So driver fatigue was to blame, yet A spokesman for Norfolk Police said the incident was “fully investigated as a road traffic collision by a senior officer” but inquiries found “there were no criminal or formal misconduct matters to answer”.
I’m incensed, I want to appeal/complain. if one of use crashed and blamed fatigue, we’d lose licence and get prosecuted and almost certainly lose our job.
Full story Norfolk Police car bollard crash 'caused by fatigue' - BBC News
“We will continue to liaise with our Norfolk Constabulary colleagues and an invoice will be sent when it comes to covering the cost of this work,” said a council spokesman.
WTF is this about? Suddenly council employees and the police are colleagues?
And, a second’s inattention sounds exactly what careless driving is all about.
One rule for them and one rule for everyone else again.
The YouTube video that is referenced
ETA : youtube.com/watch?v=dnxS1K2XJjA&feature=plcp
shows the officer driving (IMO) far too fast for the corner which he was approaching. Generally careless driving.
Driving without due care and attention .
Simple .
But i suppose there is a by law ( or there soon will be ) saying
that the police are allowed to have minor accidents and not be
prosecuted .
One law for them and one for the rest of us . Nothing changes .
SNAFU
quirky
The question for me is: would we prosecute a member of the public for a similar offence?
Errmmm - yes?
This kind of action, only furthers the gap between the Police and others.
Quite pathetic, it really is.
Just like if you hit someone with a stick and pushed him to the ground and then stood there and watched him die…
Or shot someone several times and then made up a story about a voice in your ear that made you do it…
Two Months ago, one of my colleagues finished work at 00:30 after a nine hour shift. as he was negotiating the roundabout just outside the depot, an unmarked police car overtook him and cut across to exit the roundabout, in the process sideswiped my colleagues car and wrote it off. The police prounounced the blame to be 50/50. Even though the officer had been on duty fourteen hours. My colleague only had third party fire and theft insurance so his insurance company weren’t interested in arguing the toss, so my mate was without a car and had to buy another one.
Not only that, the police went through his car with a fine tooth comb to try and shift the blame onto him.
Anyone who thinks we’re not living in a police state, think again.
Well, I wrote to my MP… I know it wont do any good, but it felt good having a bugle about it 
scaniason:
The question for me is: would we prosecute a member of the public for a similar offence?
Errmmm - yes?
Only if it’s in the public interest. Wasn’t there a squaddie who fell asleep at the wheel on the M11 on one of those police programs? Been on excercise all weekend, drove home, dozed off, totalled his car, closed the M11 and ended up in hospital… no prosecution.
I also know of several guys I used to know through night trunking who ‘swerved to miss a fox’ and never got prosecuted. So to say they prosecute everytime is not entirely true.
If we can ‘get away with it’ now and then, why can’t they? What about the traffic officer in Portsmouth who was prosecuted for dangerous driving for pursuing some scrote? He was charged and went to court for basically doing what he was paid and trained for.
While I’m by no means saying the police are angels, I’m also not going to bash the police just for the sake of bashing them, as some on here seem to do.
Derf:
scaniason:
The question for me is: would we prosecute a member of the public for a similar offence?
Errmmm - yes?
Only if it’s in the public interest. Wasn’t there a squaddie who fell asleep at the wheel on the M11 on one of those police programs? Been on excercise all weekend, drove home, dozed off, totalled his car, closed the M11 and ended up in hospital… no prosecution.
I also know of several guys I used to know through night trunking who ‘swerved to miss a fox’ and never got prosecuted. So to say they prosecute everytime is not entirely true.
If we can ‘get away with it’ now and then, why can’t they? What about the traffic officer in Portsmouth who was prosecuted for dangerous driving for pursuing some scrote? He was charged and went to court for basically doing what he was paid and trained for.
While I’m by no means saying the police are angels, I’m also not going to bash the police just for the sake of bashing them, as some on here seem to do.
Then again you have the “specially trained” coppers who can still drive at 140 + mph ignoring speed limits.
My own special training to drive a lorry taught me about speed limits.
It does tend to go against the grain when a lorry driver gets done at 45mph in the name of safety
Unfortunately In order to catch the murders, rapists etc, that everyone seems to think they should be doing, they sometimes need to break the speed limit.
You may find that the odd ambulance and fire engine often exercise blatant disregard to the speed limits…
Then again, you could compare the intensive 3-6 day HGV driving course to the 4 week police response driving course, then the 2 week pursuit course that comes after, I mean they’re bound to be as in depth and comprehensive as each other.
If a member of my family was being robbed/assulted/raped, I’d want the police to get there as soon as possible.
We all make mistakes.
Dammed if they do, dammed if they don’t…
Hung by the testicles if it were 1 of us, as I’ve always said, all coppers are pricks-simples…!
Makes me laugh… I’m not a rich man, but I’d bet my pension that all those moaning they’re victimised by VOSA, police, TC etc, have got away with far more ‘indescretions’ than they have ever been hauled up / prosecuted for, yet they still feel victims of a totalitarian state! Seems odd how they are allowed to get away in the main for things they’ve done, yet the police (for the sole reason they are the police) should be prosecuted, crucified, disembowled then burnt for anything.
Smells of hypocracy from a bunch of moaners to me.
As for some of the narrow minded, ignorant, ill though out comments you find on here sometimes, they just prove the public perception that lorry drivers are thick bullys without 2 brain cells to rub together. (This is after all a public foum that the great unwashed car-driver or journalist can openly read)
Some days you’re the dog, some days you’re the lamp post. Seems to me the copper in the video was the dog in this instance (no more than you or I have been the dog most times we’ve done something that perhaps we shouldn’t) there again, that doesn’t make good conversation in an RDC waiting room or drivers restaraunt on a ferry and doesn’t make out the poor hard done by lorry driver eeking out a meagre crust, to be a victim…
maybe a simple apology and a promise of disciplinary action (only for appearances of course )would have left a better taste in the mouths of the general public than a bald denial . the police attitude in this case bordered on arrogance , not very good pr .
rigsby:
maybe a simple apology and a promise of disciplinary action (only for appearances of course )would have left a better taste in the mouths of the general public than a bald denial . the police attitude in this case bordered on arrogance , not very good pr .
I’ll counter that by saying I know of at least 2 incidents when I was driving a HGV that led to police intervention while I was at fault, and without any admission of guilt by myself to the police, or any appology from me, I had a letter from the respective constabularies saying no further action would be taken. I know of several anecdotal incidents from people I know that are of similar vein, I suspect that there are many more on this forum that have experienced similar.
What’s good for the goose…
Reading the article, I can see no BOLD DENIAL, and ‘management action’ is a disciplinary action for the police (Professional Standards can bat things down to a management level for discipline if they deem appropriate.) Maybe the article could have mentioned that so the general public would know there was a disciplinary proceedure that took place, but that’s not the fault of that particular force or officer, it’s down to the journalist.
Virtually no-one you meet that isn’t either in the police or directly related to someone that is ever has anything good to say about them and it’s things like this that really rub the public up the wrong way. This is one of many like ‘testing’ new cars at 150mph on the public highway before you even start on the shooting and bludgeoning innocent people either to the point of severe injury or death.
Oh, but, ‘they have a difficult job to do’. Well fine, leave then.
Own Account Driver:
Virtually no-one you meet that isn’t either a lorry driver or directly related to someone that is ever has anything good to say about them and it’s things like this that really rub the public up the wrong way. This is one of many like hurtling downhill at 70mph on the public highway before you even start on the blocking 2 lanes for 5 or 6 miles while overtaking and swerving innocent people off the road either to the point of severe injury or death.Oh, but, ‘they have a difficult job to do’. Well fine, leave then.
Ammended that to show another public perception 