KNOW YOUR RIGHTS
In this month’s edition we feature more road traffic issues relevant to the trade supplied by Patterson Law. These questions are based on real enquiries that we have received from professional drivers this month. If you need any advice on motoring matters please email
e.patterson@
pattersonlaw.co.uk or call 01626 359800 for free legal advice. or for regular updates on road traffic law follow us on
facebook.com/PattersonLawMotoringSolicitors or
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Q A
I need representation for an interview please. A couple of weeks ago I was coming home after dropping off my last customer. It had been a long day and I’m not sure if I fell asleep but all I remem-
ber is waking up in the back of an ambulance. The police told me that I had gone onto the wrong side of the road and had a head-on collision with a car travelling in the op- posite direction. I was taken to hospital and had some frac- tured ribs but the other driver broke her leg. The police called me this morning saying they want to interview me under suspicion of causing serious injury by dangerous driving. I’m very worried.
You will need legal representation. Causing seri- ous injury by dangerous driving is an offence which carries a minimum 12-month disqualifica- tion (but likely to be longer) after which you have to take an extended retest and in most cases a
prison sentence.
You will have to be careful what you say at the interview. Anything you say can be used against you in evidence, so if you make admissions to having had a long day, feeling tired and perhaps falling asleep, they can use that against you in court. But at the same time if you do not comment at all you will not be able to answer anything about the al- legations being put to you and in the absence of any ex- planation as to how the accident occurred, a court is entitled to convict. We need to talk in more detail and see the evidence against you before we decide what to do at the interview.
After the interview has concluded it is likely the police would pass their file – which would include all statements, photographs and any collision investigation reports – to a CPS lawyer for a charging decision.
At that stage we may wish to make representations to the lawyer to try to influence their decision. If we feel that the collision wasn’t your fault we may want to try to avoid pros- ecution altogether. But if there was clearly at least an ele- ment of fault we may want to argue that the driving was only careless, rather than dangerous. Careless driving is an offence that carries only three to nine penalty points and a fine, so is a lot less serious.
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After the CPS lawyer makes their decision you may be sum- monsed to attend your local Magistrates’ Court – where you would be at risk of a points/ban and you would be required to enter a plea, and at that stage we would be entitled to review all of the evidence against you, so we could reassess then. But it’s important to get involved as early as possible to give us the best chance of limiting the damage at this stage.
Q A
Can you help me with a summons to court. A police officer pulled me over because he thought I was on my phone. I wasn’t. I know about the recent changes in law and that you have to be communi- cating on a phone for it to be illegal. I was just
scrolling through music which I know is OK. When I told the officer he said he was going to do me anyway. I re- jected their fixed penalty and took it to court. They’ve charged me with “driving whilst not in proper control of a vehicle”.
It looks like you are getting confused. The offence of “driving whilst using a mobile telephone” was recently considered in a High Court judgement and it was held that the interpretation of the law was that an offence was only committed if somebody
was using their mobile phone for “communication pur- poses”, including making a call, sending/receiving mes- sages and accessing the Internet.
However, it does not mean that it is OK to scroll through music on a phone. If the police can prove that when you were holding the device you were not in control of the car you can still be charged for “driving whilst not in proper control of a vehicle”, which is exactly what you have been charged with. It carries a slightly lower penalty than driving whilst using a mobile phone - three points rather than six – but the offence itself is very different.
Whether you were in control of the vehicle depends en- tirely on the facts of the case and what it is alleged you were doing. For example, if you had one hand on the gear stick and were holding the device in your other hand whilst driving at 30mph it would be very difficult to argue that you had full control of the car. We need to know more about what you were doing before we can advise you to plead guilty or not guilty.
My wife’s wage won’t cover the bills.
A Q
You are almost correct with your argument: a person who accumulates 12 or more points during a three- year period is at risk of six-month ban but the court have the discretion not to disqualify if they agree
FEBRUARY 2020
Help! I’m a taxi driver but I’ve just been banned for six months for getting 12 points. I went to Lavender Hill Magistrates’ Court yesterday and tried to argue special circumstances but they just told me to find another job. I’ve got a family and the rent to pay.
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