CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Debate!
"Man doing 98mph in a 30mph zone avoids jail"
(20 posts)-
Posted 11 years ago #
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Beyond understanding.
I used to know a bloke who was done for 100mph on a bike in open 60mph limits where the Police who caught him actually said in court that while his speed was excessive he was in control, slowed to under the limit on entering a 30mph restricted area and other than the speed was riding well. He got a years ban.
Imho the judge should be awarded a years ban from court for failing in his sentencing duties!Posted 11 years ago # -
Apparently he needs the car to get to work and ferry his kid to school. At 100mph, presumably.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Joke.
Small prison sentence and multi-year driving ban would be appropriate,
Posted 11 years ago # -
The commenters on that site very non--troll
Took a speed bump at nearly a ton. If you go fast enough do they not work?
Posted 11 years ago # -
I actually agree with the no-prison part of the sentence. Prison is an expensive thing to do to someone - costs the taxpayer lots and means that the prisoner loses their job, causes pain to their family etc from lost income. Much better to keep the criminal (that is not at risk of going and bashing someone over the head) in the community, charge them a whopping fine and make them participate in some payback community service.
Posted 11 years ago # -
"multi-year driving ban"
Lifetime ban?
Posted 11 years ago # -
@amir I think breaking the motorway speed limit in a 30 zone probably warrants that. It's no accident, they know what they were doing, and they know the law.
Posted 11 years ago # -
I'm struggling with this one. What LivD says is very compelling. But isn't the driver effectively "at risk of going and bashing someone over the head" by driving a car at 98mph in a 30mph zone?
Posted 11 years ago # -
Hmm my personal feeling is that this is an offence comparable with drunk driving, so a years ban a very large fine and driving test resit would seem justifiable to me, I would prefer lifetime bans to be mandatory for causing death by dangerous driving and optional for causing death or injury by careless driving.
Only an opinion!Posted 11 years ago # -
I am generally against sending people to jail for speeding but this is just so horrific they maybe he should have been put away for a bit. Especially as he often drives with a child in the back. if anything, that should make the sentence tougher, not more lenient. A four month ban only is just staggering.
Posted 11 years ago # -
o a years ban a very large fine and driving test resit would seem justifiable to me
And he didn't even get that!
Posted 11 years ago # -
Surely he's proved he should be the last person left in charge of driving children to school!
People convicted of offences like this should only be allowed back behind the wheel (after a mandatory ban) with a "black box" system to ensure they don't repeat such outrageous behaviour.
Posted 11 years ago # -
This is the first thing I found on sentencing guidelines, so I'm going to go with it. 100mph in a 30 is 'clearly' dangerous driving, so page 120.
Top of the page: Must endorse and disqualify for at least 12 months. Must order extended re-test.
Hmm.
Along with LivD I agree with no imprisonment, primarily because I don't want my taxes paying for the criminal's upkeep. Shouldn't be driving again for a very long time though.
Posted 11 years ago # -
This link provides some more context.
Drives a BMW (are we surprised?)
Got caught by a well-known fixed camera, which just emphasises his idiocy.
Probably got off lightly because on a main road rather than doing such speed in a narrow street by a school (for example).
Are we still shocked by how lightly the courts deal with driving crime?
Posted 11 years ago # -
Although the ban period is short, reflect that in order to drive a motor vehicle legally he will need to have valid insurance.
In order to not void the insurance cover taken out in his name, or afforded to him by the vehicle keeper as a nominated driver on another policy, he will have to declare driving convictions.
If an insurer sees you as an unacceptable risk they will refuse you insurance, and if you fail to disclose a driving conviction, this will be against the caveats set by the insurer to protect then against fraud and false declarations, thereby voiding either the insurance in your name or the policy being extended to you.
So provided this driver is honest (no comment) any attempt to obtain insurance will be excruciatingly expensive (the added penalty you don't always see), and he may choose not to get insurance, or drive on someone else's policy but not declare the conviction - which will void that cover.
So I suspect that if not during the 4 month ban, but later, then the local Police will be keeping an eye open to nab him for driving without insurance, and thus picking up a further ban/points, and keeping him off the road almost as effectively.
Posted 11 years ago # -
"and keeping him off the road almost as effectively"
Er, that depends on him being caught 'just driving around' - it's unlikely police will know (if) he is uninsured - or will randomly stop 'just to make sure'.
IF all of that happens, why any expectation of future law abidingness?
I believe there are estimates that 'a significant number of people' drive without insurance.
Posted 11 years ago # -
+1. There are ~35m cars on UK roads, 4% of which are uninsured - so almost a million. The MIB deals with 25000 uninsured claims every year, so the 4% have a 2.5% (i.e. relatively high) accident rate. All that leads me to believe that your chances of getting caught are very low- the fine is only £300. If you are in your 20's then the fine is much less than the insurance, much-much less if you factor the chances of being caught.
Most uninsureds are caught by traffic police. If you stay away from motorways/main arterial routes/public car parks/Park 'n Ride, your will avoid traffic police cars with ANPR and unless you do something daft, you will not be stopped by panda cars and will go undetected.Posted 11 years ago # -
It would be good to keep track of development to do away with VED discs and increase the levels of monitoring via ANPR.
Driving your own vehicle uninsured should then begin to carry higher risk, and so a PQ might follow this one up through your MP/MSP.
You might be surprised by the local intelligence that a good local policing regime (ie friendly recognisable locally consistent, officers on the beat) actually has but says very little about.
I've always maintained that good Policing generally means fewer arrests rather then meeting a target figure, but actually knowing a lot more about what is happening in the community.
Many years ago (when I owned a car - before quite a few of you lot were born!), I had it stolen (probably by someone who also used on the building site I worked on, to get home). It was recovered within a week and I went to collect it and almost immediately went off on a trip down the M1. Driving 'normally' within the speed limit I was stopped for check on the way out and on the way back, and, why I remember this distinctly, by the same Police Range Rover.
Now this was in the days well before on-line DVLA checks from the moving Police car, and all the other interweb stuff. I was still doing my computing with 80 column cards. I was impressed by the coverage although inconvenienced by the lag in delivering the news that I'd got the car back...
Posted 11 years ago # -
Ireland had a major problem (10%?) with uninsured drivers in the 1990s.
Interestingly, they went the opposite way to the UK now - you had to display an insurance disc as well as a tax disc. You had to return the insurance disc if you cancelled insurance. If you said you lost it, you had to arrange proof that your car was off-road.
This made it more obvious to the Gardai and the public if a car was uninsured, and served as a deterrant.
They have now added ANPR to help get it down from 5%Posted 11 years ago #
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