KNOW YOUR RIGHTS
In this month’s edition we feature more road traffic issues relevant to the trade supplied by Patterson Law. This month we’ve replicated some questions that have been asked by professional drivers. These questions are based around real enquiries.
If you need any advice on motoring matters, please email
advice@pattersonlaw.co.uk or call us on 01626 359800 for free legal advice.
Q
I’ve just received a Notice of Intended Prosecution for driving whilst using my phone having been caught by one of those new AI
cameras. They’ve sent me the photo which I’ve attached to the email. Have I got a leg to stand on or am I banged to rights?
I don’t think they can. It would be different if perhaps you were seen touching the screen, or the phone was held up to your ear.
It depends if the court agrees with us that there is no evidence of your using the phone just from this photo. We have a good chances of winning in my opinion.
If we take it to court and win, then you receive no points or fine. If you are found guilty then you still receive the six points but the fines and costs would be a lot higher, upwards of £1,000 most likely. I must also advise that it would be recorded as a conviction.
Q
*this is a similar picture taken from a news article - not the picture we were sent.
A
If you were driving, then you must respond nominating yourself as the driver. If you don’t, you’ll be prosecuted for failing to give information which carries 6 points and up to
a £1000 fine.
After that, you’ll be sent a conditional offer of 6 points and a £200 fine. It is your option whether to accept. If you accept, you will get the points, pay the fine and that will be the end of it.
If you decide not to accept it, then the matter will proceed to court. And that means that in a few months you will receive a single justice procedure notice and it will give you the option to plead guilty or not guilty by post. If you plead not guilty the matter will then be listed for a trial in another couple of months’ time.
It’s an offence to ‘use’ a handheld phone whilst driving. Clearly this is handheld, but here there is a question over ‘use’. Can the prosecution prove that this phone was being ‘used’ rather than just held?
68 A
Basically I was dropping off a passenger when a cyclist hit my mirror deliberately and rode off. I caught up with him and cut him off when turning into a side road and asked him why he
hit my mirror. He reported me with the camera footage of me cutting him up but removed the bit where he hit my wing mirror. I have court next week for dangerous driving.
We have a few options:
The first is to plead guilty and attend court just to keep the sentence to a minimum.
However dangerous driving is a very serious offence. On a guilty plea you would receive a minimum 12 month ban with an extended retest, fines and in serious cases, a community order or even custody. The benefit of pleading guilty is that you will be able to keep the sentence to a minimum, but it will be a disqualification - we cannot avoid that.
The second option is to try to get this down to careless driving. Careless driving is a less serious form of driving offence and carries up to 9 penalty points, but only a disqualification in the most serious of cases, no community orders or prison, so there is a very obvious benefit in going down that route if we win. However, if we go down that route and we lose, then you will have lost credit in sentence, meaning that the fines would certainly increase, you could receive a longer disqualification and you could receive longer com- munity orders as well.
The third option is to plead not guilty and defend the case, not on the basis of the standard of driving (as clearly cutting someone up is at least careless), but on the basis that key evidence has been tampered
OCTOBER 2024 PHTM
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