WTF is all this driving on the pavement ■■■■■■■■ about
Who in their right mind would do so
The car driver may have dealt the fatal blow, but the bloke wouldn’t have been laying in the road if the lorry hadn’t run him over
The car driver, a woman who by nature are shorter than men, could not be expected to see an object laying in the road immediately in front of her vehicle.
I’ve already covered why the lorry driver wasn’t to blame.
So that just leaves one person
The fact that the person at fault was killed should not change the outcome of this. He was in the wrong place (a road) at the wrong time (when traffic started to move) and this sequence of events led to his death
newmercman:
I’ve already covered why the lorry driver wasn’t to blame.
You must be wondering then why it ever came to court in the first place?
Do you think all these people involved in the very serious business of administering the law are fools?
Who are you comparing them to? Yourself perhaps !
This driver is in court for a very real reason, one that should strike fear into any & every driver that drives a similar vehicle. We all have a vested interest in the outcome & we should all hope & prey that what the Judge presides over, the jury will decide the truth.
If he’s found guilty then I feel for him, I’ll also be ■■■■■■■■ myself for when it happens to me.
toby1234abc:
Members of the Jury or even the Judge should sit in a lorry cab and get somebody to walk in front of a cab.The case would be thrown out of court in one minute.
There is a potential that the Lgv driver will get a long term prison sentence for somebody doing a stupid thing walking in front of a truck that he knew would move at any time in busy traffic.
Mlost of us know we are looking out for cars when pulling off.
I am not sure if the old man that was killed was on a proper crossing for pedestrians or just taking a chance in the road.How does anybody know if the old man was suicidal and wanted to take his own life.?
I think the jury may have done this as the police borrowed one of our Scanias so they could have a look at what the trucker must have seen.
IMO that is unfair as that front mirror will be the one the jury look at last as it is going to be on there mind and not the other five. I think if he was standing on the left by that big chunky a post and just behind the front mirror and say that is the first mirror you check anything could happen in that second or two between pulling off.
just for the record having seen the vechicle involved there did not seen to be any evidence that the pedestrian was ran over by the truck wheels or badly injured by anything underneath the truck… just a slight scuff on the front bumper just off centre. im not sure how they have come to the conclusion the truck driver should be charged, then again I don’t know the ins and outs of the investigation… still think its very shocking that nothing is happening to the car driver in all of this. at the speed stuff travels down Melton Road you should be well able to see and stop for anything that is in your path.
newmercman:
I’ve already covered why the lorry driver wasn’t to blame.
You must be wondering then why it ever came to court in the first place?
Do you think all these people involved in the very serious business of administering the law are fools?
Who are you comparing them to? Yourself perhaps !
This driver is in court for a very real reason, one that should strike fear into any & every driver that drives a similar vehicle. We all have a vested interest in the outcome & we should all hope & prey that what the Judge presides over, the jury will decide the truth.
If he’s found guilty then I feel for him, I’ll also be [zb] myself for when it happens to me.
It came to court because the lorry run the bloke over, a death occurred so the law must investigate in case there was a criminal act committed by any one of the parties involved.
I agree with your sentiments if the lorry driver is convicted. Even if it’s a without due care and attention.
As I said, even the most conscientious driver cannot see 360deg around their vehicle, so there will always be a risk of this type of incident occurring if pedestrians put themselves in danger.
But…Each and every case should be investigated, if only to completely absolve the driver (of any vehicle, not just lorries) of blame. This then eliminates any future civil action too.
The link below is from a Metropolitan Police video (actually directed at cyclists and drivers) which conveniently gives a Scania driver’s view of the nearside and front of the vehicle. Try running it and then pausing it at about 1.15 or 1.42. when there is nothing to be seen in any mirror.
Much has been made about the fact that the poor victim would have been walking or standing somewhere by the nearside of the lorry before he slowly crossed the road. It has also been pointed out that the view close to the n/s A post is virtually non existent.
Filmed in Juliette way Purfleet, this vehicle would surely have had the mirrors set up exactly to the recommended angles. Taking account of where the dangers are likely to come from, which mirrors do you look at longest and most closely when moving off? The front one?.. er.
Given the number of mirrors and their position on a modern truck, by the time you have scanned the last, the information that you got when you scanned the first is out of date.
You also have, now and then, to take your eyes off the mirrors, and have a quick glance through the windscreen, just to see where you are going.
But, obviously, as a truck driver, your main duty is to monitor what other people are doing in close proximity to your vehicle…because they will be completely unaware that they are just inches from a large mobile object that can kill them.
Derf:
given the definition of a road stretches from the boundary of a pavement with private property to the opposite boundary (the pavement is effectively classed as road) how does that work?
So we can drive up the kerb and along the pavement can we?
Yes. I myself & lots of other drivers do it quite regularly.
There is no law stopping anyone from driving on a pavement, it is part of the highway & the highway stretches from boundary to boundary.
Which law is it that you think stops us from driving on a pavement?
Highway Act 1835 (Penalty on persons committing nuisances by riding on footpaths, &c.)
“If any person shall wilfully ride upon any footpath or causeway by the side of any road made or set apart for the use or accommodation of foot passengers; or shall wilfully lead or drive any horse, ■■■, sheep, mule, swine, or cattle or carriage of any description, or any truck or sledge, upon any such footpath or causeway; or shall tether any horse, ■■■, mule, swine, or cattle, on any highway, so as to suffer or permit the tethered animal to be thereon; every person so offending in any of the cases aforesaid shall for each and every such offence forfeit and pay any sum not exceeding [F3level 2 on the standard scale], over and above the damages occasioned thereby.”
ROG:
Police accident expert Pc James Lawrence said that if Barnett had checked the front-facing mirror — showing what was within a metre of the front of his cab — he would have seen the pedestrian.
He said: “It’s not likely to be one second. It’s going to take a time for a pedestrian of his age with a back condition and a walking stick.”
.
Sorry but I disagree. By the time you’ve checked every single mirror it takes more than a second. It takes that for the total time of your eyes to focus. There is absolutely no way you can check all 6 mirrors properly in a second and if you did in a driving test you’d fail.
In these circumstances would you need to check all 6 mirrors?
Surely normal side mirrors, N/S proximity mirror and front proximity mirror.
Why the need to check wide angle mirrors?
I am assuming that the the incident was not on a bend etc or that the vehicle was at an angle.
The driver should get off with it,if there’s any justice. But take a note of caution from this ,if it happens to you never never never sign anything given to you by the police,once you do you,ve had it and its a legal document !!!
Had some excellent debates with a few friends this weekend, two of whom are barristers and their view was this…
At what point did the man die and of what injuries? That is what any decent defence brief will be asking. The truck ‘toppled’ the guy over but that would not necessarily have killed him. There has been no submissions to suggest he was dragged along the road or had the truck wheels drive over him. The car was witnessed to drive over him causing chest injuries. This is presumably what killed him.
If the man was alive still after the truck passed him there is no way a conviction can take place for casing death by dangerous driving. If it isn’t proven that the man was dead before the car drove over him the lorry driver must be acquitted.
Similarly for the car driver to be prosecuted there must be proof that the man was alive prior to the car driving over him.
It all boils down to milliseconds as to which action caused life to be extinct. While he may have suffered fatal chest injuries he might have died a second earlier with other injuries caused by the truck but were contaminated due to the car driving over him.
This shouldn’t even get to whether the truck driver checked his mirrors properly as they simply can’t establish that he has a charge to answer.
Sadly traffic law is different to all other UK law.
In ‘normal’ law the courts look at intent, not consequence. For instance, if you opened a door and knocked someone flying inflicting fatal injuries, the court would decide the crime and punishment on the basis of what your intention had been in opening the door. Similarly if you’d made an unsuccessful attempt to kill or injure someone, perhaps by trying to administer a dose of toxin that they ended up not taking.
But in traffic, it’s different. You could deliberately ‘bump’ a vehicle in front, and it would be regarded as being less serious than if you had an accident like the one in Leicester. That’s because it’s about consequence, not intent. It flies in the face of British law going as far back as the Anglo-Saxons.
I doubt very much whether the guy in the truck even knew the old man was there, or could have seen him. But the law won’t see it that way, because he’s a driver.
It wasn’t very long ago that a truck driver was jailed for dangerous driving. He’d left his vehicle parked in the road with double while lines (not yellow, white) for just a few minutes, while the gates to a premises were opened. He had his engine running, lights and hazards on.
A guy who was probably speeding drove into the back of his vehicle and was killed.
The lorry driver was sent down for causing death by dangerous driving. He appealed both the verdict and sentence, and lost.
He was of excellent character etc. Still got sent down though.
There has recently been a fair amount of negative comments about CCTV cameras inside vehicles. If this Scania had been fitted, like most town buses,with several external cameras and particularly with internal cameras observing the driver, there is every chance this case would never have got to court. Unless of course it would have proved that the front mirror wasn’t checked.
coreysboys:
Had some excellent debates with a few friends this weekend, two of whom are barristers and their view was this…
At what point did the man die and of what injuries? That is what any decent defence brief will be asking. The truck ‘toppled’ the guy over but that would not necessarily have killed him. There has been no submissions to suggest he was dragged along the road or had the truck wheels drive over him. The car was witnessed to drive over him causing chest injuries. This is presumably what killed him.
If the man was alive still after the truck passed him there is no way a conviction can take place for casing death by dangerous driving. If it isn’t proven that the man was dead before the car drove over him the lorry driver must be acquitted.
Similarly for the car driver to be prosecuted there must be proof that the man was alive prior to the car driving over him.
It all boils down to milliseconds as to which action caused life to be extinct. While he may have suffered fatal chest injuries he might have died a second earlier with other injuries caused by the truck but were contaminated due to the car driving over him.
This shouldn’t even get to whether the truck driver checked his mirrors properly as they simply can’t establish that he has a charge to answer.
I think your Barrister mates need to go back to law school. It doesn’t matter which vehicle hit the victim and directly caused the injuries which resulted in death. See for example the other thread about the German driver on the M25 - he collided with other vehicles, resulting in one of them being shoved into the path of another truck, which then hit yet another car, killing the occupant. Or the Selby rail crash, where all the victims were killed by the collision of one train into another - at the time they died, the car driver concerned was no longer driving - he wasn’t even in his car - which was about half a mile away from the fatal collision.
