Alleged speeding 70 in a 30

[pits]

My cousin has been caught speeding at 70mph in a 30 zone.
I've read what's he said, I've seen the road and I'm inclined to agree that he couldn't of been doing 70.
So he has court summons for late November.
No video evidence
No camera evidence
However two police officers in a standard patrol car, no calibration of the speedo, but obviously can make an informed opinion between the two officers.

But their story doesn't add up.
The road in question, is a single track road, OK yes you could do 70 on it, if you were brave enough, but the patrol car was two cars back, it was at night (11:40pm), there would have been no way for them to overtake to get a true informed opinion of speed.


Wondering what the best defence is against this, as I fail to see how they can come to an opinion of said speed, you wouldn't be able to from a car back, and at 0.5 miles long, a judgement of speed is hard to make.


Cousin, no previous convictions, no previous warnings, no section 59, but has recently started being pulled over a lot by the police for no real reason (I'm told, I make the same judgement as everyone else on that)

This was on The Shetland isle's.

[sherbertdip]

I'm a little bit confused;

Did the police physically stop him? If so how did they get past the car on a single track road?

If not they must have been close enough to get his reg no, from 2 cars back, so was everybody doing 70 mph?

Edited by sherbertdip on Monday 2nd November 15:20

[pits]

From what I understand, its either
Car in middle pulled off, caught lead car up, pulled him over.
Police put blues and twos on, car in middle moved over, police then put foot down to catch up.

I will clarify later, though looking once again at the road, appears to be a narrow 2 way road with no markings

I'm under no impression he is guilt free, I've been driving 11 years now, every time I have been pulled I was driving like a cock, just seems odd that they came up with that number, at night, two cars back in a car with an uncalibrated speedometer, whilst catching someone up. Seems a case of "I did x to catch you, therefore you were doing y"

[skodaphile]

Internet on the Shetlands?

[anonymous-user]

pits said:

I've seen the road and I'm inclined to agree that he couldn't of been doing 70.

<snip>

The road in question, is a single track road, OK yes you could do 70 on it, if you were brave enough,

Might want to to get that bit straight. A defence of "he's too chicken to have been driving that fast" doesn't have a ring of hope to it.

[ModernAndy]

Have you considered that he was perhaps doing at least 70 and the police chose that number as it was either a speed they were keeping up with him at once they got behind him or the lowest speed he could possibly have been going?

He'll certainly get his day in court at that alleged speed and the police will need to provide strong evidence against him.

[eldar]

I had a similar experience many years ago. Driving through a housing estate, well below the limit as I could see the police car behind me and there were a lot of parked cars.. Nevertheless, the copper stopped me, accused me of speeding, and breathalysed me, which unsurprisingly came up negative. Then inspected the car in great detail - 40 minutes, and demanded another breathalyser, which I did with a degree of sarcasm as it was still negative.

Then got a tirade of abuse, and told to fk off and watch my step in future. Fair enough, I though he thought I'd been drinking, but was wrong.

Three weeks later, summons for dangerous driving, based on driving at over 75mph in a dangerous manner - clearly bks.

Pleaded not guilty and did my homework.

At court, get copper to agree where it happened, what sort of car it was VW 1200 Beetle , unmodified.

Produced a map of the area, which showed that the longest straight was 110 yards.

Autocar road test that showed a top speed of 72mph and 0-60 in 22secs (or thereabouts).

Photographs of the roads showing number and location of parked cars to be expected on the day and time of the offence.

Showed, in simple terms that it would have been extremely difficult to exceed 30mph, let alone 70mph, particularly knowing a police car was following.

Magistrates listened, asked if I had any other evidence of being followed. I could produce the passengers who could, truthfully, corroborate. Not guilty, quite rightly.

For the next three months I got stopped regularly, 3 times in 90 minutes being the record! I think they got fed up with me turning up once a week with a pile of producers...

So if it is a genuine mistake/pisstake, fight it in a sensible and reasoned way.

[gruffalo]

where on the Shetlands?

[bitchstewie]

I'll watch how I word this as I'm not suggesting they thought "Let's just choose 70mph as it's a nice round number", but if they're guessing at 70mph, is it reasonable to think he probably wasn't anywhere near to 30mph?

I guess what I'm asking is whether "He was probably doing 50mph" is a better situation?

[pits]

Greg66 said:

pits said:

I've seen the road and I'm inclined to agree that he couldn't of been doing 70.

<snip>

The road in question, is a single track road, OK yes you could do 70 on it, if you were brave enough,

Might want to to get that bit straight. A defence of "he's too chicken to have been driving that fast" doesn't have a ring of hope to it.

Not a defence, what I am saying is that speed limits aside, probably not a good section of road to attempt 70mph in my opinion, if someone else wants to try it then they are more than welcome and probably could .

gruffalo said:

where on the Shetlands?

Not far from Lerwick

bhstewie said:

I'll watch how I word this as I'm not suggesting they thought "Let's just choose 70mph as it's a nice round number", but if they're guessing at 70mph, is it reasonable to think he probably wasn't anywhere near to 30mph?

I guess what I'm asking is whether "He was probably doing 50mph" is a better situation?

I would suggest you wouldn't be far wrong, I would base this purely on what I would see as a copper, if I am following a car, and the car knows I am following them, because my car has lots of stuff stuck to it and they are doing 30, and the car in front, perhaps appears to be pulling away, one would assume that car isn't doing 30.

I don't know how fast he was going, I would say that 30 probably wasn't it, and I would say 70 wasn't it either.

I think a defence of reasoned logic and admitting to a speed in excess of 30, but no more than 50 and a lot of grovelling to the magistrate would be my guess.



Eldar, thanks some interesting reading will have to speak to him properly and find out exactly what he was doing to be pulled.

[Autopilot]

pits said:

I think a defence of reasoned logic and admitting to a speed in excess of 30, but no more than 50 and a lot of grovelling to the magistrate would be my guess.

I'm not sure how these things work, but would discrediting their evidence not just get it chucked out of court?

I'm not a judge and I don't know how court processes work, but if beyond all reasonable doubt it would have been impossible to achieve 70 on that stretch of road, I don't see how another charge with no evidence could be used instead. 'Shall we just say he was doing 50 instead??' isn't anything I'd expect to hear in court!

I'd probably seek proper advice rather than make things worse for himself.

[ModernAndy]

Autopilot said:

I'm not sure how these things work, but would discrediting their evidence not just get it chucked out of court?

I'm not a judge and I don't know how court processes work, but if beyond all reasonable doubt it would have been impossible to achieve 70 on that stretch of road, I don't see how another charge with no evidence could be used instead. 'Shall we just say he was doing 50 instead??' isn't anything I'd expect to hear in court!

I'd probably seek proper advice rather than make things worse for himself.

I don't know about traffic cases in front of a magistrate but I have served on a jury where the charges were revised after all the evidence was heard. We were told to go back to our room for about 20 minutes while the advocate and the defence team discussed and when we came back one or two of the charges were downgraded (I think it went from carrying a firearm to carrying an offensive weapon in this case)

[Rh14n]

Greg66 said:

Might want to to get that bit straight. A defence of "he's too chicken to have been driving that fast" doesn't have a ring of hope to it.

I have this wonderful image of him turning up in court dressed as a chicken.

[Turkish91]

eldar said:

I had a similar experience many years ago. Driving through a housing estate, well below the limit as I could see the police car behind me and there were a lot of parked cars.. Nevertheless, the copper stopped me, accused me of speeding, and breathalysed me, which unsurprisingly came up negative. Then inspected the car in great detail - 40 minutes, and demanded another breathalyser, which I did with a degree of sarcasm as it was still negative.

Then got a tirade of abuse, and told to fk off and watch my step in future. Fair enough, I though he thought I'd been drinking, but was wrong.

Three weeks later, summons for dangerous driving, based on driving at over 75mph in a dangerous manner - clearly bks.

Pleaded not guilty and did my homework.

At court, get copper to agree where it happened, what sort of car it was VW 1200 Beetle , unmodified.

Produced a map of the area, which showed that the longest straight was 110 yards.

Autocar road test that showed a top speed of 72mph and 0-60 in 22secs (or thereabouts).

Photographs of the roads showing number and location of parked cars to be expected on the day and time of the offence.

Showed, in simple terms that it would have been extremely difficult to exceed 30mph, let alone 70mph, particularly knowing a police car was following.

Magistrates listened, asked if I had any other evidence of being followed. I could produce the passengers who could, truthfully, corroborate. Not guilty, quite rightly.

For the next three months I got stopped regularly, 3 times in 90 minutes being the record! I think they got fed up with me turning up once a week with a pile of producers...

So if it is a genuine mistake/pisstake, fight it in a sensible and reasoned way.

That sounds all too familiar to an incident that happened to my younger brother which then dragged me into it. Accused of doing 45 in a 30 through a really tight and twisty housing estate, on his 50cc moped that was genuinely still restricted and struggled to hit 40. All thrown out in the end.

And due to the fact I happened to stop in my car at the time to see if he was okay, then argued with the officer as it was evident they were talking st, I got pulled a ridiculous amount of times for months afterwards.

And they say police corruption is a thing of the past...


OP - I'd fight it, sounds a bit fishy to me.

[douglasb]

Autopilot said:

I'm not sure how these things work, but would discrediting their evidence not just get it chucked out of court?

I don't know if Scottish courts allow a "Newton Hearing" but these are for just this sort of case and aren't seen as discrediting Police evidence.

You need to ask for a Newton hearing but the basics are that you agree that you were speeding but disagree with the alleged speed. It is entirely appropriate to request a Newton hearing where the difference in the penalty between the alleged speed and what speed you will accept is different - and the difference here is between a long ban or a load of points and big fine.

Where the evidence is based on a "guesstimate" by the police you have a chance of a lower speed being agreed. You need to come up with reasons why 70 was impossible or how the police estimate is wrong (eg. If they say "we had to do x mph to catch you therefore you were doing the same speed")

[anonymous-user]

Rh14n said:

Greg66 said:

Might want to to get that bit straight. A defence of "he's too chicken to have been driving that fast" doesn't have a ring of hope to it.

I have this wonderful image of him turning up in court dressed as a chicken.

Now *that* would work. Definitely!

[wc98]

douglasb said:

I don't know if Scottish courts allow a "Newton Hearing" but these are for just this sort of case and aren't seen as discrediting Police evidence.

You need to ask for a Newton hearing but the basics are that you agree that you were speeding but disagree with the alleged speed. It is entirely appropriate to request a Newton hearing where the difference in the penalty between the alleged speed and what speed you will accept is different - and the difference here is between a long ban or a load of points and big fine.

Where the evidence is based on a "guesstimate" by the police you have a chance of a lower speed being agreed. You need to come up with reasons why 70 was impossible or how the police estimate is wrong (eg. If they say "we had to do x mph to catch you therefore you were doing the same speed")

i don't think so regarding a newton hearing. the procurator fiscal and your lawyer are usually in discussion as to what the procurator fiscal will accept as a plea prior to the case taking place. been through very similar myself,had two officers lie in court regarding what they said their lt 20 20 was reading.apparently it was flashing between 33 mph and 80 mph ,the 33 mph a car i was overtaking and the 80 mph supposedly me.

turns out an lt 20 20 that is picking up two moving objects will display an error message,and will not flash between two different speeds. 17 court appearances over 22 months to be found guilty of exactly what i was willing to plead guilty to at the outset. complete waste of time and money for all concerned.

luckily for me my lawyer knew of a company in menstrie called inc-analysis run by an ex senior officer who also ran training courses for several traffic departments around the uk. one of the employees was an ex police bike officer and between them they were able to show what the officers said happened was a load of bks. seriously tainted my view of traffic for a long time. fortunately partially restored due to dealings with a couple of officers since .

in this instance i would think the best course of action for the op's brother would be to get some good legal advice. 70 in a 30 in scotland will not have a good outcome for his licence . overtaking an off duty officer in a spirited manner ,particularly if he is also driving/riding in a spirited manner can sometimes lead to a few extra tugs for a while,particularly in an area where people are likely to happen across each other on a regular basis.