Ph Topic/story On A Driver That Got Sent To Prison

[Cameron 16]

If 10pence had been a middle aged man driving a Mondeo, and he hadn't overtaken anyone, but had the same accident, would he have still been prosecuted? If he had said "I don't know what happened. I was travelling within the speed limit but the corner sharpened and took me off gaurd and I lost control", would he have been prosecuted?

 

You've got a good point there, if I overtook someone in my Mondeo I wouldn't get anywhere near the same judgement of my driving standards as if I were in toe 205, that's for sure! BUT it's not just about the overtake! He also went on to take the upcoming corner far too quickly and lost control causing an accident. In my opinion this means he was driving dangerously and the overtaking helped him to get justice as it meant there were witnesses. If he hadn't just overtaken somebody he could have been miles up the road and nobody would have been able to prove how he was driving, he could have got away scot free!

 

Please dont feel this as an attack, but have you ever crashed a car?

 

No, but I have had some very scary near misses. Generally they've only come about where I've been too inexperienced to judge an overtaking gap. I've never driven hard enough on the road to lose control in a corner, and I never will. My first car was a 205 and after seeing my mates' similar cars after they'd been rolled I decided to be careful. This isn't to say I don't drive fast sometimes, I just do it where it's appropriate but am always thinking of what could be coming up ahead. I'm not trying to bulls*it to make myself sound great, this it just the truth.

 

I was driving down a straight A road at night and an ambulance on blues and twos was coming the other way. The opposite carriageway was clear so the ambulance was unimpeded. The car in front of me braked and slowed significantly as the ambulance passed. I did not slow but indicated, pulled out and overtook the car as I caught the car up as the ambulance passed me. It was not a risky or sudden or dangerous in any way.

It was an instinctive manoeuvre and I would do it again without a second thought. But I was tooted at and flashed by the other driver. He thought I was reckless but in my view he was an idiot..

 

Yeah, unfortunately British drivers have no respect for anyone else's driving ability. If someone overtakes they automatically assume the worst because they've been brought up with the "treat everybody else as an idiot" attitude of driving. So I'm with you on this and I would have done the same.

[muddatrucker 125]

In terms of the topic itself, I don't believe Prison is a doss for this particular type of criminal - as in someone who made a single bad decision and has gone straight to prison for it - simply because he'd probably never considered he'd ever do anything serious enough to warrant being sent there in his life.

 

But for Armed Robbers and repeat offenders who make up the majority of the system, I'd say its a massive doss and thats why it doesn't act as a deterrent, the advantages of their lifestyles out weigh the disadvantages of ending up inside.

 

As for the driver himself, I don't fell sorry for him, although I can appreciate that he managed to commit one of the few crimes where you'd be sent straight to prison for being 'careless' or 'dangerous', it sounds as if the evidence against him was pretty damning and it would be interesting to read some of his forum posts which marked his fate.

[Bigtimmy 1]

I love this forum, it's great!

 

Another point I think should be mentioned is that these days cars are so much more powerful than they used to be. My first car, some years back, was a 950cc Fester, and the school carpark was littered with the same, and the odd "daddy bought" Clio or similar.

 

These days teens are blatting round in Clio cup cars and turbocharged minis and the like, and the 950cc Fester is just not available.

 

You could go out and buy an Alpha Guillietta 1.4 multiair, one day after passing your test and it's got 170bhp or something crazy like that, but it's a 1.4 and doesn't look offensive as a car.

 

If you put a 17 year old in said Alpha in the same situation as our man here and given the same actions I wonder what the outcome would have been.

 

I realise our man here was a bit older than 17 and claims to be a "responsible and good driver", but bowling into a corner on a road you know and not coming out of the other side does suggest a bit too much right toe in the axminster and like Cam it does wind my up a bit.

 

If you want to drive like you've stolen it do a track day, making descisions about pulling over to let the Caterham R500 past at 110 mph going round a right hander does focus the mind and promote good car control.

 

Track days have the added bonus of having nothing coming the other way.

[Cameron 16]

I would tell it as it was. Had he made a safe, considerate overtake and all I had witnessed was good driving, then that is exactly what I would say. Had he made a reckless, ill-considered overtake and/or shown driving which I felt fell short of what was expected, then again, that is exactly what I would say. Unless I saw the accident between the car and biker, I wouldn't be in a position to comment on that at all - only the driving I had witnessed beforehand.

 

The last person he overtook saw him enter the corner the accident happened on though, didn't he? That's what I got from reading his accounts of the incident anyway. If I had only seen somebody overtaking then I would do the same as you but if I had seen someone overtake then as I enter the corner ahead saw him broadside across the road with a bike buried in the side of it I think that would heavily influence my opinion. Overtaking is one thing, and done safely and considerately it's fine as long as you slow down again for the corner ahead which he clearly didn't do.

 

Blame is perhaps the wrong word, but there is in my eyes he does bear some responsibility for the extent of his injuries owing to his choice to ride a motorbike. I'm sure that he now questions now whether that choice was worth it everyday his suffers pain, helplessness and ponders "what if?"

 

A different example of the point I'm trying to make - someone openly wears an expensive Rolex watch and flaunts it to all and sundry, and later that night gets mugged for said watch whilst walking back through a rough part of town. The person who mugged him was acting illegally and has done wrong, but in my eyes, the victim is partly responsible for being mugged owing to their choice to flaunt the expensive watch and to walk home at night through a rough part of town.

 

While a biker should know that they risk much more serious injury and ride accordingly, I don't believe they should bear any responsibility in accidents like this that where somebody is so clearly to blame. The biker was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, there's nothing he could have done to avoid the accident other than arrive a few moments earlier / later.

[Baz 421]

Yeah, unfortunately British drivers have no respect for anyone else's driving ability. If someone overtakes they automatically assume the worst because they've been brought up with the "treat everybody else as an idiot" attitude of driving. So I'm with you on this and I would have done the same.

 

Exactly, and at the risk of veering a little off topic, it's not just that, most general drivers have absolutely no idea or at least expect alot less of what cars are actually capable of, not just driving ability.

 

When you drive the same route at roughly the same time very often, you start to see the same cars and therefore drivers alot, and it's very telling how confident, or incompetent some are when weather or road conditions change from the usual, speeds drop massively, they panic brake and put in odd steering inputs in odd places and generally do what could be interpreted as dangerous things, clearly uncomfortable in what they're doing, which to me means they shouldn't be driving. If i feel like i'm not comfortable driving behind someone like this i'll ease off until i can make a safe overtake, but often when/if i do, i get full beamed & the horn blaired at me and generally treated as if i've just butchered a baby seal, which is totally ridiculous of course.

 

This is actually something that really aggrevates me, because what right does another road user that has absolutely no idea of someone else's ability, car control or indeed car's abilities have to judge them, and more-so then dangerously use the horn and flash/full beam them?? This could be enough to then cause an accident that would then otherwise not have happened.

 

I just can't see the logic in it, as if of course it's a perfectly safe overtake, not harming any other road users or causing anyone to change speed or direction as it should be then where's the harm in it? I could understand if it was done eratically with no care or concern for anyone else, but i see this happen all too often.

It gets worse too, as there's also people out there that will adopt a 'defensive' driving style when being followed, to the point of blocking an attempted overtake etc, all just more evidence unfortunately of the frankly IMO generally apalling mentality and abilities of most UK road users.

 

And don't get me started on the lack of spacial/size awareness that most driver's have and therefore their inability to judge where to place themselves on the road etc!

[SurGie 54]

Could it partly be because we all have to pay a lot of money to use the roads which leads people thinking they own the road ?

 

It could have been anyone when diesel is on the road

Edited October 19, 2010 by SurGie

[GLPoomobile 958]

Well, I'm not trying to debate the ins-and-outs of said incident, as none of us were there and none of us know the facts, but I'd agree that purely on the basis of him knowing the road, he must have been pushing a little too hard to have lost control, and that constitutes at least careless driving.

 

But that's not my point.

 

I'm going back to the bit about how driving is percieved by others. This could have been a genuine unfortunate accident. Forget everything you've read in the PH topic about the "facts". Lets just say for a moment that he was out for a sunday drive. The other modded cars were unrelated and simply saw another Jap import and decided to tag along. He takes the opportunity to go for an overtake in a safe place (but is percieved to aggressive and dangerous because of his rate of acceleration and loud car - judged by the same fuddy-duddy old duffers who drive everywhere at 40mph regardless of the posted limit, and overtake at 2mph more than the car in front taking half a mile to complete the manaouvre). He is then further percieved to be racing because the following modified cars then also overtake, perhaps dangerously so, and this then makes him guilty by association. He continues his drive, slowing down to the posted limit and driving within the limits of the road and his abilities. A couple of minutes later, well out of view of the following cars, he enters a bend and something goes wrong - this could be anything, an sudden large bump, some adverse camber, an animal in the road, he sneezed, whatever - he loses control and ends up on the wrong side colliding with the biker.

 

Now all of the above is purely hypothetical. All I'm doing is illustrating that in this hypothetical scenario, the driver was not doing anything wrong at the time of the accident. Something just went wrong. And that can (and does) happen to anybody. Nobody saw what happened. Only the driver knows the true circumstances. But the following drivers then downright lie (or incorrectly remember events) and suggest that he was racing because he overtook in a loud car, followed by other similar loud cars, and that they all overtook dangerously. The police then check his internet activity and form a biased opinion of his character, and all of this forms a conviction based not upon fact.

 

As I said before, this could have been any of us.

Edited October 19, 2010 by GLPoomobile

[Tom Fenton 1,526]

The police then check his internet activity and form a biased opinion of his character, and all of this forms a conviction based not upon fact.

 

 

If this is what they now form an assessment of character based on, we're all knackered and may as well hand ourselves in now.....

[GLPoomobile 958]

Well the internet is now an important part in fighting crime, isn't it? Means they can surf for gash whilst pretending to catch crims

[kyepan 291]

pretty much steve, if you've been hazzing down some stretch of road and come a cropper a bit later on, chances are the people following will dive in and claim you were worshiping the devil at 900 leptons per hour whilst sacrificing babies during dangerous overtakes where you had your eyes closed.

 

 

It's the way of the world.

 

I feel overtaking is a lost art, In the dim and distant past of my memory, i was 4 or 5 and my sister was three, The family had a white mini cooper s 1275 named YOB. Dad used to drive mum and us to birmingham regularly, before the M40 was built to go see grandma. Dad being the safety consious chap he was, fitted booster cushions and full harness seatbelts for the kids.

 

This was the order of the journey, clean running down the a roads at "normal" speed, dad catches a crocodile of perhaps 10 cars, proceeds to hop round them, one, two or sometimes three at a time, then gets back up to "normal" speed and continues journey. Never got flashed, or honked, that i remember, no fuss or bother. We, being the faster car, just overtook.

 

It's not really that world any more, Partly because everyone did 40 back then, and between 30-70 the cooper s was in it's day, rather rapid. Now everyone does 50-60 and cars are too big for the road, no one leaves a reasonable gap etc etc. It's tricky to do, and the reaction you get, even for a safe overtake is sometimes disproportionatly based on ego, and unfamilarity with it happening.

 

So inevitably, those seeking to drive as they know they can, will come under much greater scruitny if and when something goes wrong.

Edited October 19, 2010 by kyepan

[Cameron 16]

I blame cars becoming safer and simpler for the change in attitude. Modern cars are too far removed from the mechanics and the speed so people forget that they're driving a machine that can quite easily kill.

[doughboy 0]

I blame cars becoming safer and simpler for the change in attitude. Modern cars are too far removed from the mechanics and the speed so people forget that they're driving a machine that can quite easily kill.

 

+1

[GLPoomobile 958]

Agreed J.

 

It's one of my many driver's pet hates - coming up behind a line of cars following a bus/tractor/lorry/caravan etc. Any one of them with the potential to make an overtake, but instead they bunch up making it more difficult the farther back in the queue you are. It becomes impossible to "leapfrog" your way past.

 

I always drop back in that situation, and if someone wants to pop in front of the gap I've left them, then fair play to them. Chances are they'll still be there 2 miles later on, but at least I can feel warm and fuzzy inside knowing I've done my part to open up an opportunity for them. In fact, on two recent occasions (one in a LWB Transit and the other in a Fiesta 1.4 TDCi), I've actually waved a following car past when I've seen an opening* (both of which were the type of evil, kitten murdering, bastard boy racers like 10pence - one was in a Civic Type R and the other an Astra Coupe, both with loud exhausts), becuase I'd rather help than hinder their progress - they are going to try it either way so I'd rather they do it safely than take a stupid risk.

 

*bet someone now wants to point out that I shouldn't signal an overtaking opportunity to a following driver as it should be their decision and not mine

[SurGie 54]

Correct ^^ same goes for flashing your lights .

[Tom Fenton 1,526]

It's one of my many driver's pet hates - coming up behind a line of cars following a bus/tractor/lorry/caravan etc. Any one of them with the potential to make an overtake, but instead they bunch up making it more difficult the farther back in the queue you are. It becomes impossible to "leapfrog" your way past.

 

This is when you need a 205 turbo with 200+ ftlb. Wait for straight bit of road, select appropriate gear, dial up full boost, and then do the bloody lot of them in one go. Just make sure you don't crash at the next bend..........

[CaptainK 11]

I blame cars becoming safer and simpler for the change in attitude. Modern cars are too far removed from the mechanics and the speed so people forget that they're driving a machine that can quite easily kill.

+1. I prefer driving older cars as I find I'm constantly then aware of how fragile I am and how dangerous the road can be. When I drive a modern car it scares me as I don't realise that I'm accidentally doing 100+ doing the motorway and it feels so comfortable and relaxed and feels "slow" as well. The modern car is indeed one of the reasons why roads are dangerous - they are too comfy and people forget they are doing speeds and believe that they can't be harmed in their "safe" cars. Give em all 205s or Minis and I bet they'll all not do much more than 70.

[mainline 2 1 Cars]

I feel a lot safer driving my modern car, especially on the motorway. Although I always take appropriate care in any of my cars, I do feel more vulnerable in my 205. Probably because its a GTi, there's often someone trying to make a point by driving like an idiot around me and I do worry. And some of the motorway driving in this country is just atrocious.

 

I think there is far to much 'justified speeding' prevelant on internet message boards, and too much emphasis in magazines like Evo on "great drivers roads" and hooning around them. The attitude seems to be, "I am not a boy racer, because I have modified my brakes and suspension first, and fitted a roll cage. I have also done a track day. I'm not a chav with a booming system, I simply enjoy the 'thrill of driving'." So on that basis it is okay to pootle through a village at 30 mph being all rightous and virtous before heading round the next set of twisties at full chat. Except its not really is it?

[mainline 2 1 Cars]

A different example of the point I'm trying to make - someone openly wears an expensive Rolex watch and flaunts it to all and sundry, and later that night gets mugged for said watch whilst walking back through a rough part of town. The person who mugged him was acting illegally and has done wrong, but in my eyes, the victim is partly responsible for being mugged owing to their choice to flaunt the expensive watch and to walk home at night through a rough part of town.

 

As someone who has was jumped by three masked people after a wedding party whilst trying to flag a cab. They were after my watch and car keys, having observed me arriving in a car which I left in the car park at the party, I take umbridge at the connotations which your post throws up. I suffered a broken jaw and several days in hospital, plus weeks off work. I now have two plates in my face and my watch (which was a gift) is also gone (along with wallet, mobile, wedding ring, tie, cufflinks). For you to suggest that somehow the act of working hard and acquiring something nice things (whether I show off or not - and I don't for the record) gives three scumbags some justification in beating the s*it out of me (without me throwing a punch) and also makes me somehow responsible for my actions is misguided and quite offensive.

 

(sorry for the double post but I couldn't let that one slide without comment)

Edited October 20, 2010 by mainline

[danpug 1]

This is when you need a 205 turbo with 200+ ftlb. Wait for straight bit of road, select appropriate gear, dial up full boost, and then do the bloody lot of them in one go. Just make sure you don't crash at the next bend..........

 

Thats something i love about tweaked turbo cars. All that immense torque slings you past cars in the blink of an eye.

Edited October 20, 2010 by danpug

[brumster 135 1 Cars]

I blame cars becoming safer and simpler for the change in attitude. Modern cars are too far removed from the mechanics and the speed so people forget that they're driving a machine that can quite easily kill.

 

Wasn't it Jeremy Clarkson who suggested people would drive a lot safer if you just installed an 8" spike on the steering wheel, pointing directly at the driver?

 

Daft as it sounds.... <cough>....

[cRaig 265 1 Cars]

Never mind all this "more power and more turbos" business.. Driving my midget last year in the damp, (or if you were feeling brave) the wet with its ancient and comically narrow tyres was hilarious, more fun and drifting than you could possibly want. All at slightly above walking pace

 

Sadly I went to the tyre place suspecting one slow puncture and they wouldnt let me leave the place until i had 4 new tyres. Apparently they couldnt remember the last time they had seen such hopeless tyres on a car lol.

 

Moral- just get an old simple car, and enjoy "the pleasure of driving.. slowly and (relatively- at least for others!) safely.

Edited October 20, 2010 by cRaig

[danpug 1]

I agree completely but i'm sure we've all at some point ended up stuck behind a nissan micra doing 30/35 on a national speed limit road, it's so frustrating!

[jackherer 543]

Wasn't it Jeremy Clarkson who suggested people would drive a lot safer if you just installed an 8" spike on the steering wheel, pointing directly at the driver?

 

No, it was T. E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia.) Many people have suggested it as their own idea but he was first.

[Cameron 16]

I think there is far to much 'justified speeding' prevelant on internet message boards, and too much emphasis in magazines like Evo on "great drivers roads" and hooning around them. The attitude seems to be, "I am not a boy racer, because I have modified my brakes and suspension first, and fitted a roll cage. I have also done a track day. I'm not a chav with a booming system, I simply enjoy the 'thrill of driving'." So on that basis it is okay to pootle through a village at 30 mph being all rightous and virtous before heading round the next set of twisties at full chat. Except its not really is it?

 

This is a very good point.

[kyepan 291]

This topic really gets at the core of who we are, the hidden truth that we all deny, ombfuscate or paper over.

 

We like going fast. The sensation of mastery over our cars etc etc etc.. and by and large we choose to do this on the public road.

 

Come on, admit it, you do, or you wouldn't be spending endless hours discussing the world that revolves around cars, and making them go better.

This is the social proof, and we all subscribe to it to some extent.

 

But that wasn't what i was going to post about. I'm not sure how to say this without sounding like a condecending twit. So i'll just say it straight.

 

After owning the pulsar i realised i was not equiped with the skills to drive it properly, properly seems to be the most approriate word. So i sought out some driver training, this happened to be on the road training, what i didn't know was it was an IAM thing, with a serving police officer sitting next to me. So we cover observation, look down the road, say what you see, call out the hazards, when you can't see where the road goes, can you tell from the telegraph poles or trees. Then road position, approaching bends, position for left and right handers, etc etc etc. And finally overtaking, again observation, technique timing bla bla bla. At one point we did four cars down a hill because we had looked up the other side, even though when we were down there it was completly blind. I must admit my perception of driving completely changed over those two days.

 

And, two half days at that, when i came back i was exhausted, the level of mental effort was considerably higher than any previous driving i had done, the mental state was not razz or red mist, just computer calm computer fast.

 

But coming back to the original point, the law is an arse, the best drivers on the roads are the police patrol drivers, they have a level of mastery of fast road (a and b road) driving that makes most people look moronic. All people who take their road driving remotely seriously, should go find the nearest police run (usually serving or retired) IAM and spend a mere few hundred pounds. we spunk that on the most pointless of things, like paint jobs, bumpers, anodising our testicles... And what's more it works in any car, as you take the knowledge and skill with you.

 

It's the best money i've ever spent, and most importantly it gives you an insight into when you're actually being a d*ck, for example he did speak at great length about the perception of other road users.. and i must admit driving slower cars it's very difficult to overtake in such a way as they do not feel impeeded, perhaps a bit contradictory to the last post, but there you go.

 

J