Driver who deliberately crashed into cyclist admits murder

ironmancole wrote:

.............. in both cases the end result is identical, ..........

It has to be this way Mr Ironman because the alternatives are all worse.  

For example, if you carelessly step off the kerb and a swerving cyclist dies, would you like to be charged with murder?  Most people would say it was, for better or worse, a moment of carelessness.

In this case there was premeditation - a plan to kill - which has to be a worse crime than carelessness surely?

Sure, the outcomes were identical but the motives were very different and this should be reflected in the charge and in the sentence.

mike the bike wrote:

In this case there was premeditation - a plan to kill - which has to be a worse crime than carelessness surely?

Mind the gap, Mike, mind the gap.

Housecathst wrote:

I'm shocked that he didn't use the get out of jail free card of "the sun was in my eyes" 

If there was no love triangle involved he could well have done.

Carton wrote:

RIP Richard. 

It's completely bonkers that the percieved intent is so crucial to the judicial outcome. Had he hit the wrong guy, and nobody made the link.

No it's not bonkers.  It's really important. It's all the difference in the world between setting out to deliberately murder someone and any kind of other action whether negligent or reckless that ends up with someone dead.  They may all be crimes but only in one case was the intent of the perpetrator to actually kill someone.  In this case to plan it and execute it with extreme violence.  That is absolutely not the same even as dangerous driving, let alone careless driving. 

oozaveared wrote:

Carton wrote:

It's completely bonkers that the percieved intent is so crucial to the judicial outcome. Had he hit the wrong guy, and nobody made the link.

No it's not bonkers.  It's really important. It's all the difference in the world between setting out to deliberately murder someone and any kind of other action whether negligent or reckless that ends up with someone dead.  They may all be crimes but only in one case was the intent of the perpetrator to actually kill someone.  In this case to plan it and execute it with extreme violence.  That is absolutely not the same even as dangerous driving, let alone careless driving. 

That sounds good in a vacuum, but in the real world, we don't actually know people's true intent about anything. It's all guesswork. There must be plenty of road rage incidents every month that end up as SMIDSY events. Sun in his eyes and he gets two months suspended sentence. Or unexplained road deaths. Same violent intent.

The girl who kicked out at the cyclist in March, high out of her mind. Actually stated her intent before doing it. Witnesses attested to it. Intent possibly clouded by substance abuse and mental issues. Suspended sentence. Brain bleed; medical issues  are ongoing. No jail time. Poor thing, she musn't have known what she was doing.

Again, if this guy had hit the wrong guy, I doubt anyone would have made the link. The end result of the very same murder and the very same murderous intent would have likely been so much different. But he actually managed to hit the guy he intended to hit. So 25 years in the can. Instead of, quite likely, nothing or near nothing. That is completely bonkers to me.

Particularly when it comes to traffic fatalities, where it is so easy to dismiss malice as excusable incompetence, no matter the outcomes. Once in a blue moon you're actually punishing the ill-intentioned culprit. Most of the time that same intent goes unpunished. 25 years versus nothing becomes a random lottery. At most, an IQ test. 

And if we were to pray at the altar of intent, what about the cabbie who deliberately knocked a cyclist of his bike. Hard to get clearer evidence. Cyclist could have easily been killed or seriously injured. Yet he only got points off his license because he failed to attend a hearing. Suddenly, it's about the result, not the intent.

And then this time this guy hits quintuple (as in 5 x 5 = 25x) letter and word score and he gets the book thrown at him. Despite pleading guilty. It's not that I disagree with the judgement, it's that it's so striking when the veils of "road users" are lifted and suddenly here you go, an actual sentence that correlates to impact and intent.

TL; DR: Intent matters. It should be a factor. But unless everyone was implanted with a chip that actually monitors what they're thinking all the time, weighing intent this heavily seems bonkers. As in, not only preposterously unfair in terms of assigning so overwhelmingly differing punishments for the same outcomes, but an insanely overconfident overestimation of the judicial system's ability to read people's minds.

Fifth Gear wrote:

Oh, what's this? The driver admits murder. Oh well, thats totally different then.....25 years.

If he admitted murder you can bet that it's because his solicitor advised that the police had him bang to rights and that doing so would land him with shorter sentence than if he pled innocence.