In reference to this article: http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2004262488,00.html
How does that work? How can one not be responsible in Britain if your behind the wheel? I hope theres more to it then this.
He hits someone in the crosswalk, loses control and hits a tree. Normally in US that would be manslaughter at worse, and probably nothing at all in reality.
This really isn’t that different, except that it’s seen through the eyes of the Sun.
You can hit something accidently, by lack of careful enough observation, or whatever. Every driver makes mistakes and usually they get away with just a swerve, perhaps a near miss.
In such a case careless driving is fairly easy to prove, the mere fact your vehicle went out of control in your care is proof enough.
In this case though, I am surprised that a charge of dangerous driving was not brought for the first offence because the person was hit on a pedestrian crossing.This would then rack up to causing death by dangerous driving.
Dangerous driving is not always easy to prove, witnesses seeing two cars side by side speeding would come under this category as it would be seen as racing, the point is that dangerous driving has to be deliberate, and this intent needs certain evidence to prove.
He did leave the scene of an accident though, and that is a crime in itself, and in fleeing the scene he had another collision, and this was clearly the result of a deliberate act of running away in a manner likely to cause a collision.Here the charge of dangerous driving should stick, intent can be proven.
You can get ten years and more for dangerous driving here, you do not have to take a life to get it either, and given the serious extenuating circumstances, such as lack of a driving licence and insurance, he will be lucky to get less than 4 years. He may well have other driving offences on his record making it all the worse.
Where I work we have someone serving 7 years for a prolonged police chase across several counties, noone was injured but it shows what can be handed down by the judge.
If the sentence is too light he can be brought to an appeal court by the prosecution and have more time added.
Interestingly, that sensationanised article by the Sun (the doyen of truth) appears to have been the only news report on the case. This suggests to me that, had we been given decent information about what actually happened, the two different charges would make a lot more sense. The article talks of wanting a campaign against ‘killer drivers’ - but it’s possible to hit somebody on a pedestrian crossing because you were fiddling with the radio for a moment, or trying to scratch your back, or whatever. When the full circumstances are known, manslaughter often seems a ludicrous option.