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WARREN -- A class action lawsuit going after Girard and the company the city uses to issue some speeding traffic tickets is expected to proceed after appeals fighting the class action designations were thrown out.
The September 2018 case has been on hold since August when Girard and Blue Line Solutions filed an appeal of an order defining the people allowed to participate in the suit.
Judge Andrew D. Logan of Trumbull County Common Pleas Court in July issued a judgment entry defining the class and subclasses of the class-action suit, allowing anyone to participate in the suit who was issued a citation in excess of 55 mph in the westbound lane of Interstate 80 between Dec. 7, 2017, and Jan. 8, 2018.
The plaintiffs contend they received tickets for speeding in a construction zone that was not a construction zone.
Cleveland attorney Marc Dann, representing the plaintiffs, argues Girard issued inaccurate citations, and some people who received tickets were not actually speeding, or not speeding enough to warrant a ticket for being 10 mph over the limit.
Though a 55 mph limit was posted during the construction period, signs were not immediately removed when the construction was completed. The speed limit automatically reverted back to 65 mph when the construction was completed, according to Ohio law.
Girard issued 7,733 citations through its contracted company, Blue Line Solutions, according to court documents. The first subclass is made up of people who paid some type of fine, penalty or fees; the second is anyone who did not pay anything. Of those cited, 6,784 paid a fine and 949 did not, according to court documents.
More than 150 people have joined the suit.
Girard and Blue Line Solutions argued the classes Judge Logan defined are too broad and would allow people to participate who were speeding, who were not actually harmed by the erroneous ticket or who did not appeal the ticket through formal channels.
The 11th District Court of Appeals found no merit in the arguments and determined Logan's class definitions are reasonable.
rfox@tribtoday.com