The woman made a stupid mistake which caused the death of a biker and her comment was stupid in the extreme. But I never agree with prison sentences for for motoring offences that have no criminal intent, such as dangerous driving, drink or drugs or driving in pursuit of a crime.
We have all done what this women did, fortunately without consequences. Can anyone here claim they have never made a driving misjudgement which would have resulted in an accident had someone else been passing them at the time? Why clog the prison system up with an otherwise respectable citizen when a more effective method of rehabilitation would be a couple of years of unpaid work in a casualty department or helping recovering accident victims.
It would make the offender put something back and do far more to educate them as to their behaviour than being banged up with the violent misfits of society. I have been a biker for a large part of my life and also a cyclist, but whenever a fatality happens among either group there does tend to be a bit of a "hang em and flog em" hysteria among both groups.
Accidents will happen because we are only human.
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The story gets more complicated when you actually get details. She was driving with group of friends, in her PT Cruiser, alledgely checked the mirrors, pulled out and got hit by a biker with passenger on his back. None of the passengers in the car heard or saw the biker approach, neither did she. Throughout the trial she claimed the road was empty and that the biker must had been speeding . The PC who investigated the accident said in court such U turn manouver shouldn't not take more than 3.5 seconds and so the bike speed would have to exceed 126mph in order to be invisible to her in the circumstances. This was deemed impossible and she was sentenced.
In truth, I reckon it's not that impossible. I don't know about you, but 3.5 seconds for half way U-turn that's driving copper style, Make it a tad under 5 seconds in PT Cruiser and suddenly the biker speed falls into 80mph region, which we all know - is very moderate speed for any biker these days - in those circumstances it's possible she couldn't see him speeding like nutter, especially that, quite clearly, he had no time to react to her being half way in the middle of U-turn as well...
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[ Anything I drive can and will be used against me ]
Edited by v0n on 16/11/2007 at 17:40
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If the bike was coming from behind before the U turn, then I woudn't expect the passengers to be able to see the bike.
There is a commonly used layby on that road, which is the last exit before the Humber Bridge and its large toll. Quite common for people to meet there and take just one car over the bridge. tinyurl.com/28hval If this was the layby then it is very close to the roundabout and you'd be hard pushed to get to the speed mentioned in that distance. Coming off the roundabout could cut down the time the bike could have been visible for though.
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The woman made a stupid mistake which caused the death of a biker and her comment was stupid in the extreme. But I never agree with prison sentences for for motoring offences that have no criminal intent such as dangerous driving drink or drugs or driving in pursuit of a crime. We have all done what this women did fortunately without consequences. Can anyone here claim they have never made a driving misjudgement which would have resulted in an accident had someone else been passing them at the time?
That's a fair point and every one of us will have had a "what WERE you thinking??" moment at least once (and in my case a good few times) in our life, whether we admit as such or not.
The idea I was trying to get across, albeit blinded by rage at the utterly crass comments made by the driver (surely "I'm sorry that this man is dead" or something similar would have been more appropriate?), was that there are some instances of boneheaded behaviour that are so egregious as to deserve punishment by imprisonment, if only to serve as warning to others.
In terms of conceptual legal thinking, it's a similar thing to the question of "at what point does manslaughter become murder". Oh, I don't know. It just climbs up the nostril somewhat that here we have a situation where someone is dead, and the person who caused it just keeps mumbling "there couldn't of been a bike there cos I didn't see one".
FWIW I don't see the relevance of the fact that she was a magistrate. You can be an absolute pillar of the community, of unimpeachable respectability, and still be a total menace on the road.
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"Murder" as I understand it, is killing with the intent to do just that.
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"Murder" as I understand it is killing with the intent to do just that.
Indeed, and manslaughter is the same thing without the requisite intent. But there have been a string of criminal cases over the last 30 or so years in which the point at which recklessness as to whether life would be endangered could be construed as intent was explored in detail.
What I was suggesting in my post was analogous to that exploration - the point at which a mistake becomes so bad as to be deserving of punishment. The attitude of the maker of the mistake would necessarily have a bearing on this.
The case in question here is a prime example of this.
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In more than 50 years of driving both two and four wheels I've witnessed at least five or six accidents involving a motor-cyclist.
In every case the motor-cyclist has been completely blameless.
Apart from my own adventures on two wheels, my father covered many, many thousands of miles on a range of machines and was involved, without volunteering, in several accidents through the carelessness of other road users.
Only his immense experience prevented such accidents provng extremely serious through his ability to minimise the potential outcome.
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What\'s for you won\'t pass you by
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How about making U-turns illegal? Or at least illegal anywhere above, say, a 30mph limit?
There's nothing inherently dangerous about U-turns but they need a much higher level of observation than most drivers realise. Looking in the mirror, even over the shoulder, isn't enough. You need to keep looking all round all through the turn.
Add in the fact that most U-turns are done in a hurry to take advantage of a gap in traffic, and it's easy to see why they're so dangerous for motorcyclists.
I'm not a fan of this government's instinct to ban everything, but this seems a clear-cut rule change that wouldn't stop people doing it but would at least make prosecution in the event of knocking some poor sod off his bike much easier.
Make U-turns totally illegal and it takes away the worst part of every motorcycle test as well - so we win all ways!
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I drive and I ride. The problem I find in a car when manouvering in a busy or awkward situation where one's concentration needs to be 'up to speed', is the often constant wittering from the passengers. Most people do not take driving seriously enough.
Have a good weekend. I'm off out with the hooligan Labrador, Cheers...MD
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I don't want to add anything to the debate about the particular case, however would like to chip in about my experience on a 60 mile ride on Thursday. It was a nice sparkling day (the karma pay off was having to wash off the salt from the bike in semi darkness), the ride was to visit a client in very genteel area along a mix of roads including a bracing ride along a dual carriageway and A and B roads. It was busy out there. The only two examples of bad driving were within two minutes of each other, both were within the 30 mph limits of Gentilville, the first as I manoeuvred from a parking slot, A fast driven coupe drove past at well above the legal limit and nearly brushed my knee (this being a straight quiet wide boulevard type road) the second near miss was a few meters down the road as I departed, a car U turned in front of me and I nearly T boned it. Both cars were driven my middle age women (alone in their cars), certainly in the case of the second how she didn't see me i beyond understanding, riding one of the largest most visible bikes on the market, my only conclusion was that she saw me and didn't care, she didn't see me or didn't look. All scenarios are scary. The second incident was a genuine near miss and I didn't have time to react by deviation or stop or even sound the horn, despite plodding along at below the limit. This as I say was on a wide road, no parked cars on either side. It leads to a conclusion.....well it nearly bought me to a conclusion anyway.
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Is the conclusion that women drivers are perhaps lacking in some respect?
It will be considered un-pc to say so, but I find women are in general unsympathetic to two wheel vehicles. When my wife used to cycle with me we would often be out on a narrow road when a car approached from behind (riding in single file, I should add). Every now and again and without looking round I would comment "woman driver" to the better half. The reason I could tell was that instead of staying behind till they could pass they would position themselves so that the front of the vehicle was alongside the bike and dangerously close. They might as well have squeezed by for all the difference it made, sitting like that was just as dangerous. This happened too often to be just the odd co-incidence and in the end Mrs RR agreed with me that she hated it when a female driver was behind her.
Perhaps it is because very few women ride either cycles or motorcycles and don't understand the problems a rider can have. I would also add that in my years as a driving instructor virtually all the comments of "I hate cyclists" and "Motorbikes should be banned" came from female pupils.
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Edited by Robin Reliant on 17/11/2007 at 10:53
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the biker must have been travelling too fast to be able to stop in time , what if the object he hit was a sheep or similar , you cant send a sheep to jail ( but they used to hang monkeys for spying)
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i offer the following as a small snap shot of my only two damage difficulties whilst riding/owning a m/c for the past 17 years...although i do ride like a frightened rabbit in towns/cities, expecting the worst on EVERY occasion
1, male, mid 30's, black African, Executive mini-cab in E class Merc. Did sudden U Turn from two lanes of congested traffic without looking and as i was filtering at the time i bounced off his front wing & nearly came to grief with on coming traffic. Scratches to fairing, broken foot peg, bruising and swelling to foot/ankle (decent bike boots saved me).
2, female, 30's, white British, nurse driving NHS Fiesta did a turning manouver in my employer's yard, despite numerous signs saying no unauthorised entry etc (where bike was parked after i was being driven home from incident no.1), drove into front mudguard, nearly knocking bike over, caused deep scratches (observant work colleague caught her before she drove out).
so both incidents on same day.......I don't think lack of observation is necessarily down to sex.....however i do believe that if you're interested in something you'll know more about it and achieve a far higher standard in whatever it is, inc driving and probably more women are less interested in driving than men.
As stated by MD above incessant wittering in a car is most distracting and my stereotypical view of the lady magistrate was 'dozy old trout, too busy yapping to look properly, then being too arrogant to accept reality'.
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"We have all done what this women did fortunately without consequences. Can anyone here claim they have never made a driving misjudgement which would have resulted in an accident had someone else been passing them at the time? "
I agree with that, as I have certainly made mistakes which subsequently frightened me given the possible consequences.
"The woman made a stupid mistake which caused the death of a biker and her comment was stupid in the extreme. But I never agree with prison sentences for for motoring offences that have no criminal intent such as dangerous driving drink or drugs or driving in pursuit of a crime."
Deterrence and punishment do have a role to play. Both make the roads safer through frightening us into being careful. Drink/drug driving does have criminal intent in the sense that people know the possible consequences.
As I have said before here, my half brother was deprived of a driving licence in Sweden after being found drunk in a public place. They consider that drunkenness indicates a lack of control unsuited to driving.
"Why clog the prison system up with an otherwise respectable citizen when a more effective method of rehabilitation would be a couple of years of unpaid work in a casualty department or helping recovering accident victims."
That is not a bad suggestion for the less serious cases. And our legal system does have community service as a punishment.
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