't a lot of traffic at this time of the night, and you can clearly see both sides of the road. Also show that my only 2 other options would be to either back up towards a blind hill, or go left (which would require going around a barrier, hence running the red light anyway). So basically, I'm not pushing off any laws (or lack of laws), I'm just basically going for a "let's be reasonable" here. Does that ever work? I've never been to court so I don't know.

2) Does anybody know any laws relating to traffic lights? Like maintenance, required "turn around" time for green light to come on, anything related to my case. Or can you recommend some reading which would be of help to me?

3) Does anybody know of any similar cases which I can use as the ground for my defense? Or are there any websites/libraries that would help me to find such information?

Any other ideas would be greatly appreciated!

I'm 20, I've been driving for 3 years and I have a perfect record, and I intend to keep it that way.

Thanks!

[CraigFL]

A thing to consider(when asked in court) is that even though a lite is not working "correctly", there are still 100% legal ways to deal with it. You could turn around and go a different route or in most places, you could turn right on red and then work your way around back in the other direction.

[cepe10]

The MUTCD has some guidance that was obviously not followed...
[url]http://mutcd.fhwa.dot.gov/HTM/2003r1/part4/part4d.htm[/url]

When a traffic light is not operating properly it shall be treated as a stop sign - the timing you have described indicates it may not have been operating properly. You job is to present this info and the police officer is going to have to prove that the light was acting correctly.

the video and other such supporting documentation should help.

[Zigner]

Cepe is assuming that the traffic signal is not functioning properly...you have to remember that we're dealing with a 20 year old boy. Anything more than 30 seconds would seem like "5 minutes" to him.
The fact of the matter is that you pulled up to a red light, got impatient and ran it...you were aware of the time the light took to cycle, yet you still chose to travel that route. You are guilty of the crime with which you were charged.

(By the way, being a good citizen, have you complained about the signal to the municipality?)

[racer72]

The advice from the WSP officer sitting next to me is to back up a couple of times in attempt to trigger the signal. If that does not work, make a right turn then use an available parking lot to turn around.