A cyclist in London has raised concerns about the way footage of incidents on the road can be reported, using his own case as an example of how reports can fall through the cracks as police forces “follow procedure” and are “drowning under cases”.

The cyclist behind the Dylillama Twitter account originally shared footage of an incident in Bromley, south east London, on social media last month — and later reported it to the police — after an objection to a close pass led to a motorist driving alongside him for an uncomfortable length of time before accelerating ahead to get out of his vehicle further up the road to wait for the rider.

The whole incident is seen in the footage below, the driver objecting to his “too close, mate” call as they overtook, prompting him to brake and exchange words with the cyclist. “Stay away from me, piss off, move on,” the rider can be heard saying, repeatedly asking the driver to continue on their way.

When the driver eventually does it is only to wait in a side road further along the route, getting out of his car and moving into the road as the cyclist approaches. While the rider tells him to “calm down”, the man can be heard saying: “Come on, you prick”.

When the rider came to report the footage, “the police online reporting tool instructions led me to report it as an assault when it would have been better to report as solely a traffic issue”.

“That itself is insane — want to assault someone? Do it in a car,” he said. “A victim of a crime shouldn’t have to know the system.”

The problem came as the roads policing team “stopped investigating while the police investigated the assault”, meaning that while this happened “14 days went by, more actually”.

“This meant the statutory deadline for the traffic offences expired,” he continued. “The police concluded that the rest of the conduct did not warrant charging or prosecution. So the driver will get a talking to and remain ‘on the system’.”

> Here’s what to do if you capture a near miss, close pass or collision on camera while cycling

When we contacted the Metropolitan Police about the story we were told: “Police were contacted on 26 August by a man reported an incident where a driver had verbally threatened him while he was cycling on Farnborough Hill, Bromley.

“Officers investigated the incident, including viewing footage provided by the cyclist, to establish if any offences in relation to the threatening behaviour aspect could be identified. They could not and the complainant was informed.

“While there will be no further action at this time, the registered owner of the car will be contacted by police and advised about his conduct.”

The cyclist called it a “pretty poor outcome” but added he has “absolutely no issue” with the officers involved, saying “they did their best with what they had” and instead blamed the whole reporting process as “a bit of a farce”.

He continued: “I don’t blame any of the individual officers involved. The roads unit was following procedure. The police officer I spoke to was drowning under cases and got to mine as soon as he could. The charging decision has to consider both chance of conviction and the capacity of the courts system to deal with something like this, in and amongst thousands of other back-logged cases.

“I am okay. I can handle myself, de-escalate a situation and carry on my way. I love riding enough that this won’t impact me. But I shouldn’t be the standard — think about the precedent this sets for actually vulnerable riders and what it does for encouraging cycling.

“Budgets throughout the whole of the system are in crisis, from on the street policing, to back office consideration of offences, through to the ability to prosecute in court or provide restorative justice outside the courts. It’s all broken.

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“If you think this is about cyclists vs motorists it isn’t. It’s about the basic ability for laws and norms to be upheld. I hope the man in the video gets help. I am a normal person, a partner, a father, a friend, who happens to ride a bike. For that kind of rage to exist in someone for so little reason is beyond comprehension. I hope the the chat with the police gives him reflection and peace.”

This tale is nothing new either. Through our Near Miss of the Day series, our campaign making a point about driving standards and the lack of consideration for vulnerable road users on UK roads, we have reported on numerous instances where footage has gone unpunished due to issues.

Last November, Thames Valley Police apologised to a road.cc reader for not requesting clearer footage sooner, meaning it was too late to prosecute a close pass driver.

“To pursue allegations of careless/inconsiderate driving, we are required by law to send a written Notice of Intended Prosecution (NoIP) to the registered keeper of the vehicle within 14 days of the incident,” the force told us.

“In this case, we did not initially have sufficiently clear enough evidence to satisfy stage one. A request was made for clearer footage on 2 September and this was provided on the same day. However, as the time limit for prosecution had expired, we were unable to pursue a prosecution or request that the offending driver attend a driver education course on this occasion.

“Had the request for clearer footage been done sooner, there is a possibility we could have considered sending the driver on an educational course. For this, we apologise.”

While back in June, a Staffordshire cyclist told us of a police email mix-up which allowed a driver to get away without punishment for squeezing him off the road on a country lane, again the 14-day window expiring by the time it was resolved.

Near Miss of the Day 866 (credit: Rob Edwards)
Near Miss of the Day 866 (credit: Rob Edwards) (Image Credit: Farrelly Atkinson)