[Closed] Have we done that hit and run on the BBC site yet?

People have to remember that criminal offences have to be proved beyond all reasonable doubt. There is a mantra within the British justice system that states better to release than find an innocent guilty. Civil law however has a lower threshold of evidence. The fact they have been found guilty of something in a criminal court will make any subsequent civil case so much easier. There is a certain hypocrisy online in general over matters of driver identity when reported for speeding or parking offences. The advice is of denial or memory loss, except when that same advice works against the greater good like this. As to the suggestion of phone cell sitings? Really? Two people in the same car, both with phones. Do you watch too much CSI?

In fact I'd take "6points and a fine"

Thinking aloud......if he had injuries of damage to claim for, would the company the car was hired to be vicariously liable if the driver could not be identified?

There is a certain hypocrisy online in general over matters of driver identity when reported for speeding or parking offences.

Do you watch too much CSI?

Impound the car. Put the onus on the lease company to investigate in order to get their goods back or it gets crushed.

But, perverting the course of justice seems right to me (everyone from driver and passenger up to the various companies involved who seem not to have any records).

If it's down to 2 people who are known to be in the car but it's not known who was driving they should use the rather unjust threat of common purpose. Might not have a chance in court but again might be enough to get one piece of low life scum to rat on another piece of low life scum.

But, perverting the course of justice seems right to me (everyone from driver and passenger up to the various companies involved who seem not to have any records).

"If driver details are not provided within this period an offence has been committed and a charge of failing to provide driver details will have been committed, this offence carries a punishment of 6 penalty points and a fine of up to £1,000." so this sentence seems well lenient.
It is clearly a apparent offence of dangerous driving I wonder if the potential drivers were arrested and locked up to allow time to question them and establish where they were at relevant times and what there accounts were ?

[url= http://www.buzzfeed.com/rosebuchanan/cyclist-captures-collision-on-camera-but-no-prosecution ]According to BuzzFeed[/url] (sorry) the CTC are looking at it:

National cycling charity CTC told BuzzFeed News they were in touch with the cyclist and would be looking into measures to help.

"Considering the seriousness of the injury and how blatant the offence, this is very weak from the court not to have imposed the maximum penalty on the unnamed Nottingham man who failed to provide driver details," CTC campaign coordinator Sam Jones told BuzzFeed News.

CTC spokesperson Rhia Favero added: "I'm sure most people will find it incredible that the driver couldn't be traced when the courtesy car company must have their details on file."

I wonder if the potential drivers were arrested and locked up to allow time to question them and establish where they were at relevant times and what there accounts were ?

You've been watching too much CSI, they don't just lock everyone up until they've figured it out. Think how may officers are in a police station, and how many cases they're probably involved in, multiply those by how many suspects there are in each case......

how are we going to get anyone to try cycling when **** like this is systematically tolerated?

You've been watching too much CSI, they don't just lock everyone up until they've figured it out. Think how may officers are in a police station, and how many cases they're probably involved in, multiply those by how many suspects there are in each case.....

Trouble is, that just like the police and the CPS, you are treating this as a traffic offence, when it is quite clearly attempted murder.

I have not just been watching CSI though I have also been practicing criminal law for 30 years. Many dangerous driving investigations can and do involve the arrest and detention of the suspects for up to 24 hours . No need to lock up everyone just the two identified suspects . The one who did not do it often dobs the one who did in very quickly . My role is usually to defend the suspect and argue against this , justice only works when someone is doing the other side of the equation at least as diligently as I do my side.

Not worth saying twice.

clearly attempted murder.

unless the driver specifically tried to kill the guy its not attempted murder

He deliberately drove a car at him, I don't see how it can be treated any differently than hitting him in the face with an axe.

forgetting the cyclist was there

I suggest you don't try getting crankboy to defend you with that excuse.

@crankboy, out of interest what would the mechanism be to bypass the CPS and bring a private criminal prosecution?

This, "justice only works when someone is doing the other side of the equation at least as diligently as I do my side."
That in a nutshell sums it all up. CPS receive most jobs when they turn up at court while the defence has had it for 6 months.

Private prosecutions are easy to start difficult to maintain and can be taken over and dropped by the crown. You just lay an information at a magistrates court is fill in a forum.
It would not work in this case as without investigation powers you will not have any leavers to identity which of the two suspects was the driver.

[quote=MSP ]He deliberately drove a car at him

Prove it beyond reasonable doubt. Easiest payday for a defence lawyer ever (I'm prepared to be contradicted by crankboy, but I don't think that's going to happen in this case).

2nd double post i cant even work a smart phone.
I agree it would never fly as attempt murder, but would be an easy dangerous driving if you could establish identity .

I would say it was assault (possibly adding "with a deadly weapon") not attemted murder.

They should have both been banned from driving for life and given custodial sentences until they remember who was driving.

I too am amazed there is not CCTV footage from nearby on the road that shows the driver but I don't know how much gets recorded and how much is just live. It did happen outside of a BBC building so it's a shame that don't have footage of the car.

I bet the hire company is also playing dumb on it and I agree the car should be seized and held as evidence until it's resolved. I assume they have deduced the excess from the hirers credit card to cover the insurance claim by the cyclist against them? Probably not done that too and trying to wriggle out of the claim.

"Attempted murder" is possibly a bit strong, but something like "assault with a deadly weapon" seems about right.

The video [i]suggests[/i] intent to me (driver was clearly aware he was there and there are signs of agitation in the car) but yeah, proving it would be another matter unless they get the driver to admit it or the passenger to testify against him.

Edit: great minds andyl

how are we going to get anyone to try cycling when * like this is systematically tolerated?

Apparently driving around someone lying in the road is illegal in France, sounds like we could do with some laws to make it illegal not to show a bit of human ****ing compassion.

I think for assault you also have to prove intent - but I'm not the criminal lawyer on this thread. I don't know why you're all agitating for them to be charged with offences which are never used in motoring cases unless there is conclusive (not just circumstantial) proof of intent, when they didn't even get prosecuted for what our resident defence lawyer seems to think they should have been. I note that from my recollection of previous threads, crankboy tends to err on the cautious side on charging for such offences, so what he's saying here is quite telling to me.

I don't know why you're all agitating for them to be charged with offences which are never used in motoring cases...

I think people are suggesting that is part of the problem.

Because incidents like this are treated as a motoring offence the feeling is that they don't get as much time or manpower as other types of assault might.

The thing is, lacking proof of intent beyond reasonable doubt, it isn't assault. I'm certainly not an apologist for motorists, and think the while law system needs reforming regarding motoring offences, but don't think it's helpful expecting something which wouldn't even happen if it wasn't a motoring offence, given the available evidence.

Some people really don't seem to understand the concepts of "proving intent" and "beyond a reasonable doubt".

If we aren't happy with how the law works in this country, lobby MPs to change it. But as with most changes to legislation, be careful what you wish for.

I'm with those struggling to understand how invoking a right to silence /not self incriminate allows 2 people who are individually guilty of dangerous driving and withholding evidence can receive such limited punishment. They'd have to be pretty ballsy to withstand the pressure of a full on Police investigation without giving anything away. Shame the CPS weren't prepared to prosecute on the minimum offence as the two occupants committed both offences (one each).
A civil prosecution would presumably require only balance of probability - could this not be brought against the occupants collectively?

The civil action effectively is a claim for compensation for loss from negligence, the insurers of the driver will deal with that without being too troubled by the identity of the actual driver in thr incident or the motor insurers bureau will .I don't understand from the report why the injured guys claim has not progressed yet.

"proving intent" and "beyond a reasonable doubt"

[quote=deepreddave ]Shame the CPS weren't prepared to prosecute on the minimum offence as the two occupants committed both offences (one each).

Yeah, but which one did which? Reasonable doubt gets them both off either offence.

Though I do agree with:

They'd have to be pretty ballsy to withstand the pressure of a full on Police investigation without giving anything away.

and as always the sentencing is a joke, right down at the minimal level, similar to what you'd get for not naming the driver for an SP30 - sentencing for motoring offences is something which really does need addressing. Not that the maximum possible sentence would be much better.

A civil prosecution would presumably require only balance of probability - could this not be brought against the occupants collectively?

A civil "prosecution" could only be for damages, which presumably the insurance has covered anyway (I don't think we have info on this)?

I see it made the BBC 10 o clock news.

[quote=nickjb ]

"proving intent" and "beyond a reasonable doubt"

Sure, and they appear to have done some investigation into prosecuting for that, but failing on identifying the driver, which still needs to be proved beyond reasonable doubt. The intent thing was really concerning some people's suggestions that assault charges should have been laid. The withholding evidence thing would presumably be perverting the course of justice, and again on what appears to be available evidence there's room for doubt there I think (though way out of my depth on that one).

Once again I'll point out that I'm firmly on the side of more robust prosecution of motorists, and wonder whether the police could have done more to "beat" some info out of the people involved, but not sure the CPS had any other choice in this particular case.

One thing I am curious about is that they appear to be avoiding naming the people involved - yet they have been successfully prosecuted, so their names should be on court records and in the public domain...

[quote=hamishthecat ]I see it made the BBC 10 o clock news.

TBH the publicity from this might actually be quite a good thing, as I think even to non-cycling members of the public those involved don't come across well.

BBC piece here (don't think I can embed video)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-35486855

even the international news headlines section in our local paper in down under Melbourne this am

and

".I don't understand from the report why the injured guys claim has not progressed yet."

because he was riding a bike ? pretty sure "the you brought it on yourself" mentality runs through a lot of thinking and hence actions don't follow a logical path

The thing is, lacking proof of intent beyond reasonable doubt, it isn't assault.

I agree - but the cyclist describes it as "an attack" so presumably [i]he[/i] thinks it was intentional.

If that is the case then shouldn't the police investigate it as an assault and, once they have gathered evidence, interviewed the suspects, spoken to witnesses etc, THEN determine if they can prove it was intentional or if they can only get them for the lesser road traffic offences.

What we* seem to be saying here is the video doesn't prove beyond reasonable doubt that it was intentional so they can't investigate it as assault.

That is wrong-headed. The video should only be one piece of evidence.

If someone put me in hospital by hitting me over the head with a spade and I went to the police to file an assault charge, I wouldn't expect them to say [i]"Well we don't have any video so we'll have to assume it was an accident"[/i] nor would I expect them to say [i]"Well we have CCTV that suggests that it might be intentional but it's not conclusive so we'll treat it as an accident"[/i]. I'd expect them to investigate an alleged assault.

.

* and by "we" I mean us on the forum. We don't know what the police thinking or process was. They might have treated it as assault.

Shirley at very least we have grounds for:

1. Leaving the scene of an accident
2. Driving without due car or the more serious Dangerous Driving
3. Perverting the course of justice

If you can prove intent than it would be assault or ABH if not GBH.

The video is shocking but it would be easy for a lawyer to argue that they were just driving normally and failed to spot the cyclist due to some act of God.

I would like to see much stiffer penalties for dangerous driving in line with bans for life.

failed to spot the cyclist due to some act of God.

Yep, and also had some short term memory issue which made them conveniently forget the cyclist that they had been stopped directly behind before the lights changed.

[quote=GrahamS ]I agree - but the cyclist describes it as "an attack" so presumably he thinks it was intentional.

It makes no difference what he thinks - and presumably he's just basing that on his own interpretation of the video as he clearly didn't see the car coming. Anyway, how do you know the police didn't investigate it for assault? The thing is, in a situation where they can't even prove who the driver was, exactly what evidence do you think there could be which would prove intent? We have done "beyond reasonable doubt" haven't we?

If someone put me in hospital by hitting me over the head with a spade and I went to the police to file an assault charge

it would be a completely different and non-comparable situation. You're not going to come up with an analogy here of something which is clearly likely to be assault which is comparable, and there's a reason for that. Sadly many drivers are that crap that they drive into things in front of them unintentionally, even things which have been in front of them for a while (I witnessed one car running into the back of another in a traffic queue this morning - I'm sure that wasn't intentional).

[quote=andyl ]Shirley at very least we have grounds for:
1. Leaving the scene of an accident
2. Driving without due car or the more serious Dangerous Driving

Provided you can prove [b]beyond reasonable doubt[/b] who the driver is.

3. Perverting the course of justice

Which is where the loss of memory comes in. If you could prove who was driving then that would be a poor approach to take in court, but given they can't, then that's one way of introducing reasonable doubt that failure to name the driver is deliberate.

I'm not being an apologist for the car occupants here - but maybe I am for the police and the CPS. You might not like the way the law works, but most of this is pretty fundamental to the way our law system does work - and in general it works very well and is rightly world renowned. It is unfortunate that vehicle crime like this is different to other crime, but in this case there is a genuine difference - basically down to the fact that most vehicle crime is unintentional (if we exclude speeding!) at the point where the specific crime is committed. We could rightly argue that there's intent involved in driving badly enough to do things like this - and I would - but that's a different argument.

but most of this is pretty fundamental to the way our law system does work

*definitely, considering how badly these things normally seem to get prosecuted/sentenced

Presumed liability would come in handy here. Charge them both until one squeals.

I'm not one for defending the police at all times, goodness knows that would be a daft stance to take, but on this one, while it [i]may[/i] he the case that Notts Police have missed something (none of us can say based on a news article and without access to the file) it is entirely plausible that they have done everything within their power and left no investigative stone unturned and this is the end result. Such are the rules/procedures/limitations of what they are and are not allowed to do - there are a lot of them.

Presumed liability is a civil issue, not a criminal issue. If you used it in criminal cases then all suspects would be guilty until they had proved they were innocent, which I am not a fan of, frankly.

Will there actually be a court record of this publicly available?

Fwiw, the victim gave a better interview on the local lunchtime news than the evening news, but the amount of coverage it has got will hopefully make people stop and think about the level of injustice suffered by cyclists hit by vehicles.

[quote=D0NK ]maybe* we should treat car offences differently

I'm not convinced changing the way the law works would be appropriate - slippery slope and all that. The offence the driver did get prosecuted for is arguably already a step that way, involving the requirement to incriminate yourself, but I'd argue the correct thing in such cases is simply to increase the maximum penalty for that offence so that you could give a sentence similar to that if found guilty of the original offence committed (and then get the ****ing judges to actually give something other than the minimum possible sentence) A driving ban certainly should be within the normal range for failing to provide the driver's details in cases like this where the magistrates should recognise that they are taking the piss.

Though of course, bearing in mind the way dangerous driving is sentenced, the question is whether the maximum £1000 fine and 6 points (or even the £150 fine he did get) is that dissimilar to what they might have got if prosecuted for dangerous driving.

[quote=MoreCashThanDash ]Fwiw, the victim gave a better interview on the local lunchtime news than the evening news, but the amount of coverage it has got will hopefully make people stop and think about the level of injustice suffered by cyclists hit by vehicles.

Exactly what I'm thinking - hopefully a lot of good might come out of all the publicity for a case where the driver is so clearly a scumbag and the cyclist so clearly an innocent victim (those who'll just say the cyclist shouldn't have been on the road are a lost cause).