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Friday, August 9, 2019

The Texas Monitor: Maryland officials skeptical about bus camera program with ties to Dallas debacle

A school bus camera program with ties to the same plan that landed two Dallas area officials in prison has run into trouble with regulators in Maryland.
In Texas, former bus agency superintendent Rick Sorrells was sentenced this week to seven years in federal prison for taking bribes from officials for a company called Force Multiplier Solutions, in return for agreeing to use the company’s cameras in the agency’s school buses. The cameras’ purpose is to record drivers who fail to stop for buses loading or unloading, as required by law in all states.
Force Multiplier sold its technology to Bus Patrol, a Montreal-based company that took over a similar contract for use of its cameras in school buses in Montgomery County, Maryland, just north of Washington, D.C.
Now a state inspector general in Maryland is questioning the connections between Sorrells and school officials in that county. Bus Patrol is the target of that report...
...They had no idea that Sorrells and several others would be arrested on federal charges. But even when the indictments began in late 2017, with the cameras in place in Montgomery County, the Maryland parties continued to carry out the deal without questioning it.
“We … question whether an appropriate business case was presented supporting County involvement … and if a proper reassessment was made once serious issues involving the selected vendor came to be known,” the state report says...
...Motorists in Texas have complained since the indictments of receiving tickets that may or may not be valid. In one case, a collections notice was sent to a West Lake Hills woman on forged stationary, alleging she was on the hook for a driving infraction...

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