Police opinion = Evidence ???
Discussion
Car Wars Special, tonight BBC1, South Yorkshire police.
A traffic officer said a prosecution can succeed when 2 traffic officers, standing at the roadside with no measuring equipment, observe a vehicle and consider it to be exceeding the limit.
I thought the court required corroboration.
Any thoughts..........??
A traffic officer said a prosecution can succeed when 2 traffic officers, standing at the roadside with no measuring equipment, observe a vehicle and consider it to be exceeding the limit.
I thought the court required corroboration.
Any thoughts..........??
It always used to be so, how successful it would be now I don't know, lets say it could lead to discussions....
Did you see all those reckless drivers
? They didn't say how many of the public they actually managed to hit, but they bent a lot of those nice powerful cars WE buy them ! Excess (very) speed at every opportunity and no sign of a NIP between them 
:formerlyuprightloyalsubject:
>> Edited by sailor on Friday 14th March 02:45
Did you see all those reckless drivers
? They didn't say how many of the public they actually managed to hit, but they bent a lot of those nice powerful cars WE buy them ! Excess (very) speed at every opportunity and no sign of a NIP between them :formerlyuprightloyalsubject:
>> Edited by sailor on Friday 14th March 02:45
Car Wars Special, tonight BBC1, South Yorkshire police.
A traffic officer said a prosecution can succeed when 2 traffic officers, standing at the roadside with no measuring equipment, observe a vehicle and consider it to be exceeding the limit.
I thought the court required corroboration.
Any thoughts..........??
Police officers are considered experts - and therefore are accepted as de facto expert witnesses - in two areas, speed and drunkenness {insert your sarky comment here
} Two police officers - I don't think they even have to be traffic plod, I think two beat bobbies can ping you - can provide sufficient evidence for a conviction based on their expert opinion, no measuring necessary, as long as they are stationary by the roadside when they observe the vehicle. I expect bobthebench has had one or two of these cases in his time...???When responding to that plane crash they went a bit berserk. I'd have said reckless, to be honest.
Anyone else think that copper who tried overtaking the lorry as the lane closed was stupid? ok the lorry moved over a bit, but the lane was ending FFS. If *we* had been hit at the same place, we'd be called irresponsible for trying the overtake....
C
Anyone else think that copper who tried overtaking the lorry as the lane closed was stupid? ok the lorry moved over a bit, but the lane was ending FFS. If *we* had been hit at the same place, we'd be called irresponsible for trying the overtake....
C
Car Wars Special, tonight BBC1, South Yorkshire police.
A traffic officer said a prosecution can succeed when 2 traffic officers, standing at the roadside with no measuring equipment, observe a vehicle and consider it to be exceeding the limit.
I thought the court required corroboration.
Any thoughts..........??
Yes, I was done like this about 10 years ago in my mini. Traveling home at around midnight in a 30mph limit. A police car passed me in the oppposite direction, turned around and pulled me. The officer explained that in his and his colleuges opinion I was speeding, aven though they were travelling in the opposite direction and it was dark. He estimated my speed as 50mph so proceeded to write me a ticket. I know for a fact I was going nowhere near that speed, although I was probably a bit over 30.
I asked them that with absolutely no evidence other than their opinion, what stopped them singling out anyone with this excuse? There reply was "We're trained professionals sir"
I truly had to stiffle a snigger at this point. Anyway, I went to see a solictor, and he said that they can in fact do this. He also said that although they had a compartively weak case, that should the police lose in court that I would probably need to sell my car as it would be marked and I could expect future harassment. He therefore advised me to swallow my pride and take the points. Being young and foolish, I followed his advise. These days I wouldn't have hesitated in going to court.
I did have a small amount of revenge though. I had to sit in the back of their utterly filthy cop car while they did various checks over the radio on me and my car. The cop car was littered with coke cans and empty crisp packets/chocolate wrappers and bits of paper to the extent that one of them had to clear a place for me to sit down on the back seat. Whilst sitting there I noticed my feet were resting on something on the floor. Turned out to be the coppers hat, which somehow was looking rather manky by the time I got back to my own car
The copper who rammed into the artic should have been prosecuted, no question. The artic driver may well have used his mirrors in proper fashion - but at what point were the artics mirrors visible to the police car? As it hit. He was on a bend, and travelling fast. 2 basic rules for overtaking at speed:
1/ the other guy may not know you are there so assume he does not and make suitable allowances
2/ if you can't see his mirrors he can't see you.
The copper was guilty of basic lack of observation and poor judgement.
The guys who went after the bike were reckless - they all but shouted Yee-ha! as they tore off after him. And as for "its a good job we caught him, he'd have ended up dead". WTF?!!!! Its not like he was a spring chicken, my guess is he's been riding like that for years without killing himself. Arse.
The twot spying on traffic doing a little over the odds. Would it not be more responsible to park at the top of the hill to act as a deterrent and reduce speeds approaching an accident blackspot? No? Better to hide in the bushes and nick people who have already endangered life and limb (allegedly)?
What about the pando who joined in the car chase. Not 5 minutes before the biker had been sternly lectured on the perils of undertaking. Dangerous driving, no question, probable custodial sentence. Then the untrained panda driver does it, and traffic laughs "I think he undertook me actually. Ha ha." You think? Observation? So check the video if you were dozing off. He did? Book him, dangerous driving. No question, probable custodial sentence.
This program did very little to promote road safety, and quite a lot to demonstrate how the police are generally having a laugh at our expense. Just one big game, out playing with the boys and their toys, doing something illegal one minute then hypocritically prosecuting (and lecturing) someone the next for exactly the same offence.
They are NOT all trained drivers (evidently) and even those that are demonstrated significant lapses of judgement and ability, on video. Come-on MadCop et al, let the preaching begin .....
1/ the other guy may not know you are there so assume he does not and make suitable allowances
2/ if you can't see his mirrors he can't see you.
The copper was guilty of basic lack of observation and poor judgement.
The guys who went after the bike were reckless - they all but shouted Yee-ha! as they tore off after him. And as for "its a good job we caught him, he'd have ended up dead". WTF?!!!! Its not like he was a spring chicken, my guess is he's been riding like that for years without killing himself. Arse.
The twot spying on traffic doing a little over the odds. Would it not be more responsible to park at the top of the hill to act as a deterrent and reduce speeds approaching an accident blackspot? No? Better to hide in the bushes and nick people who have already endangered life and limb (allegedly)?
What about the pando who joined in the car chase. Not 5 minutes before the biker had been sternly lectured on the perils of undertaking. Dangerous driving, no question, probable custodial sentence. Then the untrained panda driver does it, and traffic laughs "I think he undertook me actually. Ha ha." You think? Observation? So check the video if you were dozing off. He did? Book him, dangerous driving. No question, probable custodial sentence.
This program did very little to promote road safety, and quite a lot to demonstrate how the police are generally having a laugh at our expense. Just one big game, out playing with the boys and their toys, doing something illegal one minute then hypocritically prosecuting (and lecturing) someone the next for exactly the same offence.
They are NOT all trained drivers (evidently) and even those that are demonstrated significant lapses of judgement and ability, on video. Come-on MadCop et al, let the preaching begin .....
Copied from the similar post in General Gassing
..........the cop with the upside down head manning the VASCAR car...........why did he wish to conceal himself so well with his video and VASCAR? Surely road safety on that stretch of road would have been very much improved if he'd been highly visible. The average speed would have reduced down that piece of hill as people spotted him, and of course speed is everything as we know He achieved absolutely nothing that day except to increase his tally.
He then spent probably thirty minutes farting about with the Irish truck driver up a slip road while the traffic continued at its own merry pace during the time he was absent. Would any of this have ocurred to him had an accident happened while he practicing his assertiveness training with the truck driver?
I suppose it's human nature to want to be doing something proactive even though it may less productive in road safety terms than parking in a high visibility position.
Regarding the lorry and police car incident in the third lane, I think they were both at fault. Whether the truck driver was supposed to be in the third lane or not, we see people do stupid, unpredictable and illegal things every day. It would have been quite risky anyway to have passed the truck at 120+mph in the third lane on a quite a tight left hand motorway bend. The police driver didn't anticipate the truck driver's actions adequately, he could have scrubbed off a whole lot of speed if he'd done so.
....and while I'm on my soapbox (justifiably I believe) .....that Volvo T5 parked on the roundabout waiting for the pursuit to arrive with him. Why the heck didn't they just block off the road at that point and nail him. Instead they waited until the drugged-up driver had gone by and then a dangerous high speed pursuit ensued through a town centre resulting in damage to two police cars and the obligatory helicopter being scrambled.
I can't help thinking it's all one big game to some of them.............
..........the cop with the upside down head manning the VASCAR car...........why did he wish to conceal himself so well with his video and VASCAR? Surely road safety on that stretch of road would have been very much improved if he'd been highly visible. The average speed would have reduced down that piece of hill as people spotted him, and of course speed is everything as we know He achieved absolutely nothing that day except to increase his tally.
He then spent probably thirty minutes farting about with the Irish truck driver up a slip road while the traffic continued at its own merry pace during the time he was absent. Would any of this have ocurred to him had an accident happened while he practicing his assertiveness training with the truck driver?
I suppose it's human nature to want to be doing something proactive even though it may less productive in road safety terms than parking in a high visibility position.
Regarding the lorry and police car incident in the third lane, I think they were both at fault. Whether the truck driver was supposed to be in the third lane or not, we see people do stupid, unpredictable and illegal things every day. It would have been quite risky anyway to have passed the truck at 120+mph in the third lane on a quite a tight left hand motorway bend. The police driver didn't anticipate the truck driver's actions adequately, he could have scrubbed off a whole lot of speed if he'd done so.
....and while I'm on my soapbox (justifiably I believe) .....that Volvo T5 parked on the roundabout waiting for the pursuit to arrive with him. Why the heck didn't they just block off the road at that point and nail him. Instead they waited until the drugged-up driver had gone by and then a dangerous high speed pursuit ensued through a town centre resulting in damage to two police cars and the obligatory helicopter being scrambled.
I can't help thinking it's all one big game to some of them.............
I didn't happen to see the whole programme.
I did see the Volvo hit the artic. That was unforgiveably bad driving on the part of the police officer. It was quite obvious that the artic was moving out and even though the Police oficer said that he should not have been moving into lane 3, (as he should not have, being over the weight limit and pulling a trailer) the signs that he was doing so were evident a long time before the police car got anywhere near the back of the trailer.
The piece where they were driving in convoy to the plane crash in my opinion was bad driving as well. At 115mph they were too close together. Drivers who are overtaken by a Police vehicle displaying warning equipment are not looking for a second one a few meters behind (although they should be aware of all possibilities) By spacing out more ( at least doubling the distance between the cars), they would have got to the incident only seconds apart from each other.
The tyre deflation was unfortunate but having driven the distance they did at speed on hatched areas, was not unforseable as there is significant unseen debris which is likely to damage tyres in those areas.
If the car which had the tyre deflation (it was not a blow out as blow outs do not happen unless there is a charge of exposive inside the tyre) had been in front, then neither of the units would have got to the plane crash as they would both have been doing the waltz of the traffic cars due to the proximity of their caravan effect.
Personally I was appalled by what I did see. If I had to crew with the guy who crashed the volvo into the artic, we would be having serious words about his competence.
With regard to the evidence of police in speeding. It is correct that only two officers who independently assess the speed of a car can give that evidence in court as expert witnesses. They corroborate the facts because there are two of them. They do not need to be traffic officers and indeed could even be two CID officers not in uniform who happen to witness an incident.
Speeding has to be corroborated in law. This needs two witness. One of those witnesses can be a mechanical device such as a speedometer or laser or muniquip or VASCAR system.
When giving evidence of a vehicles speed by evidence of opinion, the evidence is offered by, "in the opinion of the officers, the speed of the vehicle was not less than XXX mph". They cannot say the vehicle was travelling at 54 mph in a 30mph limit (unless a device gives them that specific speed). They can say in their opinion, it exceeded 50mph.
I hope that explains it for you.
I did see the Volvo hit the artic. That was unforgiveably bad driving on the part of the police officer. It was quite obvious that the artic was moving out and even though the Police oficer said that he should not have been moving into lane 3, (as he should not have, being over the weight limit and pulling a trailer) the signs that he was doing so were evident a long time before the police car got anywhere near the back of the trailer.
The piece where they were driving in convoy to the plane crash in my opinion was bad driving as well. At 115mph they were too close together. Drivers who are overtaken by a Police vehicle displaying warning equipment are not looking for a second one a few meters behind (although they should be aware of all possibilities) By spacing out more ( at least doubling the distance between the cars), they would have got to the incident only seconds apart from each other.
The tyre deflation was unfortunate but having driven the distance they did at speed on hatched areas, was not unforseable as there is significant unseen debris which is likely to damage tyres in those areas.
If the car which had the tyre deflation (it was not a blow out as blow outs do not happen unless there is a charge of exposive inside the tyre) had been in front, then neither of the units would have got to the plane crash as they would both have been doing the waltz of the traffic cars due to the proximity of their caravan effect.
Personally I was appalled by what I did see. If I had to crew with the guy who crashed the volvo into the artic, we would be having serious words about his competence.
With regard to the evidence of police in speeding. It is correct that only two officers who independently assess the speed of a car can give that evidence in court as expert witnesses. They corroborate the facts because there are two of them. They do not need to be traffic officers and indeed could even be two CID officers not in uniform who happen to witness an incident.
Speeding has to be corroborated in law. This needs two witness. One of those witnesses can be a mechanical device such as a speedometer or laser or muniquip or VASCAR system.
When giving evidence of a vehicles speed by evidence of opinion, the evidence is offered by, "in the opinion of the officers, the speed of the vehicle was not less than XXX mph". They cannot say the vehicle was travelling at 54 mph in a 30mph limit (unless a device gives them that specific speed). They can say in their opinion, it exceeded 50mph.
I hope that explains it for you.
regmolehusband said
....and while I'm on my soapbox (justifiably I believe) .....that Volvo T5 parked on the roundabout waiting for the pursuit to arrive with him. Why the heck didn't they just block off the road at that point and nail him. Instead they waited until the drugged-up driver had gone by and then a dangerous high speed pursuit ensued through a town centre resulting in damage to two police cars and the obligatory helicopter being scrambled.
I can't help thinking it's all one big game to some of them.............
They did not block off the road because we are forbidden to do so. The first thing that is put out over the radio when a pursuit is commenced, is a warning from the control centre. "PURSUIT IN PROGRESS, MAKE ONLY ONE ATTEMPT TO STOP THE VEHICLE. NO RAMMING OR BLOCKING OF THE ROAD." Policy states that you will not block the path of a vehicle that is failing to stop.
This was done on the M4 a few years ago during a chase from Bristol to Reading. Police engineered a cordon of artics across the motorway controlling the route of the stolen car via a taper effect intending that it would be unable to physically get through the block and slow down to a halt. It didn't. The stolen car drove underneath a trailer at 80mph killing both occupants.
Only under the most urgent circumstances are Police vehicles given authority to make conatct with a bandit car. If the Police driver does so of his own volition, then he has some big explanations to find.
>> Edited by madcop on Friday 14th March 10:52
madcop said:
This was done on the M4 a few years ago during a chase from Bristol to Reading. Police engineered a cordon of artics across the motorway controlling the route of the stolen car via a taper effect intending that it would be unable to physically get through the block and slow down to a halt. It didn't. The stolen car drove underneath a trailer at 80mph killing both occupants.
It's a double edged sword isn't it. Most people would say block the road and well if the occupants of the stolen car kill themselves it's not great loss.
However think of three other possibilities;
1) car jacked but victim kept in car - crash could kill the victim of car jacking too.
2) Stolen car rebounds off the road block and injures a third party. In the cvurrent climate the third party would launch the ambulance chasers against the police and insurance company of the car that was stolen.
3) Stolen car rebounds off the road block and injures a traffic officer. Not nice
I wish the whole Stinger concept was more successful, but even that has had instances where things have gone horribly wrong.
I know there are times when I would love to do the traffic job and pull up the numpties, but I guess this would be a very small part of the job. The rest, well I know I'd not be too good at the scene of a bad RTA etc. Tough job. Madcop and the rest of the decent BiB you have my respect.
Chris
victormeldrew said: The copper who rammed into the artic should have been prosecuted, no question. The artic driver may well have used his mirrors in proper fashion - but at what point were the artics mirrors visible to the police car? As it hit. He was on a bend, and travelling fast. 2 basic rules for overtaking at speed:
1/ the other guy may not know you are there so assume he does not and make suitable allowances
2/ if you can't see his mirrors he can't see you.
The copper was guilty of basic lack of observation and poor judgement.
I have got a Class 1 HGV licence - The lorry driver should have seen the Police Car coming, more likely he had a quick glance in his mirror and indicated and started to pull out, he clearly didnt maintain observation in his mirror otherwise he would have seen the Police Car coming.
The mirrors on an HGV are huge - the driver in theory should be able to see the middle lane and the outside lane when in the inside lane. He didnt make a 'sharp' manouvere so his mirrors were not 'blind'
The police Officer saw the lorry pull out from lane 1 to lane 2 and didnt really expect it to go to 3 - I know drivers should think along the lines of expect the un-expected but ask yourself - How many times have you seen a lorry travelling in lane 1 suddenly pull out to lane 3?
Nice one Madcop, good to see that you were as appalled us the rest of us by the police driving standards shown.
If the officer REALLY had to pass the artic on the entry to a roundabout (highly questionable) then in that situation I'd argue that by far the safer option would have been to do so on the inside lane, where the artic clearly had no intention of going whatsoever. Artic notwithstanding, this would have given him max visibility on the entrance to the roundabout as well, and given him a faster line on exit (unless he was turning left, which given his monumental lack of judgement was entirely likely!). He sucked basically, however you look at it.
>> Edited by victormeldrew on Friday 14th March 13:29
I think you find the basis of defensive driving, apart from observation, is to expect the unexpected and allow for it.
In all reality - would you have expected the HGV to continue across to lane 3?
If the officer REALLY had to pass the artic on the entry to a roundabout (highly questionable) then in that situation I'd argue that by far the safer option would have been to do so on the inside lane, where the artic clearly had no intention of going whatsoever. Artic notwithstanding, this would have given him max visibility on the entrance to the roundabout as well, and given him a faster line on exit (unless he was turning left, which given his monumental lack of judgement was entirely likely!). He sucked basically, however you look at it.
>> Edited by victormeldrew on Friday 14th March 13:29
Marcos maniac said:
madcop said:
Personally I was appalled by what I did see. If I had to crew with the guy who crashed the volvo into the artic, we would be having serious words about his competence.
In all reality - would you have expected the HGV to continue across to lane 3?
from what I saw of the footage of film, then yes I would have realised as the wagon got closed to the dividing line between the two lanes that my options may start to run out. I would have backed right off to see if the wagon was just misplaced in its lane or was inseed moving into lane 3.
In my opinion, the collision was down to the Police officer. That does not excuse the wagon driver moving into lane 3 but the collision was avoidable by the Police officer.
There's some nice eloquent expressions of disgust on here, but instead of us just venting our anger amongst ourselves how about a few well-worded e-mails to the South Yorkshire Police's press office at pressoffice@southyorks.police.uk. I think I'll fire one off myself later. However, it may be conter-productive because if they get a lot of negative response they might decide not to co-operate with future such programmes.
Out of interest I just spotted this on their website.
"Due to operational changes we have reduced the number of planned (mobile) speed camera checks in South Yorkshire. Some traffic officers have been seconded, as a priority, to tackle street crime in Sheffield"
But surely, since mobile speed cameras save so many lives, won't people will die as a result of this operational change!!!????
Out of interest I just spotted this on their website.
"Due to operational changes we have reduced the number of planned (mobile) speed camera checks in South Yorkshire. Some traffic officers have been seconded, as a priority, to tackle street crime in Sheffield"
But surely, since mobile speed cameras save so many lives, won't people will die as a result of this operational change!!!????
And another thing...........
Madcop, I agree with your criticism of the South Yorks traffic driver.
You might be interested to know that an instructor, from the same force, was recently conducting pursuit training and stuffed his Volvo into a dyke at 110mph in a 30 limit, totalling his car and hospitalising his passenger.
The passenger reported that, just before the off, he declared "there is scope to reduce your speed............"
Madcop, I agree with your criticism of the South Yorks traffic driver.
You might be interested to know that an instructor, from the same force, was recently conducting pursuit training and stuffed his Volvo into a dyke at 110mph in a 30 limit, totalling his car and hospitalising his passenger.
The passenger reported that, just before the off, he declared "there is scope to reduce your speed............"
Mr2Mike said
Well, sod me.........same thing happened to me. Mine was so effective, he was seen 3 months later dealing with an RTA, sans cap!
Now I see why their caps are always crumpled...!
The stroppy chappie pulled me for a breath test on the excuse of a moving traffic offence. He ordered me into the back seat. "In there?" I asked, pointing to the cap. "IN THERE" he confirmed. I checked again. He turned up the strop control, so in there I went. "WAIT" he bellowed. Too late. Crunch.
Serves him right for pulling me for an offence that wasn't an offence. (He agreed, after a lengthy debate).
MADCOP.........why the hell are so few traffic drivers as competent and balanced as your goodself? If you ever pull me, I'm the one with the nice smile..........and a cap on me foot.
I did have a small amount of revenge though. I had to sit in the back of their utterly filthy cop car..........Whilst sitting there I noticed my feet were resting on something on the floor. Turned out to be the coppers hat, which somehow was looking rather manky by the time I got back to my own car
Well, sod me.........same thing happened to me. Mine was so effective, he was seen 3 months later dealing with an RTA, sans cap!
Now I see why their caps are always crumpled...!
The stroppy chappie pulled me for a breath test on the excuse of a moving traffic offence. He ordered me into the back seat. "In there?" I asked, pointing to the cap. "IN THERE" he confirmed. I checked again. He turned up the strop control, so in there I went. "WAIT" he bellowed. Too late. Crunch.
Serves him right for pulling me for an offence that wasn't an offence. (He agreed, after a lengthy debate).
MADCOP.........why the hell are so few traffic drivers as competent and balanced as your goodself? If you ever pull me, I'm the one with the nice smile..........and a cap on me foot.
mybrainhurts said: And another thing...........
Madcop, I agree with your criticism of the South Yorks traffic driver.
You might be interested to know that an instructor, from the same force, was recently conducting pursuit training and stuffed his Volvo into a dyke at 110mph in a 30 limit, totalling his car and hospitalising his passenger.
The passenger reported that, just before the off, he declared "there is scope to reduce your speed............"
I imagine the lesbian was killed outright.
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