Need to beat a speeding ticket? There's an app for that

SAN JOSE, CA - Driving around his college campus while doing the speed limit, 21 year old Sahas Katta wasn’t expecting to get a speeding ticket. When police told him he had been clocked with a radar gun going 40 mph in a 25 mph zone, he was shocked.

“That was actually the first time I'd been pulled over,” he told Sacramento, California affiliate KXTV . “I'd never dealt with the cops before. I didn't really know what to say, so I just said I apologize, took the slip, and headed my own way.”

It was after he got home, that Katta looked at his smartphone. He had been running an app called My Tracks to keep track of his average speed and distance travelled as he drove around the UC-Davis campus. According to the program, Katta had never gone faster than 26 mph during his entire trip.

“I just really didn't want to put up with the fee,” he said. “I felt like I had some evidence.”

He took that data to court and the judge was impressed.

“I think the evidence I presented was very new and refreshing, and it is cutting edge technology,” Katta said after being in court. “Clearly, this had not come up in his court before, which is why he made a statement afterward declaring me not guilty.”

Katta also said that the officer was questioned in court and wasn’t able to remember the last time he had been trained with his radar gun or the last time it had been calibrated.

But if not for the My Tracks app on Katta’s smartphone, he may have just ended up paying the ticket. Pretty smart, for a phone.