A state appeals panel has stopped a class action lawsuit accusing the suburban village of Stone Park of illegally issuing red light camera tickets.
In November 2021, Michael Tock sued the village in Cook County Circuit Court, seeking to lead potentially hundreds of others ticketed for allegedly failing to stop when turning right on red at the intersection of Mannheim Road and Lake Street, not far from O’Hare International Airport. Although Tock successfully contested his $100 citation, his lawsuit alleged the village continues to issue tickets for drivers who didn’t violate the law, presuming they would pay the fine rather than engaging in the administrative appeal process.
Fellow named plaintiffs Hector Hoyos and Keith Wetterquist joined the suit.
Illinois First District Appellate Justice Mary Ellen Coghlan
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But Cook County Judge Neil Cohen dismissed Tock’s complaint, finding Tock lacked standing because he successfully contested his citation, while the other plaintiffs failed to exhaust their administrative remedies before attempting litigation.
The plaintiffs appealed to the Illinois First District Appellate Court in Chicago.
First District Justice Mary Ellen Coghlan wrote the panel’s decision, filed Dec. 26; Justices Terrence Lavin and Aurelia Pucinski concurred. The order was issued under Supreme Court Rule 23, which restricts its use as precedent, except under limited circumstances.
On appeal, Tock alleged he suffered financial harm because he expended his personal time and resources to contest the ticket.
The panel said the plaintiffs “seek declarations that the tickets issued by the village are invalid, that the village’s ticket review procedure violates due process and an injunction requiring the village to ‘refund all fines collected’ from these tickets,” Coghlan wrote. “Tock was found not liable, his ticket was dismissed and he did not pay a fine. Therefore, it is not ‘substantially likely’ that granting the requested relief would prevent the economic harm incurred from attending the hearing.”
The panel said the plaintiffs cited a 2022 Illinois First District Appellate Court ruling, Potek v. Chicago, regarding drivers ticketed for cell phone use.
But Coghlan said the ruling in favor of those plaintiffs hinged on a determination the administrative agency that found them liable lacked the jurisdiction to do so, not whether the plaintiffs paid their fines or engaged in contention proceedings. The panel said there was no finding of liability against Tock, and neither Wetterquist nor Hoyos challenged the city’s authority to find them liable.
On appeal, Coghlan said, the plaintiffs did directly challenge Stone Park’s legal authority to issue the tickets. Not only did they waive the right to make the argument by failing to do so in circuit court, the panel said, but challenging municipal authority to issue citations doesn’t trigger the exemption to requirements for exhausting administrative remedies, that could be applied only to findings of liability by the village’s Code Hearing Unit.
The panel further disagreed with arguments that exhausting administrative remedies would be futile. The plaintiffs argued they intended to prove they stopped their cars before entering the intersection, while alleging village code allows only three enumerated defenses: the car or license plates were stolen; the driver was yielding to an emergency vehicle or participating in a funeral procession; or another person was driving. However, the panel said the code “allows a registered owner to ‘contest the merits of the alleged violation’ at an administrative hearing” while the violation notices themselves have a complete list of the grounds for objections.
“One need look no further than Tock’s successful challenge to appreciate that not all administrative challenges to red light tickets are futile,” Coghlan wrote.
Although Hoyos didn’t prevail at his administrative hearing, the panel continued, he was allowed to challenge that ruling in his own circuit court lawsuit.
That plaintiffs instead asked the court to find the entire ticketing apparatus a systemic failure, the panel said, brought them in line with the plaintiff in Pinkston v. Chicago, who challenged the city’s process of writing tickets for cars parked in the Central Business District.
In December, the Illinois Supreme Court issued a 7-0 opinion finding the plaintiff couldn’t continue a lawsuit without exhausting administrative remedies simply by alleging the Chicago Department of Administrative Hearings lacked the power to prevent future tickets issued against cars not parked illegally in the contested area.
“While the city may issue the tickets through its code enforcement officers, it has also implemented an administrative process to deal with challenges to those tickets, including a hearing before the DOAH,” wrote Justice Lisa Holder White. “To simply claim it is the city’s actions at issue and thus exhaustion is not required would have the effect of nullifying the administrative process for a whole host of code violations and flood the circuit court with litigation. This was not the legislature’s intent in establishing the Administrative Review Law.”
Tock’s lawsuit is no different, the panel concluded, agreeing Judge Cohen was correct to dismiss the complaint as an attempt to circumvent the administrative review process through putative class action.
Tock is represented by attorneys Richard F. Linden, of the firm of Lipman & Linden; Robert Fioretti, of Roth Fioretti; and Peter Bustamante, all of Chicago.
In response to questions from The Cook County Record, Fioretti declined comment on the decision itself. However, he said the plaintiffs are considering various legal options, including an ultimate potential petition for appeal to the Illinois Supreme Court.