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Police confiscate £170,000 McLaren after driver hits cyclist

Uninsured supercar taken into custody

Islington police seized a McLaren MP4 valued at a £170,000 on Thursday, November 14 after it was involved in a collision with a cyclist.

The cyclist, a 41-year-old man, was taken to a north London hospital with minor injuries.

The vehicle was seized by police as the driver, a 63-year-old man, did not have the appropriate insurance.

The incident happened just before midday in Old Srtreet at the junction with Mallow Street.

There were no arrests.

If the driver decides he doesn’t want his car back, it may be auctioned off.

Earlier this year, a Lamborghini Aventador valued at £300,000 was confiscated in Newham, east London after police found the driver had insufficient insurance.

The driver failed to come forward after police confiscated the car and it was sold for £218,000. The money was put into frontline policing.

John has been writing about bikes and cycling for over 30 years since discovering that people were mug enough to pay him for it rather than expecting him to do an honest day's work.

He was heavily involved in the mountain bike boom of the late 1980s as a racer, team manager and race promoter, and that led to writing for Mountain Biking UK magazine shortly after its inception. He got the gig by phoning up the editor and telling him the magazine was rubbish and he could do better. Rather than telling him to get lost, MBUK editor Tym Manley called John’s bluff and the rest is history.

Since then he has worked on MTB Pro magazine and was editor of Maximum Mountain Bike and Australian Mountain Bike magazines, before switching to the web in 2000 to work for CyclingNews.com. Along with road.cc founder Tony Farrelly, John was on the launch team for BikeRadar.com and subsequently became editor in chief of Future Publishing’s group of cycling magazines and websites, including Cycling Plus, MBUK, What Mountain Bike and Procycling.

John has also written for Cyclist magazine, edited the BikeMagic website and was founding editor of TotalWomensCycling.com before handing over to someone far more representative of the site's main audience.

He joined road.cc in 2013. He lives in Cambridge where the lack of hills is more than made up for by the headwinds.

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28 comments

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abbeybob | 10 years ago
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They should put the car in the crusher

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jollygoodvelo replied to abbeybob | 10 years ago
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abbeybob wrote:

They should put the car in the crusher

Why? Strange response.

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gazza_d | 10 years ago
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Driver hits cyclist
Driver has no insurance
Car seized and flogged for £220K
£220K funds more coppers stopping cyclists without lids.

Hmm.

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Colin Peyresourde replied to gazza_d | 10 years ago
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gazza_d wrote:

Driver hits cyclist
Driver has no insurance
Car seized and flogged for £220K
£220K funds more coppers stopping cyclists without lids.

Hmm.

I don't think they have sold the McLaren. The article talks about a Lamborghini which was seized and sold because the owner couldn't produce insurance. I guess that may happen in the case of the McLaren, but that will depend on what the owner does.

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Argos74 | 10 years ago
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Difficult to say what would happen on the insurance / civil liability side of things. But there's three ways it could turn out:

* The insurer of the vehicle deals with third party losses on a discretionary basis
* If the driver has valid comprehensive insurance, his insurer may deal with third party losses under the Driving Other Vehicles bit of his third party liability cover
* no valid insurance is in place on either the car or the driver, or the vehicle's insurer declines to deal on a discretionary basis - off the Milton Keynes to make a claim against the Motor Insurers' Bureau

But in any event, the damage to the vehicle is not covered. This is assuming the driver was at fault, but he's likely to be in deep crap anyway, probably facing a wodge of points on his licence and substantial increases in costs of insurance in the future.

Does anyone have any ideas that help a driver in this unfortunate situation?...  19

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Leviathan | 10 years ago
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Teach him a lesson, where is my tank...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQ-8xj8CUZw

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willdeath | 10 years ago
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Also in the Road CC story it states " did not have the appropriate insurance."

Not "no insurance"

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felixcat replied to willdeath | 10 years ago
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willdeath wrote:

Also in the Road CC story it states " did not have the appropriate insurance."

Not "no insurance"

Isn't that the same thing? I'm fairly sure the insurance company would refuse to pay out if the insurance did not cover the driver.

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Guyz2010 | 10 years ago
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Let's hope they chuck the book at him. Sell his car and sponsor the cyclist in suing him for damages. I would!

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Stumps | 10 years ago
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You dont arrest for no insurance, like Sswindells stated, unless you fail to provide your details (so no summons or ticket can be issued) or in certain cases where you are a foreign national and the issue of a summons or ticket is not appropriate (for instance a foreign lorry driver who is in the country to drop off or pick up a load)

Some people must think if your not arrested you dont go to court. There really are some thick people on this forum at times.

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jarredscycling | 10 years ago
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That is a punishment that will actually sting. A lot better than just community service

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kie7077 | 10 years ago
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I object to the proceeds going to the police, this type of funding is not generally done for good reason. The money should go to the exchequer and help to pay off the national debt.

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notfastenough | 10 years ago
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Agreed, I used to have an IBM company car that was 'underwritten' rather than insured.

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racyrich | 10 years ago
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Car insurance is not as simple as some people imagine.

If you can PERSONALLY guarantee £0.5M you don't need to purchase insurance from a 3rd party insurer.

Many of these supercars in West London are driven by Arabs who are more than capable of self insuring.

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Karbon Kev | 10 years ago
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another twat with too much money and not enough sense ..

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jollygoodvelo replied to Karbon Kev | 10 years ago
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Karbon Kev wrote:

another twat with too much money and not enough sense ..

Twat, perhaps. You don't know the circumstances. No sense, unarguably.

Too much money? That's just envy/jealousy. I'd have that car in a flash. And at least it is designed, engineered and mostly built by a British company, in Britain. So the £200k it cost new has gone into the British economy...

Interesting place for the accident, I know the location well. Was the car pulling out of Mallow Street or into the Shell station I wonder...

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kraut replied to jollygoodvelo | 10 years ago
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Twat, perhaps. You don't know the circumstances. No sense, unarguably.
Too much money? That's just envy/jealousy. I'd have that car in a flash. And at least it is designed, engineered and mostly built by a British company, in Britain. So the £200k it cost new has gone into the British economy...

He's not a twat for driving a McLaren - that's a fine car. Perhaps not ideally suited for driving in central London, but that's a different matter.

He's a twat for driving without insurance.

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Dobbsy | 10 years ago
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Isn't it a McLaren, not Maclaren.

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EddyBerckx | 10 years ago
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So you can drive uninsured and hit someone and not be arrested or charged?

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sswindells replied to EddyBerckx | 10 years ago
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Arrest is a final option for police. The driver if he doesn't have insurance will be reported for summons. Committing an offence is not an automatic reason to arrest someone. He will most likely be interviewed under caution for hitting the cyclist and reported for summons for that too if appropriate. ( careless or inconsiderate, or driving without due care and attention ). Just because it's not in the article doesn't mean it hasn't happened. But it hardly creates headlines.

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northstar replied to sswindells | 10 years ago
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Sswindells wrote:

Arrest is a final option for police. The driver if he doesn't have insurance will be reported for summons. Committing an offence is not an automatic reason to arrest someone. He will most likely be interviewed under caution for hitting the cyclist and reported for summons for that too if appropriate. ( careless or inconsiderate, or driving without due care and attention ). Just because it's not in the article doesn't mean it hasn't happened. But it hardly creates headlines.

"There were no arrests."

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sponican replied to northstar | 10 years ago
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northstar wrote:
Sswindells wrote:

Arrest is a final option for police. The driver if he doesn't have insurance will be reported for summons. Committing an offence is not an automatic reason to arrest someone. He will most likely be interviewed under caution for hitting the cyclist and reported for summons for that too if appropriate. ( careless or inconsiderate, or driving without due care and attention ). Just because it's not in the article doesn't mean it hasn't happened. But it hardly creates headlines.

"There were no arrests."

I think what Sswindells is saying that just because there were no arrests does not mean that there will be no charges.

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northstar replied to sponican | 10 years ago
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sponican wrote:
northstar wrote:
Sswindells wrote:

Arrest is a final option for police. The driver if he doesn't have insurance will be reported for summons. Committing an offence is not an automatic reason to arrest someone. He will most likely be interviewed under caution for hitting the cyclist and reported for summons for that too if appropriate. ( careless or inconsiderate, or driving without due care and attention ). Just because it's not in the article doesn't mean it hasn't happened. But it hardly creates headlines.

"There were no arrests."

I think what Sswindells is saying that just because there were no arrests does not mean that there will be no charges.

I know that, still find it bizarre why a driver who has struck another road user with a motor vehicle is not arrested.

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oxoneil replied to northstar | 10 years ago
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northstar wrote:
sponican wrote:
northstar wrote:
Sswindells wrote:

Arrest is a final option for police. The driver if he doesn't have insurance will be reported for summons. Committing an offence is not an automatic reason to arrest someone. He will most likely be interviewed under caution for hitting the cyclist and reported for summons for that too if appropriate. ( careless or inconsiderate, or driving without due care and attention ). Just because it's not in the article doesn't mean it hasn't happened. But it hardly creates headlines.

"There were no arrests."

I think what Sswindells is saying that just because there were no arrests does not mean that there will be no charges.

I know that, still find it bizarre why a driver who has struck another road user with a motor vehicle is not arrested.

Because there still needs to be a necessity to arrest otherwise it will be unlawful. What you have to ask yourself is "what are hoping to achieve from the investigation by making an arrest?" Such things could be obtaining bodily samples or a house search for instance. The necessity criteria are laid down here

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1984/60/section/24

in section 24(5).

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northstar replied to EddyBerckx | 10 years ago
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StoopidUserName wrote:

So you can drive uninsured and hit someone and not be arrested or charged?

Yup, it seems that way.

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timothy | 10 years ago
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can you get a bike carrier on that? If so I'll have it.

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zoxed replied to timothy | 10 years ago
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timothy wrote:

can you get a bike carrier on that? If so I'll have it.

Problem is that the "rules" state that if you must put a bike on a car it must be worth more than the car !!

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Some Fella | 10 years ago
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And they say cyclists should be insured?
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