motorist jailed for cyclist death.....DISGUSTING

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GFamily

Über Member
Location
North Cheshire
As one of the commenters posted the cyclist must have gone through a red as well ?

Doesn t excuse the defendent but there plain to see is the risk of running a red light.

No.
As I understand it, the lights were at the site entrance to the BAE site. The cyclist was waiting to turn right into the site, and the driver was approaching the lights from the opposite direction.

The lights changed and the driver started slowing.
With the lane (apparently) clear, the cyclist set off across the junction into the site.
The driver, 'scared by the sound of his own brakes' decides to speed up through the red lights.

The cyclist was doing exactly what he was supposed to be doing.
The driver did a completely reckless act.
 

400bhp

Guru
1518957 said:
Never driving again would be a fair starting point.

Possibly, yes.
 

400bhp

Guru
It's hard to argue against isn't it.

Perhaps it isn't done as we have forgotten that driving is a privilege and not a right.
 

I like Skol

A Minging Manc...
It wouldn't work! How many people flout repeated driving bans, not just scroats, but otherwise ordinary people who may be banned for speeding or drink driving etc but choose to keep driving to maintain a normal life which would otherwise crumble into unemployment and even homelessness without the access to a motor vehicle. All life bans would do is lead to an increase in the unregistered, unlicensed, uninsured underground driver movement.
 

400bhp

Guru
That's not a valid reason not to do it.

It means that you think we can't police the sentences handed down
 

Parrot of Doom

New Member
Considering how traffic police are now routinely sent to deal with domestic disputes etc, I don't think we can police the roads effectively.

Too much reliance on £££ yellow boxes, and not enough on officers who can issue stern warnings or more.
 

PpPete

Legendary Member
Location
Chandler's Ford
No.
As I understand it, the lights were at the site entrance to the BAE site. The cyclist was waiting to turn right into the site, and the driver was approaching the lights from the opposite direction.

You'd have to be deliberately homicidal to go through the lights by the site entrance on red.
Far more likely to have been to have been the lights on the A59/A677 junction down by the Trafalgar hotel IMO

Not that the location is any excuse.
 

Nigeyy

Legendary Member
While the driver running a red is at fault, I do wonder if the cyclist did a check to see if it was safe to cross or even if that was possible to do so (I'm drilling into my kids all the time -when the light says green to cross at a pedestrian crossing, all it means is a green light -not that they cross without looking first!). Of course I'm not saying the cyclist carries the blame, just that it's obviously important that you look. A red light is no magical physical stopping device -I really like Zoiders post about this.

Another thing: I'm not going to claim I know the answers -in fact I'd be lying if I didn't say I'm completely confused about what "justice" means, or how you achieve it. E.g. some of the questions I think about-

Did the driver make one horrendous mistake? Should he be imprisoned for a longer period? Does that change things for the better? If he was jailed for substantially longer, is it an effective or productive deterrent? Having done it, is it enough punishment for him? (e.g. some people punish themselves far more effectively than any justice system can) in fact, what do we wish a sentence to achieve?

However, it's easy to ask those questions -but what if the cyclist were my child? My wife? I'm certainly not sure I'd answer those aforementioned questions in the same way. And then there's the approach of an extremely harsh punitive reaction, e.g. this was a very big news story in the States in the 1990's: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_P._Fay It's safe to say I'm not a fan of caning someone for vandalism (seems a bit harsh to me), BUT I did catch myself asking myself the question "If I were Michael Fay, would I vandalize cars in Singapore again?" The answer, to be brutally honest, is a resounding no. So for all my wishy washy liberal ways, am I saying to myself that a harsh punitive approach works? In a similar vein, let's say, for example, all red light jumpers were imprisoned for life and all their financial assets seized, would this reduce the number of red light jumpers? Again, in all brutal honesty, I do believe this would be true -so does this mean that kind of extreme punishment works?

Again, I don't know the answers -but I do know I think it's rarely a case of clearly defined black and white (though who knows, in this case it might be). Just some thoughts.
 
See Lee's post

+1

This sort of case is always a difficult one. Its not fair to compare a murder to it in an way, shape or form.

I'm leaving my judgement aside, but imagine for a second how you'd feel if you were cycling downhill, and made a mistake that you shouldn't have, knocking down an old lady and killing her. Would it matter what a court gave you, because decent people would be living with the guilt for the rest of their life anyway.

At the same time, if it were my father/brother/son I know exactly how I'd feel about the sentence.
 
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