Well, an "Opticon", in this context, to the best of my knowledge, is a photocell (electric eye) mounted up on the stoplight bracket, and ambulances and fire trucks (and, presumably, the cops) have some secret code that they flash through their windshield with a strobe - the Opticon picks up that signal, and changes the cross-lights to red, and changes the light for the emergency vehicle green. Some guy had decoded that code, and was breezing through town, but presumably got caught because the red-light cameras were timed to the moment when the light was _supposed_ to have turned red - there was this car in the intersection, and the "switch to red" signal had been overridden!
They caught the guy. :-)
Cheers! Rich