BATON ROUGE - For some students at Louisiana State University, what used to be a quick coffee run is turning into a costly mistake.

Students say parking cameras near a campus Starbucks have led to hundreds of dollars in fines for briefly stopping in what university officials say is a designated fire lane.

Cassidy Wartelle said she first learned about the tickets through social media, after seeing a TikTok video of a student who joked her coffee ended up costing nearly $300 because of a citation captured by a camera mounted on a nearby pole.

Wartelle said the experience has changed her habits.

“I used to just park and run in for mobile orders, but now I park and walk over because I'm not trying to get a 300 and something dollar ticket,” Wartelle said.

Other students report similar experiences. Easton Lonibos, a senior at LSU, said a friend recently received a $375 ticket tied to the same enforcement system.

“She was really upset,” Lonibos said. “$375 is a lot of cash to cough up for a ticket.”

Students say the fines feel steep and the cameras are not always obvious, leaving some surprised when citations arrive.

University officials say the only camera set up to issue fines is located near the Starbucks on Nicholson Drive. It monitors a marked fire lane where parking is prohibited.

When asked how the university would enforce fines against non-students, LSU officials said unpaid citations could be referred to the Louisiana Attorney General’s Office for collection. However, a spokesperson for the Attorney General’s Office said it does not issue tickets and directed questions about parking enforcement back to the university.

Franz Borghardt, a defense attorney in Baton Rouge, said recipients of the citations have the right to challenge them.

“You absolutely have a due process right to challenge these tickets,” Borghardt said. “LSU has to prove that one, it was your car that was parked illegally, and two, that you, in fact, were the person driving your car.”

Borghardt described the fines as costly but emphasized that drivers should respond quickly if they plan to dispute a citation.

For now, some students say the risk of a hefty fine is enough to change their routines even if it means skipping a quick stop for coffee.