I think the argument is something along the lines of: the public hears that an engineer is making certain claims and then push for the laws to be changed. Running of yellow/red lights ends up killing a lot of people. Perhaps without this passive enforcement, more people would die.

Having read some local news about the incident, it sounds like his wife blatantly ran a light according to the laws of Oregon and he attempted to get it thrown out using a dubious technical argument.

http://www.oregonlive.com/commuting/index.ssf/2014/02/joseph...