Texting driver kills red-running cyclist, gets 4 yrs prison

[flemke]

In the apparent absence of a thread on today's news item:



Text driver jailed for bike death

A motorist who was texting on her mobile phone when she hit and killed a cyclist has been sentenced to four years in prison.
Jordan Wickington, 19, died from head injuries when he went through a red light and was struck by Kiera Coultas' car in Southampton in February 2007.

Coultas had earlier been found guilty at Southampton Crown Court of causing death by dangerous driving.

The 25-year-old from Hythe, Hampshire, was banned from driving for five years.

Following the crash, Mr Wickington, of Netley, Hampshire, who had not been wearing a helmet, was taken to Southampton General Hospital where he later died.

Sgt Alison West, of Hampshire Constabulary, recommended drivers switched off their mobile phones during journeys.

"It's pretty routine nowadays at the scene of these serious or fatal accidents to seize drivers' mobile phones, and to have them analysed to see if the phone has had anything to do with the driving standards involved," she said.

"In this particular incident, it transpired from a phone analysis that there was phone use close to the time of the incident."
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/hampshire/7270751.stm)



Any PHers care to share their thoughts on this?

[flemke]

Oh, sorry about that.
With no offence meant to the OP, the title "Is this a little unfair?" is also more than a little ambiguous, and I had not taken note of it.

I would have thought this topic a natural for SP&L, but with the regrettable general decline of standards on PH lately, I suppose it's no surprise that the mods let it ride.

I'd delete this thread altogether, but I don't know how.

Cheers.

[flemke]

hornetrider said:

flemke said:

I would have thought this topic a natural for SP&L, but with the regrettable general decline of standards on PH lately, I suppose it's no surprise that the mods let it ride.

Well yes. But a little harsh to attribute someone placing it in GG to a decline in standards imo...

as you were

I was alluding to the fact that on a number of occasions lately there have been parallel threads on a single topic running on different threads, or sometimes within the same thread, and at least some of the time the mods have not bothered to unify them even when the problem was brought to their attention.
The OP is of course entitled to post wherever he or she thinks fit. The advantage to posting law-related topics here is that they appear to get a lot more attention from our resident BIBs than they do on GG or other places, and obviously the authorities' insights are a lot more interesting than those of another adolescent who's been teased onto PH by a Haymarket ad campaign.

[flemke]

vonhosen said:

GKP said:

It wasn't proven beyond all reasonable doubt that she was texting at the time of the accident.

It was proved beyond all reasonable doubt that she was guilty of dangerous driving.

I'd disagree, von. Rather, it was considered to be beyond all reasonable doubt that she was guilty of dangerous driving. That is not the same thing as "proved", which implies a timeless reality that transcends human limitations.
To think it to have been "proved", in the most conventional understandings of the word, is akin to thinking that the law is right because it is the law.

I'm not taking sides on the result, as I am not smart enough to have a straightforward opinion. This is a difficult and fascinating case, with no obvious "right" answer, which is why I was looking forward to some thoughtful discussion here on SP&L, which we have got.

Cheers.

[flemke]

vonhosen said:

flemke said:

vonhosen said:

GKP said:

It wasn't proven beyond all reasonable doubt that she was texting at the time of the accident.

It was proved beyond all reasonable doubt that she was guilty of dangerous driving.

I'd disagree, von. Rather, it was considered to be beyond all reasonable doubt that she was guilty of dangerous driving. That is not the same thing as "proved", which implies a timeless reality that transcends human limitations.
To think it to have been "proved", in the most conventional understandings of the word, is akin to thinking that the law is right because it is the law.

I'm not taking sides on the result, as I am not smart enough to have a straightforward opinion. This is a difficult and fascinating case, with no obvious "right" answer, which is why I was looking forward to some thoughtful discussion here on SP&L, which we have got.

Cheers.

Perhaps she'll get some cold comfort from that lofty position when using the spare time she has to think about it in her cell.
When you are on trial in a court, proven beyond reasonable doubt to the satisfaction of the court is what you are concerned with.

Sure, but the point is that "proved" in a court is usually a matter of opinion - which is why many appeals are successful. Apart from procedural errors, how can something that has been "proved" be overturned? As I understand it, you are saying that, because the defendant was found quilty, then the case against her was "proved", per se.

Just as a human erred in cycling through a red light, and a human erred in texting whilst driving, humans can and do err in making judgments about whether something has been "proved beyond a reasonable doubt".

[flemke]

Derek Smith said:

flemke said:

Just as a human erred in cycling through a red light, and a human erred in texting whilst driving, humans can and do err in making judgments about whether something has been "proved beyond a reasonable doubt".

A small point but an important one: the driver of the car also erred by driving through a green light. Whilst there is no statutory offence of failing to comply with a green ATS, it means you may proceed if the road is clear. I.e. it is conditional and if those conditions do not apply then you should not procede. The evidence of the dead cyclist goes a long way to proving that the conditions for moving forward were not met.

A normal speed for a fit cyclist (such as a 19 year-old) is perhaps 15 mph, or 22 feet per second. At many junctions, there is less than 22 feet in the space between the lead car or van at the stop line and the perpendicular flow of cross-traffic.
Without trying to defend the texting, which is indefensible, it seems to me that, in the real world, it is not a dereliction of one's driving responsibilities to fail to anticipate a vulnerable road user suicidally shooting from the side directly into one's path.
Roadcraft asserts that the average driver's reaction time is 0.7 seconds. That would leave a driver with 0.3 seconds of time to get his car's speed down sufficiently to avoid hitting the cyclist who's foolishly tried to run the light at 15 mph. I don't know what is the max speed at which to come to a stop within 0.3 sec, but I'd guess it's about 10 mph. If you're saying that every driver should be prepared to go through a "normal" - not heavily compromised - junction at no more than 10 mph, then that's an opinion, but that certainly is not how the world operates now, even for the many Class 1s with whom I have ridden.

[flemke]

Derek Smith said:

flemke said:

I'd disagree, von. Rather, it was considered to be beyond all reasonable doubt that she was guilty of dangerous driving. That is not the same thing as "proved", which implies a timeless reality that transcends human limitations.
To think it to have been "proved", in the most conventional understandings of the word, is akin to thinking that the law is right because it is the law.

I disagree with your disagreement, and necessarily the philosophising.

The evidence given in court in the main was documentary (the phone records for instance), what a witness saw, heard or other sensory experience and real evidence. There would be some opinion, such as what the doctor concludes from his examination, but even there, the evidence is mainly real, “The skull was fractured in fifteen places and parts of the brain were exposed.” Is real enough. The opinion: I concluded that the person was dead. is about as factual as opinion can get. These facts and the barest of opinion is what can be termed proof. So the fact that the phone records show [whatever] is proof of what the phone was doing and this is therefore proven.

It is up to the jury to come to a conclusion on the facts, ie what has been proven, and such conclusion can only merit a guilty verdict if to interpret the facts otherwise would, in the opinion of the 12 good [wo]men and true, be unreasonable. So the facts are proven, the conclusion of the jury is opinion, or actually I believe the term is belief. So it is perhaps more precise to say that the person’s guilt has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt in the opinion of the dozen or so members of the jury. Which can be, and normally is, shortened, as Von did, into proven beyond a reasonable doubt.

The only argument, and one which is also down to opinion, is whether the correct word to use is proved or proven. Many say proven should be used only as an adjective and proved as part of the verb. I reckon that proven sounds a bit posher and more poncey so should be used in legal matters where so many of the inmates are posh and poncey.

That's an interesting point, Derek, one which I credit (I hope that doesn't sound condescending, which it is not meant to be).
If you are saying that the formal definition of "Causing Death by Dangerous Driving" comprises a set of actions which were incontrovertibly included in this case, then you must be right. I had not seen anywhere in the public domain the evidence of that; perhaps you have done.
If that is correct, then it is not a matter of opinion. ISTM that the notion of complete proof anteceding an opinion (as opposed to individual proved facts, which may not necessarily prove a conclusion) is an oxymoron; if something has been "proved", it is not opinion, it is (accepted as) fact, and not susceptible to challenge except if you are a lunatic millionaire who owns a large department store and has an attitude.
I was referring to what I thought senor vonhosen meant:

vonhosen said:

GKP said:

It wasn't proven beyond all reasonable doubt that she was texting at the time of the accident.

It was proved beyond all reasonable doubt that she was guilty of dangerous driving.

That is, he seemed to be saying that, regardless of whether the woman had actually been texting, the verdict "proved" her guilty of the formal offence. As I said above, this reasoning is of the same sort as what we've read here many times before: The law is right because it is the law. Some people will accept that tautology; I myself think it is sophistic nonsense.

I'm sorry to hear that you don't prefer "proved". I should think that its lack of pretentiousness would recommend it, but perhaps I have not gotten your point.

[flemke]

Derek Smith said:

Courts are not, and never have been, about justice...

Her Majesty's Courts Service 29 February 2008


Her Majesty's Courts Service (HMCS) is an executive agency of the Ministry of Justice (MoJ). Our remit is to deliver justice effectively and efficiently to the public. We are responsible for managing the magistrates' courts, the Crown Court, county courts, the High Court and Court of Appeal in England and Wales.
(http://www.hmcourts-service.gov.uk/)

[flemke]

Lady Ginswigger said:

fluffnik said:

Lady Ginswigger said:

Only on pistonheads would you get people arguing the tiniest details about whether the word "proven" or "proved" should have been used....

No argument, proven is correct.

...at least here in Scotland.

We all got the point BEFORE the discussion about which word was correct...but hey, it was still fun dissapearing up our own arses about it

Thanks for another valued contribution to PH.

[flemke]

Derek Smith said:

flemke said:

Derek Smith said:

Courts are not, and never have been, about justice...

Her Majesty's Courts Service 29 February 2008


Her Majesty's Courts Service (HMCS) is an executive agency of the Ministry of Justice (MoJ). Our remit is to deliver justice effectively and efficiently to the public. We are responsible for managing the magistrates' courts, the Crown Court, county courts, the High Court and Court of Appeal in England and Wales.
(http://www.hmcourts-service.gov.uk/)

Ah, the opinion of Her Majesty's Courts Service. As you no doubt have already worked out, I disagree with their statement as nowhere in the procedures of hearings in court (rather than the advertising slogan above) is justice of any interest whatsoever. Courts are interested in procedure. If something does not conform to their mores then regardless of whether or not the decision is just, then it is excluded.

Ah, okay. I took your statement to mean that the courts are not intended to be about justice. You were saying that in the reality of how they work they are not about justice. You are in a better position than I to know this. If it is a fact, it is a sad one indeed.

Derek Smith said:

I am not arguing about whether or not this is 'right'...
Again my argument is solely on justice and not the rights/wrongs of the situation.

I'm struggling to understand the distinction you're making, Derek.
In what sense are you saying that "justice" is different from the general issue of "whether or not (something) is right"?

[flemke]

Langweilig said:

Okay,the cyclist wasn't wearing a cycle helmet. That is illegal.

It is entirely legal to cycle without a helmet.
Guess again.

[flemke]

Langweilig said:

I have seen cyclists ride one-handed carrying cups of coffee - ILLEGAL

What law is being broken?

Langweilig said:

I have seen cyclists ride on the pavement when there is a cycle lane provided -ILLEGAL

It is always illegal to ride on the pavement - unless there is a designated cycle path upon it.

Langweilig said:

I have seen cyclists use mobile phones whilst riding their bikes -ILLEGAL? If it's unlawful motorists then it should also be unlawful for cyclists.

And unlawful for pedestrians?

Langweilig said:

I have seen cyclists wearing stereo earphones. Were a motorist to do this it is ILLEGAL But not for a cyclist.

Wrong. It is legal for motorists to wear stereo earphones.
Guess again.

Langweilig said:

TIGHTEN UP THE LAW AND PUT ALL BICYCLING MORONS IN THEIR PLACE

And where would that be - in with yourself?

[flemke]

heebeegeetee said:

The Belgians and Dutch also almost to a man ride proper bicycles, not the fashion-led hi tech bits of kit we insist on using over here. So over there, no lycra, no helmets, no hi-viz, no 21+ gears, no suspension, no unsuitable tyres, no odd riding positions. I think they've got it right.

"Proper bicycles..."
Would that mean that the only proper motorcars have crank starters and oil headlamps?

[flemke]

SS2. said:

'Should' is not a mandatory direction. 'MUST', on the other hand, is.

It is kind of you to correct the poster's misunderstanding, but in light of the attitude that he or she has shown so far, you may be wasting your time.

[flemke]

thewurzel said:

Vipers said:

Well read most of the posts on here. Yes he ran a red, but I see more motorists do that then cyclists.

Exactly my experience. I'm a motorist and a cyclist, so like to think that I'm not biased one way or the other. I dislike red light jumpers of all kinds, be it on a bike or in a car.

How many times have you seen a car go through on amber, then several other cars follow it through after the light goes red. It's something I see all the time.

I think that people seem to consider it a cyclist only problem because it winds them up (with good cause!) to wait at a red light and have a cyclist sail on past. Have this happen a few times, and it's not surprising that people think all cyclists behave like that.

In fairness, it must be said that the % of all motorists that go through amber or transitional-red is probably smaller than the % of all cyclists that do, and certainly it is rare to see a motorist go through a fixed red, whilst a substantial % of all cyclists sail past waiting cars and through reds as if the lights were not even there.

[flemke]

Derek Smith said:

In the case of speeding, it might be right or wrong that a damaged sign, not the fault of the local authority, should render a speed limit unenforceable. Justice concerns a person who, knowing that a speed restriction exists and that people who are using the road, i.e. pedestrians crossing it, would take the restriction into consideration, nevertheless ignores it. He is unable to be prosecuted because of the damaged sign.

My feeling is that if the signing does not conform then there should be no prosecution in the case of ignorance of the limit. In the case of the driver familiar with the route, it seems to me unjust that he should not be punished because of a technicality.

I'm only talking about justice.

Derek,

A couple of things:

I hear what you are saying about the possible injustice of a driver's wittingly breaking the speed limit but going unpunished because of a technicality. It seems wrong that "justice" should hang on a technicality.
The thing is, in most cases of speeding violations, the violation itself is a technicality. That is, the risk to innocent parties has not been elevated to an unacceptable level. Rather, the authorities have decided that one of the best ways of keeping people from unduly elevating the risk to innocent parties in other circumstances is broadly to impose a technicality, even in those cases where the risk is literally still acceptable.
I'm not trying to get into the "is speeding acceptable?" thing that we've done to death here (which won't keep us from getting back into it, probably later this week). Let's agree that it is right for the authorities to impose the technicality.
If it is acceptable for the authorities to impose the technical requirements on drivers, even when there is no actual (increased) risk, then how can it simultaneously be acceptable for the authorities not to heed the technical requirements imposed by the rules on themselves?


Separately, I'd like to ask you (and any other of the grown-ups on SP&L, who unfortunately seem to be becoming a minority) the following. It is not meant as a rhetorical question.
I am not entirely comfortable with the concept that the punishment for an offence should depend on its unforseeable outcome. If you were purposefully to shoot someone in the head pointblank, but he miraculously lived, it is not clear to me why your punishment should be less harsh than it would have been had your victim died. Yes, this is the way it works, but the "justice" of it is not obvious. Should your punishment really be determined by such things as how good the victim's surgeon was, or whether there was an ambulance available to take him directly to hospital?
In the case of the texting driver, let us imagine that there had been another texting driver coming through the junction in the opposite direction, and this driver was on course unavoidably to strike the red-running cyclist a direct hit, also at 45 mph, from the other side. However, by virtue only of her direction of travel, the woman who actually did kill the cyclist got there first. Even if the second, hypothetical driver's actions had been filmed and proved to have been identical to the woman's, he would not have received 4 yrs custodial plus a 5 yrs ban.

How do you, or does anyone else, feel about the severity of one's punishment being so heavily influenced by the random consequences of one's actions?

Cheers.

[flemke]

Lady Ginswigger said:

have aread of this...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/highlands_and_islands/7189168.stm 

He died of head injuries, and guess what? he wasn't wearing a helmat (even though that bit is left out of the news reports) how do I know this? because my partnere was the detective who had to photograph him on the slab after he died. Do you think a helmat might have helped him? I think so.

It's regrettable that his injuries were fatal.

By telling us that he was not wearing a helmet, are you trying to make a point?

[flemke]

10 Pence Short said:

flemke said:

I am not entirely comfortable with the concept that the punishment for an offence should depend on its unforseeable outcome.

If you travel across a junction at 45mph in a 30 limit whilst texting, you are not going to be oblivious to the potential outcomes.

That is why this woman was given the sentence she was.

Not quite sure what you mean by that, 10PS.

Maybe the penalty for texting whilst going into a built-up area junction at 45 mph should be 4 yrs inside/5 yrs ban, regardless. I'm not saying that the punishment for the driver's actions was wrong, or right.
I am just asking, Why should the punishment depend on a random outcome that was outside the offender's control, rather than exclusively on what the offender did?

[flemke]

Lady Ginswigger said:

I love it when a person doesn't have a reasoned reply and resorts to wild generalisations

Can you tell me this....how many lives are lost due to wearing cycling helmats? and how many are saved do to wearing them? none in the first category, and plenty in the second... what have you got to lose by wearing one?

And many of the rest of us love it when someone who has been on PH for all of six days starts leaping wildly into discussions and pissing on other people's well-intentioned comments.


Many lives are lost due to cyclists' wearing helmets:

First, there is the phenomenon of risk compensation by the cyclist him/herself:
http://injuryprevention.bmj.com/cgi/content/extrac...

Second, there is risk compensation by other road users. There was a recent experiment done in the UK in which was studied how closely overtaking vehicles came to a cyclist when he was wearing a helmet, and then when he was not. On average, vehicles gave the helmetless cyclist nearly twice as much space as they gave to him when he was helmeted.

Third, by enlarging the effective area of the head through fixing a helmet to it, and increasing the leverage that can be effected by contact with a foreign object, the frequency of neck injuries goes up. This includes basilar skull fractures, which are often fatal.

Finally, and probably most important, mandatory helmet use has been shown time after time to reduce the number of people who choose to cycle. Because of the substantial long-term health benefits of cycling, the less a population cycles, the shorter its average life-expectancy will be.

So the answer to your question of how many lives are lost due to the wearing of cycling helmets is, "Quite a lot, actually."

[flemke]

vonhosen said:

flemke said:

10 Pence Short said:

flemke said:

I am not entirely comfortable with the concept that the punishment for an offence should depend on its unforseeable outcome.

If you travel across a junction at 45mph in a 30 limit whilst texting, you are not going to be oblivious to the potential outcomes.

That is why this woman was given the sentence she was.

Not quite sure what you mean by that, 10PS.

Maybe the penalty for texting whilst going into a built-up area junction at 45 mph should be 4 yrs inside/5 yrs ban, regardless. I'm not saying that the punishment for the driver's actions was wrong, or right.
I am just asking, Why should the punishment depend on a random outcome that was outside the offender's control, rather than exclusively on what the offender did?

Do you know for sure that she would have still hit & killed him even if she had not been texting & doing 45 in a 30 ?
Otherwise she did have some control over the situation, but she neglected to exercise it when the situation demanded that she did.

10 Pence Short said:

I'm not quite sure why you say it's outside of the offenders control? The causation for the death has been established by the guilty verdict for death by dangerous, hence the outcome was viewed to be entirely within the offenders control.

If the circumstances were that the collision would have occured even without the car drivers action or lack of action, it would have been very difficult to prove the death element of the charge.

Easy, guys. It feels like you are putting 2 and 2 together and coming up with a sum other than 4.

I'm not saying that the woman's actions were outside her control. Nor am I saying that the outcome was not influenced by her actions.
Certainly it is true, however, that the outcome itself was outside her control. If the outcome had been entirely within her control, then she would be guilty of intentional murder, and I do not believe that anyone is accusing her of that.

Even if she had been trying purposefully to take the cyclist out (and alas there are many cases of motorists having done such a thing), surely you cannot argue that she controlled whether he lived - which would have been a function of his fitness, the precise nature of his injuries, how quickly he received medical attention and how good that medical attention was.
As I understand it, if she had done exactly what she did, but the cyclist had most fortunately survived, then her punishment would likely have been less harsh than it was because the cyclist died.
Again, I am not questioning whether the absolute punishment was fair. Rather, the question is whether it is fair to have differential punishments dependent on things outside the offender's control (such as the victim's fitness and medical care).