7/27/2020
Maryland, France, Germany, Italy: Photo Radar ThwartedVigilantes disabled a handful of speed cameras in the United States and Europe last week.
Vigilantes in Rockville, Maryland, on July 17 torched the speed camera that had been issuing automated tickets at the 400 block of Hurley Avenue. According to the Montgomery County fire department, the device's lenses were spraypainted before the fire was set. Officials have no idea who might be responsible.
"Some would say that's doing the lord's work," one commenter added to the fire department's Twitter announcement.
On Sunday, the pole-mounted "turret" speed camera on the RD6089 in Terrasson-Lavilledieu, France, was cut down. On Saturday, opponents of automated enforcement likewise toppled the turret speed camera on the RD1083 in Mantry. They had explained their motivation a few days earlier, on Thursday, by painting slogans on the road opposing the "lying government" of President Emmanuel Macron and calling for a citizen-led referendum. The nearby speed camera in Alieze was blinded with spraypaint. Also on Thursday, the newly installed speed camera on the RD137 in Saint-Hippolyte was set on fire. On July 19, excrement was smeared over the lens of the speed camera on the RN57 in Aubonne.
Vigilantes in Saronno, Italy, blinded the speed camera on the Via IV Novembre with red spraypaint. The device had just been installed two weeks ago.
In Luxembourg, the city court on Thursday acquitted the BMW-driving vigilante who blocked the N2 speed camera in Remich by parking behind it for forty minutes. The judge noted that parking near an automated ticketing machine is not a crime.
In Wildeck, Germany, on Saturday, the passenger in a black Volkswagen Golf hopped out, picked up a paving stone, and proceeded to bash the automated ticketing machine on Steinkauten Strasse, according to police.