Ex parte City of Tuskegee, Nos. SC-2025-0247 & SC-2025-0251, 2026 WL 1902098 (Ala. July 2, 2026). The Court (Shaw, J.; Stewart, C.J., and Wise, Bryan, Sellers, Mendheim, McCool, and Parker, JJ., concur; Cook, J., concurs in part and concurs in the result, with opinion) grants in part and denies in part petitions for writs of mandamus, holding that the plaintiffs’ claims challenging the legality of Tuskegee’s automated traffic-enforcement ordinance are moot, but that the defendants failed to show a clear legal right to dismissal of certain tort claims allegedly arising from the issuance and dissemination of the citations.
Tuskegee enacted an ordinance allowing automated photographic-enforcement devices to issue civil traffic citations for speeding and traffic-signal violations. Id. at *1. The ordinance provided an administrative process for contesting citations, including a hearing before a municipal judge and an appeal to the circuit court. Id. at *1-2. Each plaintiff received one or more citations under the ordinance before the City later passed resolutions voiding certain citations, treating them as warnings, providing reimbursement eligibility for paid fines, and eventually ceasing enforcement of the ordinance. Id. at *2.
The plaintiffs sued the City, city officials, and JENOPTIK (the entities allegedly responsible for installing, maintaining, and monitoring the enforcement devices). Id. The plaintiffs sought declaratory and injunctive relief challenging the ordinance’s legality, refunds of fines and fees, and damages for negligence, invasion of privacy, and fraud. Id. The City defendants and JENOPTIK moved to dismiss, arguing that the plaintiffs’ claims were moot because the plaintiffs had either accepted liability by paying the fines or by failing to contest the citations through the ordinance’s administrative process, and because the City had discontinued enforcement and made refunds available. Id. at *3. The circuit court denied the motions to dismiss, and the defendants petitioned for mandamus relief. Id. at *4.
As to the ordinance-based claims, the Court grants mandamus relief. Relying on Woodgett v. City of Midfield, 319 So. 3d 1231 (Ala. 2020), Mills v. City of Opelika, 320 So. 3d 554 (Ala. 2020), Moore v. City of Center Point, 319 So. 3d 1223 (Ala. 2020), and City of Montgomery v. Hunter, 319 So. 3d 1213 (Ala. 2020), the Court explains that a plaintiff who pays a citation or fails to contest liability through the process provided by the ordinance accepts liability and eliminates any justiciable controversy. Id. at *4-7. The Court also reasons that the City’s later resolutions voiding the citations, making refunds available, and ceasing enforcement further mooted the plaintiffs’ requests for declaratory and injunctive relief. Id. at *7.
However, the Court explains that the negligence, invasion-of-privacy, and fraud claims appear to allege independent tort damages arising from the issuance or dissemination of the citations, including alleged employment consequences, reputational harm, emotional distress, and other damages. Id. at *8-9. The Court holds that the defendants did not show that those claims were mooted by the plaintiffs’ failure to use the administrative process, payment of fines, or the City’s later discontinuation of the ordinance. Id. at *9.
The Court therefore directs the circuit court to dismiss the plaintiffs’ claims challenging the legality of the ordinance but denies mandamus relief as to the tort claims. Id. at *11. The Court also denies JENOPTIK’s request for dismissal based on lack of personal jurisdiction, holding that the record was insufficient to establish a clear legal right to dismissal on that basis at this stage. Id.