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Sunday ride ruined


Toutsuite
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10 hours ago, Toutsuite said:

The magistrates court did not actually require my presence (the defendant pleaded guilty), so not sure there was a prosecuting solicitor? Perhaps just the prosecutor? (Technically it's the police doing the prosecuting).

The other thing is the "unlimited fine". If it really is unlimited, what's to stop a judge from making an educated guess as to how well-off (or not) a defendant is, and fine them accordingly? I mean, I'm on a modest salary, and if I had done this and been fined 260 pounds, I'd think I'd got off lightly. This guy hit me in an £80K+ car, why not slap a fine of £5K or £10K? Cash goes to the government, and self-important, entitled bastards like him feel the sting, and think twice before doing it again. 

The fine has to fit the crime. Doesn't matter if you earn £8 an hour or £800, the fine has to be appropriate to what they actually did. Otherwise we'd have people with parking tickets being jailed for 30 years and fined millions, just because they're young enough and have a bit of cash on the side. 

Bike minor damage, you nothing broken and no-one is dead. I'd expect a few grand payout from the insurance and that's it, really. He got a slap for fleeing the scene and in a big, heavy car like that possibly didn't even notice the impact, especially if he had the stereo up, wasn't paying attention, or was distracted by something/someone else... and I'm guessing you haven't heard his side of the story, any mitigating circumstances he may have raised in court, or anything?

Without his side, we just have your (perfectly understandable and fairly justified) anger. I understand, believe me - I was ready to rip the driver who hit me out of his car and beat the living fuck out of the stupid cunt.... until I actually saw the driver was a terrified young girl, already shaking uncontrollably and practically shitting herself when she saw me get up and come for her with murder in my eyes... I kinda calmed down after that and took her inside (she hit me outside my own house) for a cup of tea.

You also seem to have made an awful lot of assumptions - £80,000 car, fine... how do you know he hasn't saved up his whole life for this, been gifted it, or maybe won it? People do still get these on PCP/Hire Purchase/whatever it's called... How do you know he lives on a massive private estate and is rolling in fresh cash every night? A lot of people who live on such estates have absolutely no cash and have inherited an expensive property from a relative. Land-rich cash-poor... You see them scraping the pennies just to go shopping for the Value items of Tesco.

TBH, until you actually know what passed in court, you can't really say either way...

 

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Jimmy is spot on about the CPS, we all moan that the "POLICE" don't fine or punish offenders but most folks forget that it's their job to catch them not prosecute offenders. I have always thought that the police officer who has spent ages making a case against someone to find they have been let off with a slapped wrist must think "why bother?"

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7 minutes ago, Ttaskmaster said:

 

 

"The fine has to fit the crime": exactly, the crime in this case being hit and run, a criminal offense, and not like a parking fine. £260 for a criminal offence is ridiculous. 

The injuries to myself were multiple contusions, a dislocated left clavicle, a fuckload of pain and 3 weeks off work. Not too terrible in the grand scheme of things, I'll grant you, but still classed as a serious injury.

I'm pretty sure he noticed the impact  - I was right in front of him!  The fact witnesses said he then sped off tells me he was well aware of what he'd done and did a runner. Very possibly because he'd had a few, and if he'd been caught over the limit the actual punishment for that is far greater than H&R. 

"how do you know he hasn't saved up his whole life for this, been gifted it, or maybe won it?" - I googled him. He lives in a mansion in Yorkshire. I put two and two together. No penniless aristo drives a car that expensive. It's usually some clapped-out old Land Rover. 

 

 

 

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Mate just hold on a minute, have you contacted a solicitor? If not then you need to as soon as you can, lay out your claim against this guy and see if you have a chance of getting the thing through court, legal advice is out there you just have to do it yourself. I have had great service from the C A B (citizens advice bureau) they will give you free legal advice (for an hour) as you say your pain and injury plus the loss of time at work are important so you need to act quickly to get things in motion. Just my ten pence worth but if it was me I would have done this ages ago.

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Slice, yes, it's all handled through my insurance. My issue is not that I won't be compensated (I will). It's that this bastard will see no reason to modify his behaviour, because he won't have felt much of a sting.  This guy failed to respond to the police summons, and his own insurers were not able to contact him. I get the impression he can't be bothered to deal with the little people. Or that he is a total child, unable to face the consequences of his actions. Or both.  

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Oh I'm sorry I thought that you had just left it to the boy's in blue to get it sorted. It's sometimes best to walk away from this sort of thing and let the professionals deal with it just so you don't get to emotionally involved, but I bet he will notice when he has to go to court for the compensation claim your putting up against him, they usually sting a LOT worse than the pathetic  fines and points that the courts dish out. Stick with it mate you'll have your day in court and see the look of shock on his face when the final total is dished out. Plus of course the more the compensation awarded against him the higher his premiums will be from the insurance companies and that isn't something that just goes away either any company he approaches for insurance will now load him premium for insurance. You'll have your day and this shithead will get his comeuppance.

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Well slice, the compensation payout, however much it turns out to be, will be paid out by his insurer. It's not going to come straight out of his pocket. 

However, there's a possibility his insurer might pay out, then promptly cancel his policy and sue him for the amount they had to pay out. I believe insurance companies often do this to hit-and-runners. He will also find it difficult to get himself re-insured with his record. His premiums should be eye-watering. 

 

 

 

 

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>the crime in this case being hit and run, a criminal offense, and not like a parking fine. £260 for a criminal offence is ridiculous.
What was his defence, though? Why did he get such a low fine? Must be a reason, else they'd have pushed for heavier sentencing...

Criminal just defines how it's handled and who by in which court, with the addition of possible jail time, not really how serious the crime is. Misleading price indication can be a criminal offense, for which the maximum penalty is £5,000. A corner shop might be crippled, but Tesco wouldn't even blink. That's just how fines go.

It was £360, according to the above and that'd certainly cripple me for a couple of months, but you can't fine people based on how much they do/don't have. All the lower class benefit scrotes that go nicking stuff would get off scot-free otherwise, and it'd take forever going through people's accounts to prove what they have in the first place.

Besides, plenty of bigger cunts out there than this guy - How much money you have is nothing to do with it.

But as you say, even if all that is 100% true - It's his mansion, not a National Trust place of which he's the caretaker or maybe just the owner's driver, and he has money to burn every night, etc - Even at maximum fine, he'd still not feel it. Further more, you could hit him for millions with your claim, but he won't pay a penny beyond the excess - That's what the 3rd Party insurance handles, same as it would for me or you.

You said he has a 6 month driving ban which, depending on what he actually does for a living in order to be the rich mansion cunt he 'appears' to be, may more seriously impact his oncome than is immediately apparent. It will be even worse when he finally returns to the road, with all that on his record.

>No penniless aristo drives a car that expensive. It's usually some clapped-out old Land Rover.
Actually, the car tends to be the one thing they do splash out on, especially as old Landies cost a fortune to run.
Keeping up appearances, and all that.

 

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"you can't fine people based on how much they do/don't have": well, let's stick to driving offences, where actually, you can Other countries do this. with penalties such as jail time or driving bans, your financial status should play no part, and rightly so. However, with a monetary penalty, in order for the law to apply truly equally, it has to "hurt" equally, and therefore be means-tested. See this:

 https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2015/mar/04/finland-speeding-progressive-punishment-motorist-fine

 

 

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2 hours ago, Toutsuite said:

  Other countries do this. with penalties such as jail time or driving bans,

Other Countries also torture people, and hang them and stone them and give them lethal injections, but I'm sure we don't want to go down that route.

Other Countries also actively discriminate against Motorcycles restricting the cc, or the power output, or because of the age of the bike, but I'm sure we don't want to go down that route, any further than we have.

Other Countries also rigidly enforce laws on speeding and protective clothing etc as well as a huge number of other Laws that would have a serious impact on the British way of Life, but I'm sure we don't want to go down that route.

 

I fully appreciate you're hurting mate, but the best way is to go for as much compensation as you can get. Both myself and others have advised Motorcycle specific Lawyers in order to get the highest compo award, but your Insurance is dealing with this, fair enough, but I would still state that a specific motorcycle accident lawyer like Mark Lampkin or Dalton White would give you the best outcome. I would see no harm in phoning them and explain the situation including the fact your Ins Co is dealing with it. They will advise whether they could take it on and whether it would be a no win no fee basis.

 

The main advice from me bud, would be dont tear yourself up over this. What happened has happened. He was dealt with in the Court, and believe me as Slice said the number of folk that do not get that satisfaction because either the CPS or the (Crown Office) Procurator Fiscal up here have dropped the charges for reasons only they know

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1 hour ago, Toutsuite said:

"you can't fine people based on how much they do/don't have": well, let's stick to driving offences, where actually, you can Other countries do this. with penalties such as jail time or driving bans, your financial status should play no part, and rightly so. However, with a monetary penalty, in order for the law to apply truly equally, it has to "hurt" equally, and therefore be means-tested. See this:

 https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2015/mar/04/finland-speeding-progressive-punishment-motorist-fine

 

 

As mentioned, the amount of work and the costs involved in proving just one individual's income is immense - This is evidenced by Proceeds Of Crime prosecutions, where the accused must go through everything (from bank accounts to receipts to possessions and so on) to prove they didn't purchase any of their possessions with illegally made money. It'd be the prosecution doing this for motoring offenses, though, to prove the accused does have the money to pay XYZ in fines and would be an astronomical undertaking. It can't work the other way, as people can easily lie about tax returns and the like.

As for hurting equally, that's what points, bans and imprisonment is for. Finland's system won't work on those who have no officially disclosed income from which to calculate a percentage... of which there are plenty in the UK.

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