Fined For Warning Speed Trap

[Northern Munkee]

Gun said:

Does anyone know if Brake have said anything about this yet (it is right up their street after all), I'm sure they'll provide an intelligent, well informed point of view like they always do

They were straight on R5 last night, to delight with the judgement (of course), 'speed kills' mantra, and why should anyone feel sorry for anyone warning 'criminals' that they about to be caught? 'You wouldn't warn a burgular (I wish she had said rapist, BBC might have made a token effort to show no bias), why is warning these criminals socially acceptable?'

of course I was shouting expletives all the way home from work!!

[Derek Smith]

Jinx said:

I'm a bit confused with this one - surely he was only commiting an offence if drivers going the other way were speeding? Without the trap catching them how do the officers know these drivers were speeding and if they did catch any speeding drivers surely his warning was ineffective and therefore not an obstruction?
Why wasn't this thrown out of court?

There is a stated case that says just this. A lot will depend on his reply after caution.

But it is a pathetic waste of time. Policing needs to be by consent.

What do they expect other motorists to do?

If it was a special operation or such then possibly but this is just a mobile speed camera. It's a regulation, nothing more.

When the police are being hit by massive cuts in funding you'd think they would need to show the public that they have their priorities all sorted.

One wonders if anyone with any common sense actually made any form of judgement on this case or if it was just some PC's wet dream.

If you can't prove it without a confession then you should not try and prove it with. If the defendant (or his brief) had pulled the stated case and then run with that the whole thing would have collapsed.

If this was obstruction of the police for a crime there would have been all sorts of justification required before proceeding. I once arrested a chap for criminal damage. As I was putting him into the van his girlfriend grabbed me around the collar and pulled me back. Her nails actually scratched neck. A colleague nicked her.

The custody officer (thankfully) refused charge for obstruction saying that as he knew that it would be binned by the process unit it would be dishonest to charge. It happens in such circs.

If you do a drugs bust you can charge everyone within a building with obstruction but sense prevails.

It seems odd that you ignore obstruction for crime yet for a regulation some force is willing to waste everyone's time.

[audidoody]

So, I can now be arrested if I see a chap wearing a striped T-shirt and carrying a bag with the word "Swag" on it acting suspiciously around a house and I tell him that the Rottweiler-owning, black-belt karate owner is inside?

[catso]

Derek Smith said:

It seems odd that you ignore obstruction for crime yet for a regulation some force is willing to waste everyone's time.

Rules are rules, the pettier the better especially when there is money to be made from people who generally don't put up a fight.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, everything about the Speed camera 'industry' is rotten to the core. The ghost of nu-labia's cowardliest Scam will live a long time I fear.

Ending the war on the motorist? seems it's being ramped up again, the money's too easy to resist I suppose...

[Sour Kraut]

Manee said:

you can argue agasint this till your blue in the face

point is - the police are down a few quid and needed to get back as much as they could

So now they're £15 up (victim surcharge) and three officer-days down (to attend court).

[AJS-]

So what about signs that say Cameras in Use, Unmarked Cars Operating etc. Are they also perverting the course of justice?

I actually got stopped for this same "offence" once and was threatened with prosecution for something like "using a signal without cause" or some such. He let me go in the end though.

What a sad, sad country.

[Bing o]

catso said:

I've said it before and I'll say it again, everything about the Speed camera 'industry' is rotten to the core. The ghost of nu-labia's cowardliest Scam will live a long time I fear.

First time I was caught by a camera (hidden in a bush on the A40) was in 1996 - who was in power then?

[catso]

Bing o said:

catso said:

I've said it before and I'll say it again, everything about the Speed camera 'industry' is rotten to the core. The ghost of nu-labia's cowardliest Scam will live a long time I fear.

First time I was caught by a camera (hidden in a bush on the A40) was in 1996 - who was in power then?

Well yes, all politicos are not to be trusted but I believe it was 'phoney Tony' that brought in the self-financing ruling that allowed the 'Partnerships' to grow and become the cowardly, jobsworth, self-righteous bunch of scamming parasites that they are today...

[grumbledoak]

catso said:

I've said it before and I'll say it again, everything about the Speed camera 'industry' is rotten to the core. The ghost of nu-labia's cowardliest Scam will live a long time I fear.

It's not the Scam Camera industry that's at fault. It's fines as punishment in general.

You cannot create or conceive a Just fines system. Yet as soon as you implement (a necessarily Injust) one, you create a revenue stream for someone. That person now has a motive. And it will not be altruistic.