[Closed] Drink Driving

So for example show me a case where a driver not involved in any accident has been stopped and as a result given a one year ban and substantial fine.

In the summer I charged a guy with dangerous driving. He was overtaking on the approach to a bend, and nearly took my police car and two other off the road when I came round the bend the other way. No accident (although I don't know how!), no injuries, no damage. 12 month ban, about a £500 fine.

With phones the law just hasn't been quick enough to catch up yet, and the legislation as it stands left barmy loopholes. The presumed issue with phones was holding the phone, but the risk with hands free is hardly lower, but consumer handsfree systems only really evolved in response the loophole.

You would think that talking hands free would be no less risky than talking to a passenger, but a passenger can actually add to your awareness - if you are mid conversation and a hazardous event begins to unfold your passenger stops talking.

There is a suggestion that the period of risk extends to some 10 minutes after a call, although how thats measured I'm unsure. If someone has called to impart information I presume in the absence of being able to be either note or act on the information must be preoccupying.

But how do you police those 10 minutes?

With phones their widespread adoption and use is just too recent to be able to effectively legislate for yet. I'm sure it'll happen though

Whatever Bandit.

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and the legislation as it stands left barmy loopholes.

Too right! Recent case law, someone got off driving on their phone because the police officers hadn't seen whether or not he was speaking, even though he was holding it by his ear whilst driving along with one hand on the wheel! Defence argued that if he wasn't speaking he wasn't [i]using[/i] the phone, so wasn't guilty. Court agreed.

Surely his phone records would have been sufficient? Spose it depends how accurately you can place the time of the offense though (and unless the phone was seized you wouldn't know what phone he wasn't talking into)

If they had them yes, but it's not routine practice to seize phones. For exactly the reasons you suggest. Even if you seize the phone he pulls out of his pocket, was that definitely the one he was holding when I saw him 30 seconds earlier? Bit of a minefield, do we start searching vehicles top to bottom for a mobile phone offence to make sure there's no more, and take all the passengers phones? It's crap, but it's the reality of prosecution and defence in court.

[i]Bit of a minefield, do we start searching vehicles top to bottom for a mobile phone offence to make sure there's no more, and take all the passengers phones?[/i]

Yeah go on! When they start protesting just hand them a copy of the case you refer to justify your actions.

I thought it was an offence to be even holding a phone in a car, whether you are speaking or not?

The point is that a large volume of dosh, time and expertise has been put into making D & D socially unacceptable. As a result attitudes have changed dramatically and it is no longer the jokey socially acceptable misdemeanour that it was.

All I am saying is that if the same effort were put into other issues with frighteningly similar jokey socially acceptable misdemeanour tags as has been put into D & D that would be a good idea. For those jokey things read such things as mobile phone use, assaulting a person with a motor vehicle as recently proposed by both Clarkson and that dickhead chef, and so forth and killing cyclists.

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So did I druidh. The offence is 'using' a mobile phone whilst driving, and using was not further defined, which some defence solicitor has spotted, hence this recent case law.

EDIT This might only apply to Scotland. Prior to this, the High Court (in Scotland) decreed that if you were seen holding it to your ear it could be correctly inferred that you were using it.

OK - but surely the old "driving w/o due care..." bit would still apply?

Yes. That's what the police used to use before the specific mobile phone offence came in.

(Again though, I don't know if you would get it past a court that, on it's own, holding a phone amounted to carelessness. Holding a phone/banana/pie in one hand while steering round a corner would be held to be careless, I've seen that before. Driving down a straight road, not so sure. The new law was meant to be a bit more absolute when it comes to phones. And I'm not saying what happens is right, just highlighting some of the pedantic debates I've seen in courtrooms).

Drink-driving killed 430 people last year

Looks like drunk drivers are angels.

Check out old drivers, per kilometre driven they are just as dangerous according to a German report I saw on TV.

Where this all started was the assertion by Zokes that the high profile policing and draconian punishment of drink drivers (regardless of whether they are in an accident or not) is only because detection and prosecution is easy. You can catch someone drink driving purely by accident, without any suspicion or observation.

So the suggestion is that the police and prosecuting authorities would rather direct their efforts at easy busts cherry picking drunk drivers, rather than doing the real work of prosecuting other drivers that are careless in other ways. And that therefore drink drivers are targetted only as quota achieving exercise.

But I've no experience of the police allowing careless drivers to just swan about being careless, simply because there are higher-scoring prizes to be had. There might be an issue though of making the penalties for other driving offenses more effective.

This is indeed my point, and you got it well, up until the final para I've quoted... As other people have said, the UK police do, especially at this time of year, set up roadblocks and breathalyse everyone. No such thing exists for people reading a map, arguing, pacifying kids etc - they have to be caught veering about before something gets done.

Lets take an example...

Car clips kerb, spins into oncoming cyclist, sadly killing them. Police investigate.

a) he's sober, truthfully says he swerved to avoid a sheep and the accident happened. Police investigate, and find in his favour - verdict, tragic accident.

b) same as above, yet he didn't swerve to avoid a sheep, but says he did. In actual fact he was changing radio station / reading a map / arguing / etc. Police investigate and find in his favour.

c) This time he did swerve to avoid a sheep, but had a pint before leaving the pub. Police instead pin death by dangerous driving on him - using the fact he had alcohol in his bloodstream to do so, even though in actual fact it was non-contributory in this case.

d) same as C, yet this time he had 2 pints. He quite rightly gets the book thrown at him.

These are all scenarios that could happen. Comparing A and C is especially interesting, whilst comparing B and C demonstrates exactly my point. Only possible witness is under the car - it's a rural road so sheep are quite plausible, so driver B gets away with death by careless driving, driver C gets a much worse punishment when he didn't deserve it.

Take away your subjective views about it being a cyclist I've hypothetically put under the car, and the stigma attached to DD, and tell me which is the fairest outcome...

Talking of Zokes scenarios, a friend of a friend was driving to work one morning, he`d had a fair few the night before. A doctor was on his way home from pulling a nightshift at the local hospital, the doctor fell asleep at the wheel, swerved across the road and and drove into him. Both were breathalised and the friend of a friend was still a little bit over the limit and was blamed completely for the accident as he should not have been on the road in the first place. He certainly shouldnt have been but neither should the doctor.

Personally I think the limit should be much lower than it is at present, certainly less than a pint. Im a fair size and have always drank quite a bit, takes a lot to get me drunk, I used to ride motorbikes and if I had just one pint I could really notice the difference, you dont notice the difference as easily in a car but its there alright, hence I never drink anything whatsoever anymore if Im driving.