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London van driver who knocked cyclist off bike wasn't prosecuted despite helmet cam footage

Cycling UK says Met applied their own "nobody died" interpretation of the law...

The Metropolitan police has been criticised for failing to prosecute a London van driver for careless driving after he knocked a cyclist off her bike. Cycling UK commented: "If this represents Met Police policy they might as well say that they are just not bothered about careless driving, as long as nobody suffers a life changing injury.”

The London Evening Standard has published helmet cam footage of the incident which took place on Lambeth Bridge roundabout on July 22 last year.

Nisha Singh was riding from St Thomas’s hospital to the Maudsley hospital in Denmark Hill when a white van, which had up until then been driving behind her, pulled into the side of her.

She suffered bleeding, bruising and a black eye and said that it was only because a black cab had been following at a distance that it was able to avoid running her over as she lay sprawled in the road.

However, in the wake of the incident Singh said she endured six months of frustration dealing with the Met and the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime.

The driver claimed that Singh had been trying to overtake him and she said she felt the police would have believed him that the collision was her fault if it weren’t for the video footage.

Furthermore, because she escaped serious injury, no charges were brought against the driver and he was instead told to attend a safer driving course.

Karen Stuart, the Met official in charge of considering traffic offences in Lambeth, told Singh: “The National Driver Alertness Course is the first option that is offered to drivers where there is evidence of driving without due care.

“A course would not be offered if the matter involved a life-threatening or life-changing injury. Unfortunately we cannot offer both the driving course and also summons the driver to court.”

A Met police spokeswoman said: “The injuries and standard of driving are all taken into consideration.”

Duncan Dollimore, Cycling UK’s Senior Road Safety and Legal Campaigns Officer was unimpressed.

"If this represents Met Police policy they might as well say that they are just not bothered about careless driving, as long as nobody suffers a life changing injury,” he said.

“This driver's lack of attention and bad driving was no less careless just because Ms Singh was lucky, and was merely bloodied and bruised rather than paralysed.

“Careless driving is driving below the standard of a careful and competent driver. This was way below that standard. The Met however have applied their own "nobody died" interpretation of the law, and offered a re-training course. Somebody should be asking themselves what message they are sending regarding road safety and the standard of driving they expect on London's roads?

"Minimisation of incidents like this is why we have called on the Ministry of Justice to review their definition of bad driving offences in their recent consultation on driving offences. One man's view of careless seems to be another's view of dangerous, with the Met having a bespoke view of what's worthy of prosecution."

Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn't especially like cake.

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27 comments

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Podc | 7 years ago
1 like

And yet still she was on the course  2

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ClubSmed | 7 years ago
0 likes

In my opinion all points and a fine do for speeding is teach the driver to look more carefully for speed cameras and slow down for them. It does not teach them that they need to reduce their speed consistantly as this is an educational piece that the driver awareness courses cover.
We don't want drivers who just avoid getting caught or only amend one area of their bad driving, we need bad drivers turned into good drivers.
For those that have done a course and re-offend the penalty should be doubled (extra points, fine and redo the course).

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karlssberg | 7 years ago
0 likes

I was knocked off my bike because of poor driving, and the police insisted that I agree for the driver to be sent on an awareness course because there is always the risk of a biased jury exonerating the driver.

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OldRidgeback | 7 years ago
1 like

Crap driving and penalty points should have been due there, plus a hefty fine

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zanf | 7 years ago
1 like

Not really much to add on top of the disgust that everyone else rightly feels except that I live near that roundabout and try to entirely avoid using Lambeth Bridge because its a death trap.

The exits all have pinch points that leave no room for cyclists to go, and it is notorious for red light jumping vehicles as well. The exit this woman was using is this one which heads out on to the Albert Embankment towards Vauxhall.

It used to be really bad with taxis and PHV's parking outside the Martime Union building after events, despite the double red lines.

Heading the other way, it pinches dangerously when you head from AE on to the bridge, again with red light jumpers that then squeeze cyclists.

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LastBoyScout | 7 years ago
1 like

I was involved in a car accident last year. Bright warm sunny afternoon, awaiting at the back of a queue of traffic on a road that is well-known for having queues of traffic.

Without any warning, we got hit from behind.

Immediate reaction was that the guy behind us had hit us, but, in fact, it turned out that that he'd been stopped behind us, brakes on, and had been hit from behind by a plumber in his van.

Called an ambulance, because I had my family in the car, daughters aged 2 weeks and 2 years, and I wanted them checked over. Because of that, the police were also informed and a local patrol car turned up.

And the police could not have been more disinterested and did absolutely NOTHING about the driver that caused the accident, despite my questions as to why, given that he'd caused a 3-car pile-up because he'd driven into the back of a parked car in broad daylight with sufficient force to shunt it into another car, he wasn't being charged with, at least, driving without due care and attention, especially as he'd earlier admitted he'd been distracted by waving to his boss that had driven past the other way.

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ClubSmed | 7 years ago
1 like

In this case because he lied about the situation (and I am assuming that the vehicle also did not stop to leave details) I believe that a greater punishment should have beenhanded out. If however he had stopped and not tried to lie about the situation I think that a driver awareness course could have been suitable. I do really believe in re-education and rehabilitation, if it doesn't stick then that is when the law needs to come down like a ton of bricks.
The course I attended did not have the best facilitators, but I could have been overly critical because I have been trained in this area. Even so, I certainly still have some take-aways from my speeding course 6 years ago that have changed my driving significantly like:

  • Ignoring motivation from the sat-nav to try and beat the X minutes to your destination and instead try and beat my previous fuel efficiency to the destination.
  • Following behind the car in front using the two second rule.
  • Not taking it for granted that if it is a dual carriageway that it is the national speed limit.

and others but I'll not bore you further...

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kie7077 | 7 years ago
2 likes

This isn't lack of attention and bad driving, it's blatant disregard for life and limb, it's nothing short of dangerous driving, it's very clearly driving below the standards expected etc.

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ClubSmed | 7 years ago
1 like

I have to say that I was caught speeding once and was offered a drivers education course and took it. I believe I am a better driver because of it and I have quoted many things from it, to others, that I found really interesting/useful.
If the same happens here it isn't necessarily a bad thing. We see far too often on here reports of incidents caused by banned drivers continuing to drive. So maybe changing (at least some of) those bad drivers into good drivers and starting those ripples in the pond to more considerate driving will work?

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FrogBucket replied to ClubSmed | 7 years ago
1 like

ClubSmed wrote:

I have to say that I was caught speeding once and was offered a drivers education course and took it. I believe I am a better driver because of it and I have quoted many things from it, to others, that I found really interesting/useful. If the same happens here it isn't necessarily a bad thing. We see far too often on here reports of incidents caused by banned drivers continuing to drive. So maybe changing (at least some of) those bad drivers into good drivers and starting those ripples in the pond to more considerate driving will work?

 

I agree in certain circumstances that a driver improvement course is helpful. However, speeding and driving without due care and attention are very different and should not be considered equal in term sof punishment. This driver should have been prosecuted for the offence.

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davel replied to FrogBucket | 7 years ago
2 likes

FrogBucket wrote:

ClubSmed wrote:

I have to say that I was caught speeding once and was offered a drivers education course and took it. I believe I am a better driver because of it and I have quoted many things from it, to others, that I found really interesting/useful. If the same happens here it isn't necessarily a bad thing. We see far too often on here reports of incidents caused by banned drivers continuing to drive. So maybe changing (at least some of) those bad drivers into good drivers and starting those ripples in the pond to more considerate driving will work?

 

I agree in certain circumstances that a driver improvement course is helpful. However, speeding and driving without due care and attention are very different and should not be considered equal in term sof punishment. This driver should have been prosecuted for the offence.

In my experience (I've done two) there's some useful stuff in there but they're run by the worst kind of 'confuse-correlation-with-cause-and-effect' jobsworths who are insecure in their topic so won't discuss around it (eg. highlighting the downward trend in KSIs and attributing it to seatbelts while not considering (or wanting to discuss) other factors).

As such, it becomes a 'shut up and get through it to tick the box' exercise: I'm not convinced many people leave as better drivers. I think most people are likely to floor it significantly over the speed limit as soon as they leave just to put some distance between them and the experience.

Of course, the twerps responsible will probably point to the downward trend of KSIs as proof of their effectiveness...

And of course, I might have learned more if I hadn't been such an overtly cynical twat, moaning about the state of the free coffee...

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DrG82 replied to davel | 7 years ago
1 like

davel wrote:

FrogBucket wrote:

 

In my experience (I've done two) there's some useful stuff in there but they're run by the worst kind of 'confuse-correlation-with-cause-and-effect' jobsworths who are insecure in their topic so won't discuss around it (eg. highlighting the downward trend in KSIs and attributing it to seatbelts while not considering (or wanting to discuss) other factors).

 

I ended up on a speed awareness course when caught doing 35 in a 30 zone.

At one point the bloke running the course told us that children where less likely than adults to be injured if hit by a car "because they bounce".

At which point the woman next to me piped up and told him that this was a load of tosh.

His reply was "how do you know? do you feel you should be teaching this couse?"

At which point she told him she was a senior consultant at the pediatric A+E in the local hospital and described all the different incidents and associated injuries to children.

He shut up and swiftly moved on.

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burtthebike | 7 years ago
4 likes

I wonder if the police would prosecute someone who attacked a police officer and caused a black eye, bruising and bleeding?  And how many years in prison they'd get?

As the CUK rep says, it was a matter of complete luck that the cyclist didn't suffer much more serious injuries, and anyway,  the level of injuries of the victim is irrelevant.  What matters is getting incompetent drivers off our roads, and demonstrating to other drivers that if you fail to drive responsibly, you too will lose your licence.  All this failure will achieve is to encourage drivers to take risks with cyclists' lives, in the full knowledge that it won't matter as long as they don't actually kill them.

I always thought that the first responsibility of the police was the safety of the public.  Not any more I don't.  It's making sure that drivers are allowed to keep driving unless they've killed someone.

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beezus fufoon replied to burtthebike | 7 years ago
0 likes

burtthebike wrote:

I wonder if the police would prosecute someone who attacked a police officer and caused a black eye, bruising and bleeding?  And how many years in prison they'd get?

I got 80 hours community service for assaulting a police officer, with maybe £40 court costs

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ChrisB200SX replied to beezus fufoon | 7 years ago
0 likes

beezus fufoon wrote:

burtthebike wrote:

I wonder if the police would prosecute someone who attacked a police officer and caused a black eye, bruising and bleeding?  And how many years in prison they'd get?

I got 80 hours community service for assaulting a police officer, with maybe £40 court costs

This doesn't surprise me.

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Mystery Machine | 7 years ago
4 likes

Well, I made the following comment re the (fake) video of the woman ripping the wing mirror off the white van men's vehicle:

"The police do FUCK ALL to motards. The only way for them to get any kind of payback for this kind of shitty behaviour is to hand it out yourself.

I am astonished that more people on bikes don't end up sorting matters themselves."

This (non-fake) story proves the point. Cyclists may as well get tooled up and try and take these fuckers out ourselves. The police certainly aren't going to do anything about it.

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Yorkshire wallet | 7 years ago
5 likes

Meanwhile 3 points on your licence for driving past a camera over the limit on an empty road. Run someone over below the speed limit and you're ok. 

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beezus fufoon | 7 years ago
2 likes

not sure I'd agree that having your incompetence publically displayed is getting off scot-free, nice of the standard to pixelate the number and name on the side - I hope this doesn't mean the institution involved fail to also hear of this incident

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EK Spinner | 7 years ago
6 likes

I can't believe that this one goes unpunished, the driver uses 3 different lanes in the seconds before swiping into the rider, frighteningly selfish driving needs to be dealt with properly BEFORE a serious injury occurs rather than dealing with it BECAUSE such an injury (or fatality) happens

 

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ChrisB200SX | 7 years ago
5 likes

He nearly side-swiped the black cab then ploughs into the cyclist, really does seem like open-season  2

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Gourmet Shot | 7 years ago
7 likes

Seriously ???

Fail to see how you cant prosecute the van driver who clearly cuts up the taxi and then runs into Singh....WTF !!!

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Huw Watkins | 7 years ago
6 likes

Exactly the same thing happened to me after I'd been t-boned by a driver who admitted driving without due care and attention on the spot.

When I pressed the case with the Met after reciving the letter informing me that the driver would just receive a warning, I was told that the decision was down to a civilian worker who had subsequently been removed for disciplinary reasons relating to poor interpretation of the guidelines.   

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cbrndc | 7 years ago
7 likes

"The driver claimed that Singh had been trying to overtake him and she said she felt the police would have believed him that the collision was her fault if it weren’t for the video footage."

So even after lying to the police and being found out, no action to protect the public from a scumbag who cannot drive.  Yet the Met intend to adopt the close pass initiative.  Close pass = action; drive into someone and injure them NO action.

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Dnnnnnn | 7 years ago
5 likes

The driving in the video is shocking and surely worth prosecution.

I wonder if the complaint against the Met could be escalated too?

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Grahamd | 7 years ago
8 likes

I thought the police were supposed to uphold the law, not interpret it.

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Username | 7 years ago
8 likes

Quote:

 because she escaped serious injury, no charges were brought against the driver

 

So if I knife someone this evening on the High Street, no charges will be brought so long as I don't cause serious injury?

 

FFS

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wycombewheeler replied to Username | 7 years ago
9 likes

Username wrote:

Quote:

 because she escaped serious injury, no charges were brought against the driver

 

So if I knife someone this evening on the High Street, no charges will be brought so long as I don't cause serious injury?

 

FFS

 

perhaps a knife skills course?

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