The Nicosia District Court acquitted a driver charged with speeding after errors in how the mobile camera fine was issued, including a charge sheet that named the wrong location, an unproven speed limit and evidence that the driver was elsewhere at the time.
The driver faced a charge before the court of exceeding the speed limit. The charge stated that on August 30, 2024, in Dali, a photo-enforcement device recorded him driving a vehicle at a speed above the maximum limit, specifically 119km/h instead of 50km/h.
After receiving the fine, the driver informed the contracted company that he was not the owner of the vehicle at the relevant time and that it had been transferred to his name on November 27, 2024.
Police, through the Traffic Department, rechecked the system and found that he had in fact owned the vehicle at the time in question, specifically from May 27, 2024 to November 21, 2024, when it was transferred to a company, before appearing again as the registered owner from November 27, 2024 onwards.
According to the court, the fact that the driver owned the vehicle at the relevant time could not on its own lead automatically to the conclusion that he was also the one driving it that day and time.
The driver had argued that at the specific date and time, he was in Kato Paphos, where he had gone to deliver wedding photographs he had taken. He presented photographs of his vehicle’s number plates, which differed from those captured by the photo-enforcement system.
The court also raised doubts over where the offence had taken place. While the charge sheet listed Dali, the camera operator had recorded the location as Leoforos Lefkosias in Latsia. As for the speed limit on that road, the court noted there was no reference to it in any of the evidence submitted, while the operator had written “50–65” on the forms he completed.
The court noted that the prosecuting authority had not clarified whether the speed limit on the road where the vehicle was photographed was 50km/h or 65km/h.
Although the court questioned the driver’s claim that the vehicle recorded had the same plates and type as his own, it did not pursue the possibility of plate cloning, describing this as genuinely strange and concerning.
The court also noted, as a further point of concern, that the driver had not mentioned any of this in his written response to the photo-enforcement company, particularly given that he admitted lying in that response, while putting forward his reasons for having done so.
The judge noted, however, that there was no evidence showing the vehicle in question had been driven by the defendant. The fact that the vehicle’s registration numbers matched those he held at the material time could not, on its own, support a conclusion beyond reasonable doubt that he was the driver.
The court found that the driver could not have been in Latsia and, at the same time, in Kato Paphos meeting two people. In light of its findings, the court acquitted and discharged the driver.
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