You know, the ones that specialise in getting their defendents off scot free from speeding and other traffic violations – ie, Fergie twitchy bum time.

There are supposedly a whole bunch of specialists who pride themselves in having won every case theyve ever defended. Along with this, there is apparently information available (at a cost) that guides average joe’s towards a successful outcome in the courts.

It’s simple isnt it – you get flashed by a roadside camera – it’s calibrated etc, therefore you are guilty as charged? How do they get away with it?

They go after process failings. They can always find some.

In which sense? A paperwork descrepancy?

i guess they cause enough of a stink that the local authority/police decide it’s not economically viable to continue trying to prosecute?

@Slimjim Sometimes that is all it is, these guys forced the police to post up calibration records of their equipment on websites to prevent cases being dismissed. I find their branch of law quite abhorrent.

A ticket is £100, right?

What lawyer can you hire for £100?!

I guess if you’re on your second offence it’s a lot different.

Not sure if it’s still the case but didn’t it used to be a requirement that there were clear warnings of speed cameras ahead, I’m sure more than one person got off on that basis. But yeah generally they show a problem with the police following the process to the letter and get it thrown out on that basis.

It’s about putting doubt in the magistrate/JPs mind. That’s all they have to do. See the Danny Cipriani drink driving case. He’s bang to rights, but his lawyer was arguing that since there wasn’t absolute proof the machine wasn’t faulty he shouldn’t be convicted – trying to put enough doubt in the magistrates mind to make him acquit. Didn’t work on that occasion, but often does.

One of the most common is (was?) a camera fine with a defence of I can’t remember who was driving. As above cost of proceedings (£5k min?) always more than the fine but there may be other factors.

The one I’ve heard of is because there is a limited time period in which the charge can be made you get your solicitor to make a series of deliberate errors, eg, name spelt wrong, address spelt wrong etc, until the time period is used up. No idea if it’s true or not. Scum the lot of them anyway!

At court as a witness once & policeman told me it’s always worth contesting speeding tickets* as there is almost always some technicality with the signage or some such that is not compliant with regulations

* not that I’ve ever had one btw

If you are looking at a driving ban then it ‘might’ be worth bothering as that can have a big cost impact.

Basically the solicitor looks at every minute detail of process and tries to find something wrong. They then argue that that one mistake makes the case unsafe.

One example I know of involved a policeman on motorbike who pulled over a ‘star’ for speeding and suspected drink/drugs. ‘Star’ was bang to rights guilty on speeding, border line drunk and very squiffy eyed but the policeman didn’t have a drugs kit to test.

It went to court and the policeman was called as a witness. A little nervous about appearing in front of the notorious solicitor he chewed some menthol gum to keep his mouth from drying up.

The solicitor spotted him chewing and asked if he was being contemptuous of the court by eating while giving evidence. Policemen panicked and said no. Solicitor asked what he had in his mouth. Policemen said it was medical. Solicitor asked exactly what it was and the policeman admitted it was chewing gum.

Solicitor said that the policeman had lied under oath in court and could not be considered reliable so the case had to be dismissed.

It was.

The ‘I can’t remember who was driving’ plea no longer works as the owner is now considered liable and will get the points and fine.

If you fail to send one of the required forms back to the court then you are in the wrong but I think that if they then proceed to court without the correct forms then they are in the wrong and you can ask for it to be dismissed. Not certain on that but seem to remember something along those lines.

speeding and suspected dick/drugs.

That could certainly be distracting!

On a car forum I used to frequent, one of the guys got flashed and went with the “don’t know who was driving” approach, before hiring one of these specialists to defend him. They got him off.

He knew perfectly well who was driving but rather than put his hands up and pay the £60 fine he did this “out of principle”. The principle being “I’m rich so I should be allowed to drive as fast as I like”. T**t 🙄

Which reminds me, he took a similarly t**tty approach to recycling, refusing to separate his waste on the basis that he pays lots of tax so somebody else should do it.

T**t.

Apparently if you don’t send in your earning declaration, which you legally must, they might assume average earnings and base the fines on that. If you earn more that the average this might help. If you do this you are breaking the law and if they get shitty about it then it might not help but I guess they have to prove that you didn’t send it rather than they lost it.