we have with us this morning george lynn edelman of the eastern district it was guns welcome it has to be our first case for argument this morning as cochran against the illinois state tolls highway  paying hefty fines year after year for deliberate evasion who didn't realize they missed a toll till it's too late there's something terribly wrong with this picture that cries out for justice but you won't hear those cries if you place form the next two message like to offer three observations that will sharpest sharpen our focus this morning if you can hold your questions for rebuttal i think it will make the best you know as more than a hundred that we ask questions when we have questions  we're just trying to use your time the best i'm sorry the first observation is we're not disputing the authorities right to charge reasonable tones we're challenging the policy for penalizing deliberate evasion second we're focusing on the authorities told the patient policy itself not using this to do with the constitution as opposed to being an argument for a legislature that has everything to do with your honor when  you call it a procedural due process which i don't comprehend it since the state offers a year that's all due process requires i'd like to answer that your honor it's the point of asking questions first of all when the authority added three violations and a grace period to the mix i'm not asking about violations from grace periods i'm asking about how this can be a procedural complaint when hearing was offered obviously your honor knows better than i am that due process involves both an adequate notice and a meaningful opportunity to be heard because this policy they put together assumes the offender's knowledge  consisting its procedures and yet procedures were offered and not resort to that smileless with question is whether the procedures are adequate not whether they were offered you a and first target we have is that they were unconstitutionally vague the policy because it invites arbitrary or discriminatory application how do we say that well we allege that hybrid or tb choir's cash papers only to exit  payers just get a bill if you will mail a notice that you have to pay somebody tolls but instead it's hybrid and that cash payers are singled out to go off the freeway not to slow down like the district court of they are but i'm going off from wisconsin that the signs they may want to use you as a witness your honor what i'm saying is that in the complaint we take great pains to keep the question is what's in adequate about the notice there are signs the film art is publicly available to anyone who cares to learn about the process it is in comprehensible to those who are unfamiliar with hybrid or t v as my son moves in that there is a huge body of science including beige and inference that says you can have one hundred foot sized sign that says turn here but if your whole life you've always been conditioned that you only pay when you're done on the freeway and you're exiting and you can't miss it by the way you go through this little toll booth are you purported class action that's applied to all interstate users by the way we sometimes forget that this is one leak in the eastern interstate system started by the federal highway system ok so there's full knowledge by the authority that there are travelers coming from other states who may or may not be familiar with hybrid or i v of on pain cash i have to exit reenter even though i'm not done you don't exit and re second witness that you're missing the point with all due respect this is a factual issue if the question is do we allege something that's possible in the complaint to make it a genuine issue of fact and we say that we have because we're going to have an expert border containing a copy of it's criminal code it's not the criminal code that's the very point i mean why use this in a more like contractor this is why for the purpose of the constitution use the criminal code or the law about adulterated drugs were the rule against securities fraud any different from the rule about how high we told you paid because this is not that situation i totally agree with you if that were the offen this is basically not about the privilege of having over i was license let's try this a different way do you have any decision of the supreme court or a court of appeals holding that for this purpose the honor first of all there's two different statues those that the vehicle code which is what you guys are talking about all this the scenarios you're involving in are premised upon the privilege of having a driver's license so when you come into illinois on this highway you presumed to have knowledge of the traffic laws this is not that case we're not doing it by privilege we're pain for the right to go across your state on this part of the interstate and if it's more contractual in nature th safety code or driving code that is very important in order to make a correct we believe decision about this and keep in mind we're talking about the very first page of a summary dismissal based upon what we're alleging again we take great pains to say that there is a factual question that will be a battle of the experts as to whether it is comprehensible when your whole life your condition the only pay when you get off by the way the complaint says this is not just about jeff we did an internet search and it's a huge problem many many people you can almost in fact we put two examples in the complaint so every day this is the claim that the system is unconstitutional for only were educated in two thousand and whenever that happens early two thousand i think about this hybrid system they went through they spent lots of money the authority did to educate because it's confusing by the way they had knowledge but once you do that just like once you introduce the grace period you cannot you have to treat people equally under the constitution under the fourteenth amendment if they educate the citizens about  does both because of the fact that there was not it's unconstitutionally vague in terms of requiring a for people to know that aren't educated about getting off and on when their condition that you only to please the court my name is freebies and i represent the whole highway authority this court should affirmed the dismissal of cochran section one thousand nine hundred three claims because he did not state officially plausible claim for a violation of either his rights procedural due process or equal protection turning to due process the two essential requirements of procedural due process are notice and an opportunity to be heard notice must be reasonably calculated to apprise the parties of the pending action and an opportunity h there's no dispute that the authority sense cochran's a notice of told violation which informed him of the pending fines and how to contest them at a hearing as to the hearing cochran does not challenge any of the procedural components of the hearing process rather he complains that the hearing would have been meaningless because he would not have been able to prevail on his preferred defense that he did not intend to miss the tolls so to to the extent that i can understand the due process claim it's a little bit different than one like you're addressing right now i think what the plaintiff is arguing is that the state doesn't provide adequate notice of how to pay not adequately inform him of how to pitfalls with cash but any by any insufficiency in the sign or any conduct by the authority which prevented him from paying tolls is something that he could've raised at here in  here and then he's making another argument which is that this is a strict liability offense and those sorts of excuses aren't excepted that would be that the it would then be a challenge to the substantive requirements of what constitutes a toll i lay ssion which are in the whole highway act and then the the authorities regulations and that would be conducted under a rational basis analysis and the analysis would probably come very close to th was rationally related to a legitimate interest and here this is some would pass rational basis review because it places up a burden on the drivers to comply with the toll requirements it reduces administrative costs and imposing some sort of a and intent requirement would be very difficult to enforce as well because any driver who is told to them to say well i didn't mean to and the and cochran also talks a little bit about bigness he claims it's vagueness but a void for vagueness challenge goes are goes to the ask the question of whether the statute and regulations aren't constitutionally begun here are the prohibited conduct is clearly defined as going through its whole collection point without paying the tolls and any of other claims which arguments which you wanted to make regarding the sufficiency of the signs could have been raised as a defense at the hearing and just turning to equal protection the authorities policy of allowing only i pass users an opportunity to avoid a fine by having paying a missed toll in twenty one days of receiving the notice is rationally related to the valid interest in promoting transponder use it for up provides benefits i pass users and therefore creates an incentive to create and maintain a valid i pass accounts unless your honour's have any further questions i would ask that you affirm the district court's order this year w i'm not aware if they have the pictures of the the signs the specific signs no your honor i got up to check on that but but if you go onto the onto the web site it there i believe there is a way to figure out if you have missed a toll which totally missed and then to pay that must toll on line and thereby avoid a fine