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Home Office have announced new sentencing on anyone who causes death by Dangerous/Reckless, Aggrivated TWOC up to 14 years. Any comments.
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I suspect it will be very popular. There seems to have been a recent spate of cases involving someone with a long history of motoring convictions getting just 6 years or so for causing death by dangerous driving.
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I refer to the thread
www.honestjohn.co.uk/forum/post/index.htm?v=i&t=12...5
where I posted the following on 11 April 03:
".... Proposed: "the Government published its report on the Review of Road Traffic Penalties, in which it was confirmed that the maximum penalty for dangerous driving would be increased to 5 years, as proposed in the 2000 consultation paper. The Government also announced in its report that the maximum sentence for each of the three driving offences occasioning death (causing death by dangerous driving, causing death by careless driving while under the influence of drink or drugs, and causing death by aggravated vehicle taking) would be increased to 14 years."
So, motorists, be careful. You can be jailed for 5 years for dangerous driving. ....." <<
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Pugugly: a side question as you are likely to look at this thread -
have you got any facts on the case law hinted at in the following thread - see my post there at 20.01 on 29 April 03.
www.honestjohn.co.uk/forum/post/index.htm?f=2&t=12...4
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I strongly believe that a penalty should relate directly and solely to the manner of the offence, not to the result of it.
Tying penalties to the results of an offence will please those who are out for revenge for the death of a friend or relative but it is not morally justified.
14 years may be an appropriate penalty for reckless/dangerous driving (though I personally think it excessive). If so, I've no complaint -- but let's keep to old-fashioned fairness and penalise *only* for the offence.
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Derby man with 100+ previous convivtions (not all motoring related) just got 6 years for causing an accident that killed 2 people. That means he might serve 4 - not enough IMHO
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More than likely three - minus any time spent on remand.
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Important to note that it is a maximum penalty and not a minimum, The judiciary are none to happy about some bits of the new regs. Time will tell as will caselaw.
MB, sorry, I missed your posting on this or I would have added (feel free to move it there Mark, Dave, Martyn) I will read it now and inwardly digest and come up with an opinion.
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Dizzy,
If a friend or relative of yours was killed in the same manner, would you still feel the same way? Not wishing to stir things up, but I'm genuinely interested in your opinion.
HF
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HF,
Yes, I would feel exactly the same way.
I haven't lost any relatives through motoring accidents but I do have a relative that I am very close who suffered horrendous injuries at the hands of a maniac driver a few years ago. The driver lost control of his car at a speed estimated by the police as being at least 60 mph round a sharp bend in a 30 mph zone. This was the driver's third offence of a similar kind and, in my opinion at the time, the penalty was far too lenient (can't remember just what it was now).
My relative could have suffered no injury at all if he had been a few feet away -- or he could have been killed if he had been in a few feet in the other direction. Should the driver have received just a fine and some points on his licence for 'speeding' if there was no injury involved but 14 years in clink if death had occurred? Those are the possible extremes where the penalty is influenced by outcome rather than cause.
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Thanks for answering me Dizzy. I'm sorry to hear about your relative. I can see exactly your point, and as others have said here there seems no ideal solution.
Personally I'd probably go with the idea of drivers knowing the *potential* damage they could cause by reckless actions, and be treated accordingly. But I can also fully respect what you are saying.
And as someone with a relative who has suffered this horrifically, you are certainly well-qualified to have a valid opinion on this.
Thanks
HF
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>>I strongly believe that a penalty should relate directly and solely to the manner of the offence, not to the result of it.
I would tend to agree.
Losing it on a bend whilst drunk and hitting a park bench is the same offence whether or not someone was sitting on the bench at the time.
However, first we would need to decide what prison is for;
deterrence
punishment
revenge
removal from society
etc.
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This is a dashed difficult balancing act for those making the law and those implementing it. IMO, few people appreciate what a deadly weapon a car can be and they are not treated with the respect a weapon deserves. However, the problem is differentiating an unfortunate and unintended consequence from one that could reasonably be expected, or even one that was intended. Using a vehicle with intent to injure or kill should not, IMO, be classed as a motoring offence. Taking risks that could reasonably be expected to result in death or injury should incur a serious sentence, then maybe other drivers will realise that a car is not a right to be used as they like, but a responsibility.
I don't know how the law stands at the moment, but multiple offences should influence any sentence strongly, and any prison sentence should be followed by a driving ban of similar proportions.
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I thought the only difference between causing death by reckless driving and the broader offence of manslaughter was the maxima of 10 & 14 years respectively.
If there's no difference between the offences now, what's the point?
Yours confused.
Maz.
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I've thought about this issue many times, and never been able to come up with a firm opinion. Take the example of driving while knowingly unfit due to lack of sleep. One might doze off and drive off the road into a field. One might also doze off, drive onto a railway line, de-rail a train and kill many people. In one sense, both offences are morally equivalent, in another, they are entirely different.
I tend towards the view that one cannot seperate the consequences of wrongful conduct with the outcome. If you fire a gun into a crowd, you have to take the consequences if you hit someone. What does alarm me is the seperate proposal to give the victims of crime a direct say in the sentencing of the offender. Of all the people able to think clearly and consistently about sentencing, surely the families and victims of the offence are the worst? I know this is a somewhat contraversial view, but I have my suspicions that policies like this are suggested for short term political gain, and are never intended to become part of the criminal law.
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"policies like this are suggested for short term political gain, and are never intended to become part of the criminal law."
Isn't this Chapter 1, Page 1 of the A Campbell guide to getting re-elected.
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PU
Already covered for S1 Offence is a punishment on indictment of 10 years imprisonment. How many wigged ones do you know that have invoked the maximum?
Labour party trying to look hard on crime to appease protest.
DVD
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Not many, persoanally I feel this is partly a political issue and partly the result of lobbying by certain single issue groups. In reality I can't see much changing.
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