A man who killed a cyclist after driving into the back of him on a dark and unlit road had been reading and composing WhatsApp messages leading up to the incident, reports The Northampton Chronicle. John Michell, a 26 year old accountant, pleaded guilty to a charge of causing death by dangerous driving. He was jailed for 21 months and disqualified from driving for three years.
On the evening of January 9, 2014, 57-year-old Mark Greenwood was cycling home from where he worked at a charity called Abbeyfield in St Albans when he was hit from behind by Michell’s Volkswagen Golf. Prior to the incident, Greenwood had been seen by a number of motorists riding along the A5183 towards Redbourn. He was said to have been cycling slowly and in a straight line, near the kerb, wearing a high-vis jacket.
The court heard that in the two minutes and 21 seconds leading up to the collision, Michell had used his mobile phone to compose three messages using the mobile messaging application, WhatsApp, and had read two messages he’d received in return. The messages, described as ‘trivia’, were with a woman he’d met online earlier but had not yet met in person.
Coincidentally, the two men had lived in the same Redbourn apartment block. Michell subsequently moved to Northampton and gave up his career in accountancy. His barrister, John Dye, said he was genuinely remorseful and had been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder following the incident.
Judge Andrew Bright QC said he was satisfied the cause of the collision was that Michell had been distracted by his mobile phone and described the use of mobile phones by drivers as being like an epidemic. In handing down the sentence, he said that he had a duty to send a message that those who use mobile phones when driving could expect prison sentences if their actions resulted in loss of life.
In the wake of Greenwood’s death, St Albans Cycle Campaign repeated calls for conditions to be made safer for cyclists on Redbourn Road.
Committee member Mike Hartley said the group supported local councillors’ efforts to reduce the speed limit on the road and had also submitted a request to the county council to convert the footway into a shared pedestrian and cycle route.
Earlier this year, a driver who admitted exchanging texts with his girlfriend before his van hit and killed an 18-year-old cyclist was cleared of causing death by dangerous driving and of causing death by careless driving. The parents of the victim, Daniel Squire, subsequently called for those who text behind the wheel to be banned from driving as a matter of course.
46 thoughts on “Driver who killed cyclist had been checking WhatsApp messages leading up to collision”
I think that if the offence
I think that if the offence was called “manslaughter” rather than “dangerous driving”, this would feel like quite a light sentence. Why is driving so special?
cat1commuter wrote:I think
Probably a policy decision. Manslaughter apparently being difficult to secure convictions for – possibly leading to people charged with motoring offences simply being acquitted by juries and walking away free.
cat1commuter wrote:I think
Couldn’t agree more. There is an urgent need for a sentencing review and change in law or guidance to Judges. Until manslaughter or murder are applied as charges in these cases, irresponsible and reckless idiots will continue to be punished far too leniently.
A few months inside is no reflection on the value of the life that was cruelly taken.
demolitionspecial
Murder is irrelevant as there is no intentional to kill. I’m sure it does happen, but that isn’t what is going on in these cases. Manslaughter is specifically not used because jury’s didn’t convict when manslaughter charges were used for these cases. So sure, feel free to change it back to manslaughter, and then you can watch conviction rates slip even further. The best you can hope for is stiffer sentencing, but you may even find that juries were again hesitant to convict because they wouldn’t want to be convicted and harshly sentenced if it was them innocently texting while driving 40mph past a school at chucking out time. At which point the lesson we learn is that the general public, for it be they who make up the juries, believe that road deaths are an acceptable price to pay for the convenience of driving, which is pretty sad, but what can you do? Move to the Netherlands perhaps…
vonhelmet wrote:The best you
Yup, everyone is correct to claim driving is a privilege not a right, but we are so close to it being the other way. Everything about our society now is geared to driving, from where we live (housing estates out of town), how we work (office complexes miles from home), how we shop (retail parks). To juries of our peers driving requires a ‘level’ of focus, if the defendant is a normal person and not an ‘angry yob’ then they identify as someone who tries but makes a ‘mistake’.
Of course the key fact, there are more and more convictions. Which means our ‘peers’ are raising the ‘cost’ of life and ‘mistakes’ ARE being punished. But its the Judges that pass sentence, and its a slow process to push to tougher sentences.
[Please note my use of ‘ ‘ around key words such as ‘mistake’, yes i know its not before someone rants, but thats what the public thinks like it or not]
I struggle to understand the
I struggle to understand the judiciary’s and/or the CPS’s logic.
Using a phone when driving is a deliberate, premeditated decision to do something that is proven to detract from your driving skills. How can this simply be dangerous driving?
And I’m fed up that 100% of the drivers claim to be remorseful. It’s only because they’ve been caught. I don’t care how remorseful you claim to feel – don’t use your bloody phone in the first place!
Claiming PTSD is appalling
Claiming PTSD is appalling how do you think his family feels?
balmybaldwin wrote:Claiming
“Claiming PTSD” and being diagnosed with it are two different things,surely?
No sympathy for him, though and lifetime driving bans should be handed out as standard in these cases.
balmybaldwin wrote:Claiming
Sadly, the people causing these incidents are just normal people, not setting out to kill and destroy peoples lives. They are you, me, your mum and dad, your best friend, the person you sit next to at work. Using a phone is so easy and so ingrained in society that people forget to put them away, and that ‘just a quick check cos it beeped’ leads to more and more distraction.
What we need is more penalty for using them while driving all the time, not more penalty when unfortunate luck turns it into something terrible like loss of life.
STATO wrote:balmybaldwin
if you drive a car without looking where you are going then it is not ‘unfortunate luck’ when you hit something or someone but an entirely foreseeable consequence of your inattention and I fail to see why the rest of us should have to share the road, whether we are in a cars, on our bikes or walking, with convicted killers
Northernbike wrote:
if you
So we agree driving around without paying attention has a foreseeable potential consequence.
But what im saying is the action by the driver is the same regardless of the ACTUAL consequence. Sadly the hitting or not hitting someone when you are not paying attention is down to luck.
The consequence of hitting someone is clearly terrible but, but £60 fine and not banned vs years in prison? why should there be a difference when its the same action, lack of attention / care. For clarity, im not saying the worst outcome should be reduced!
Isnt every person you see on the road holding a phone as bad as the person who has already hit someone? If they have not seen you, but you avoid being hit by your action, you have not only saved yourself you have protected them from a year in jail.
STATO wrote:Northernbike
So we agree driving around without paying attention has a foreseeable potential consequence.
But what im saying is the action by the driver is the same regardless of the ACTUAL consequence. Sadly the hitting or not hitting someone when you are not paying attention is down to luck.
The consequence of hitting someone is clearly terrible but, but £60 fine and not banned vs years in prison? why should there be a difference when its the same action, lack of attention / care. For clarity, im not saying the worst outcome should be reduced!
Isnt every person you see on the road holding a phone as bad as the person who has already hit someone? If they have not seen you, but you avoid being hit by your action, you have not only saved yourself you have protected them from a year in jail.— Northernbike
Yes, of course they are. Which is why the only real solution is to install a phone blocker in every car, and make tampering with it punishable by loss of car, phone, driving privilege and liberty. But that doesn’t mean the law should ignore those who do manage to kill.
oldstrath wrote:
Yes, of
I have no problems with people in cars using mobile phones as long as they are not driving.
That will mean that
That will mean that passengers won’t be able to use their phones either, of course.
Meaulnes wrote:That will mean
I sometimes think this is a small price to pay. Majority of cars on the road have only a single occupant anyway.
STATO wrote:Northernbike
So we agree driving around without paying attention has a foreseeable potential consequence.
But what im saying is the action by the driver is the same regardless of the ACTUAL consequence. Sadly the hitting or not hitting someone when you are not paying attention is down to luck.— Northernbike
Balls to that. ‘When you are not paying attention’ When exactly are you allowed to not pay attention while driving?
‘Oh, lucky I didn’t hit that cyclist, considering I was texting’
Like others have said, it’s a conscious choice to pick up and use your phone while driving, being remorseful about getting caught or reaping the consequences for an accident shouldn’t factor into the equation.
FFS
STATO wrote:balmybaldwin
They set out to do a dangerous thing while in charge of a lethal weapon. Claiming they didn’t set out to kill essentially involves thinking that they are so braindead they cannot comprehend the danger.
We need both, plus much better policing, and the removal of garbage such as ‘I feel remorseful’ from consideration by courts.
oldstrath wrote:
They set out
That’s the nub of it. Driving a car is dangerous and difficult to do safely even when not impaired. Making the decision to do something which further increases the risk is intentionally taking a gamble with other people’s lives. Why should someone who has proven that they have done this be granted the privilege of operating the dangerous machinery _again_?
STATO wrote:Using a phone is
People look at me like I’m a Victorian, or just mad, when my phone beeps and I ignore it.
“But you’ve got a message!”, they cry. “I know, but if it was urgent, they’d call me”, I reply.
Or my phone rings and I don’t answer it. “But your phone is ringing!”, they cry. “That doesn’t mean I have to answer it”, I reply, “I do have voicemail.”
People are gradually becoming slaves to their technology, IMO.
His barrister, John Dye, said
be interesting to know when the “remorse” started, was it immediately after the accident or when his Solicitor advised him the evidence against him was such that the best course of action was to plead guilty to the lowest possible charge in an attempt to lessen the sentence.
RedfishUK wrote:
His
A solicitor would be negligent not to advise a client of a) the fact that he is likely to be convicted and that b) an early guilty plea will attract a discount.
bendertherobot
So the job of a solicitor is to make it easier for a killer to get back on the road sooner? Shit, they make bankers look ethical.
oldstrath wrote:So the job of
The job of the solicitor is to defend his client. It doesn’t matter how reprehensible his actions. Everyone is entitled to a defence and – in case it isn’t obvious – we only know who is guilty after the trial is finished, so for the solicitor to do anything but his utmost for his client would be to presuppose the guilt or innocence of the client which would rather knock justice into a cocked hat.
vonhelmet wrote:oldstrath
Sorry, but when someone who does something they know is likely to put another human being at risk of death is given a gentle slap by way of punishment, justice is not so much knocked into a cocked hat as dragged down the road into the gutter and stamped on.
And by the way, yes we bloody well did ‘know who was guilty’ in this case. But apparently neither he nor his solicitor are capable of recognising the magnitude of what he did.
oldstrath wrote:vonhelmet
Sorry, but when someone who does something they know is likely to put another human being at risk of death is given a gentle slap by way of punishment, justice is not so much knocked into a cocked hat as dragged down the road into the gutter and stamped on.
And by the way, yes we bloody well did ‘know who was guilty’ in this case. But apparently neither he nor his solicitor are capable of recognising the magnitude of what he did.— oldstrath
He didn’t sentence himself. His lawyer didn’t sentence him. The state did. It did so having regard to the evidence, the speeches made by the CPS and defence Counsel and with the benefit of having read a pre sentence report. I don’t like the sentence. It’s still too low and doesn’t send the message. That said, amongst similar type of cases, it’s not the worst I’ve seen.
If you don’t like the system lobby your MP to make representations that the sentencing guidelines are wrong.
Have a read here:
http://www.cps.gov.uk/legal/s_to_u/sentencing_manual/death_by_dangerous_driving/
That’s the legal regime which applies. Discount for early guilty plea is up to a third. So the sentence is “about right” in relation to the regime which applies.
oldstrath wrote:Sorry, but
That you take issue with a specific sentence has nothing to do with the wider issue of what a defending solicitor’s job is.
No, we didn’t know who was guilty. If we did, we wouldn’t have needed the trial. Trials are expensive, you know, we wouldn’t have them if they didn’t serve some purpose.
oldstrath
Do you read the Daily Mail?
driving is a privilege not a
driving is a privilege not a right, the sooner the cps, judiciary and police deal with these cases in that light the better.
I recall a device used for
I recall a device used for compacting aluminium cans for recycling. This should be standard issue kit in patrol cars for dealing with these offending devices.
cars should be made with a
cars should be made with a phone blocker in them, somehow
“diagnosed with
“diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder following the incident.”
Meanwhile his victim has been diagnosed as dead. I suppose at least the driver got *some* jail time.
A man died and if it was due
A man died and if it was due to my negligence I would certainly do the time!!Having been through this recently only for the accused to receive a suspended sentence, unless you have been through it you have no idea.I lost my uncle and feel extremely sad justice was not served.I realise the accused will have to live with it, but at least he gets to live. He is currently being treated as the victim, which further sickens my family . Another total travesty! My heart goes out to Mark Greenwoods family.
If he were genuinely
If he were genuinely remorseful, he’d be prepared to do a full jail term
Scoob_84 wrote:If he were
Good point. I wonder are there any studies showing how many of these people give up driving?
If he were genuinely
If he were genuinely remorseful, he’d be prepared to do a full jail term
PTSD
Perennial Totally
PTSD
Perennial Totally Selfish Drivers
Life time driving bans should
Life time driving bans should be introduced, why as a society are we so scared of not been able to drive? Neither myself or my wife drive and we get by ok, I really am at a lose what this obsession is all about.
Irrespective as to whether
Irrespective as to whether anyone has been injured, what we need to change the culture of poor driving is very long bans for people caught driving dangerously, which would include using a phone at the wheel, and prison (rather than the usual further ban) for anyone found to be driving while disqualified.
Personally, I don’t think
Personally, I don’t think that the custodial sentence is that out of order – in fact, I’d say it tended to the severe. The ban, however, is laughable.
It should be simple: if you kill or seriously injure someone as a result of dangerous driving, you lose your license to drive for good. If it’s careless driving, you lose your license and must face an extended retest every year (at your expense) to get it back. If you are caught driving while under a ban, you are jailed under the same tariff as assault with a deadly weapon.
Oh, and everyone, without exception, faces a retest every, say, 2 years.
Frivolous maybe, but will his
Frivolous maybe, but will his ban run from the end of his time served? Or from the sentencing date? Or worse still, back-dated to the incident???
Oh yes, +1 for the inductance loop to stop phones operating as messaging devices in vehicles. What on earth did we do before they were invented??
and the slaughter continues
and the slaughter continues
The only suitable sentence
The only suitable sentence for Michell is a bullet in the head as this is effectively what he did to Mark Greenwood.
This piece of scum John Michell does not deserve to breath the same air as the rest of us.
Kill someone with your
Kill someone with your vehicle whilst using a phone? You have killed someone. Killed them. They are gone.
5 years prison + driving ban for life. You take a life so you lose that privilege for life. You want to argue against phone records? Fine. 10 years in prison.
No excuses. No extenuating circumstances or health considerations. You were using a phone and driving a car at speed.
It can and should be that simple.
Everyone, write to your MP
Everyone, write to your MP and demand
-the law to be reviewed, its a joke
-launch a hard hitting education campaign to ram it home that using your mobile device whilst driving makes you a stupid, ignorant dick
I dare say he won’t enjoy
I dare say he won’t enjoy prison, and it will change his life forever. Driving ban should be much longer.
I have a scale I use to
I have a scale I use to impress on people how dangerous motor vehicles are. I hold up a 9mm pistol round and tell them that this is a car at 35 km/hr. I hold up a 20 mm cannon round and tell them this is a motor vehicle at 50 km/hr. I grunt and wheeze and barely lift a 155 mm cannon round an tell them this is a motor vehicle at 90 km/hr. That usually gets through thick skulls pretty well ~X(~X-( But not always.