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| Court Fight Against MTA Summons Can Be A Mysterious Process (241455) | |||
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Court Fight Against MTA Summons Can Be A Mysterious Process |
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Posted by Gold_12TH on Thu Aug 18 01:54:13 2011 video from: NY1 NewsNY1 has followed the stories of several viewers who got $100 summons because of trouble with ticketing machines on the Select Bus Service routes. NY1's Transit reporter Tina Redwine went to court on Wednesday with a viewer and discovered many passengers are fighting a court process that is anything but transparent. Aaron Goldberg took the morning off work to go to Brooklyn to fight a $100 summons for boarding the super-express Select Bus Service in Manhattan without the required paper ticket. As NY1 previously reported, Goldberg has a monthly unlimited MetroCard but did not have the paper ticket because both machines at his stop that read the MetroCard were broken. On Wednesday, NY1 saw Goldberg win his case. "NY1 is the only reason I was able to get the evidence I need to get have my ticket dismissed," Goldberg said. He described the process that requires a trip to the Transit Adjudication Bureau as "unfair." Many waiting in court echoed that view to NY1, as they tried to get information on how to defend themselves against tickets involving what they claimed was the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's faulty equipment. "I am going to have to wait for them to send another appointment in the mail. Then they're going to give me the paperwork to send to transit, which is going to take me a month to get. It's frustrating," said Sharone Lott, who got a summons. "You go to sit up there for four hours just to see a guy for five minutes," said Dan Moriarity, who also got a summons. "Jumping through hurdles to get a little ticket taken care of. It's tortuous." The New York Civil Liberties Union says the process is "torturous" and has been for two years suing the MTA to open the court to the public. It won that suit a few weeks ago, but NYCLU officials said more reform is needed. "Frankly, a lot of unfair things happening in these hearings," said NYCLU Associate Legal Director Chris Dunn. Dunn said non-English speakers would plead guilty, not knowing their rights, so translators have been added to the court. "Don't get a summons, because you don't want to be going down to that place, because once you go down there, you're probably not going to understand what's going on," said Dunn. "The deck is going to be stacked against you, and it's just a very dark and mysterious process." MTA officials said they are trying to make the process easier for the public to navigate by increasing the MTA's presence on the website and developing a brochure. But mass transit users with summons will still have to go to court. |
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