New Orleans has paused issuing traffic-camera tickets while NOPD investigates how officers reviewed citations. The inquiry’s central practical questions remain open: how the department will verify the review process and what it will do about tickets issued in 2025. Mayor Helena Moreno said she would wait for Police Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick to finish the investigation before commenting further, according to FOX 8.
What the inquiry has—and has not—established
FOX 8 reported that its examination focused on 15 officers paid overtime to review automated traffic tickets in 2025. The station found tickets logged as reviewed during regular shifts and private paid details, although NOPD’s rules prohibit officers from doing this review during those periods. Its analysis of digital timestamps also found no logged review activity during nearly half of more than 1,200 overtime shifts worked by the officers under scrutiny. Those findings raise questions about the process; city officials have not said that any particular citation was improperly issued.
NOPD has not announced when its internal inquiry will conclude. The department is withholding a screen recording it had said it would provide showing how officers review tickets, FOX 8 reported. The pause also does not necessarily rule out later citations: NOPD says it continues collecting data and could issue tickets for violations recorded during the suspension. The city has not explained how it will handle 2025 tickets reviewed by officers under scrutiny.
The review sits alongside existing appeal and oversight safeguards
Louisiana law gives New Orleans Traffic Court exclusive appellate jurisdiction over appeals from administrative hearing officer decisions involving the city’s automated traffic-enforcement system, according to the Louisiana State Legislature. NOLA.com reported that the state’s 2024 law provides drivers an opportunity to request a hearing before a traffic adjudication officer and to appeal that officer’s decision within 30 days. These procedures describe routes to challenge a decision; they do not resolve the status or validity of tickets involved in the current NOPD inquiry.
The current questions also have a history in city oversight. In a January 30, 2020 evaluation of New Orleans’ Traffic Camera Safety Program, the New Orleans Office of Inspector General recommended that NOPD update its citation-review policies and add quality controls for approved citations.
A later OIG review offers a separate measure of review speed, not a finding about the officers now under investigation. In a follow-up report released Jan. 8, 2026, the office said 68% of the 2024 camera citations it examined were reviewed within 10 seconds, and 23% within three seconds. Those figures concern a different year’s citations and do not establish whether 2025 reviews were proper.
For now, the investigation’s completion date and the city’s plans for affected 2025 tickets remain unknown. The distinction matters: existing appeal procedures and earlier oversight findings provide context, but neither answers whether any citation under scrutiny should be changed or withdrawn.
