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Police tape (CC licensed by freefotouk on Flickr)Cyclist seriously injured by hit-and-run driver in “senseless act of violence”
An 18-year-old cyclist was left with serious injuries after a motorist, driving a car with illegal “cloned” number plates, struck him in what police have described as an attempted murder and a “senseless act of violence”.
The cyclist was riding on Gore Avenue, Salford, in the direction of Weaste Lane, at around 4.30pm on Monday 30 January when he was hit by the driver of a white Ford EcoSport. The seriously injured 18-year-old victim was taken to hospital for treatment.
The following evening, investigating officers found the car involved in the collision abandoned on Cranbrook Road, Winton.
According to Greater Manchester Police, the car’s number plates were “cloned”, an illegal practice in which a car’s registration number is copied and assigned to another vehicle.
Number plate cloning, or vehicle identity theft, has often been used by criminals seeking to evade the attention of the police, by replicating the plates of cars with ‘clean histories’ – in other words, with no points or fines on their licence – and using them on their own vehicles.
According to a recent article by Auto Trader, the use of cloned number plates has risen dramatically in recent years due to the increase in the number of Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) cameras on the roads. The motoring website says that an increasing number of speeding or dangerous drivers have resorted to using cloned number plates to avoid fines and prosecutions.
Greater Manchester Police say they have contacted the true keeper of the plates in question, who they say has “no connection to this investigation”.
They have also appealed for witnesses or anyone with dashcam and doorbell footage of Monday’s collision to come forward.
“This was a senseless act of violence against a young man,” Detective Inspector Chris Horsfield of Salford CID said in a statement.
“We are currently following all lines of enquiry, and no matter how small you think the information may be, it could prove vital to the investigation.”
Anyone with information is asked to contact Greater Manchester Police either on 101 or 0161 856 5049, quoting incident 2586 of 30/01/23.
Alternatively, details can be passed through the force’s LiveChat function or via the independent charity Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.
After obtaining a PhD, lecturing, and hosting a history podcast at Queen’s University Belfast, Ryan joined road.cc in December 2021 and since then has kept the site’s readers and listeners informed and enthralled (well at least occasionally) on news, the live blog, and the road.cc Podcast. After boarding a wrong bus at the world championships and ruining a good pair of jeans at the cyclocross, he now serves as road.cc’s senior news writer. Before his foray into cycling journalism, he wallowed in the equally pitiless world of academia, where he wrote a book about Victorian politics and droned on about cycling and bikes to classes of bored students (while taking every chance he could get to talk about cycling in print or on the radio). He can be found riding his bike very slowly around the narrow, scenic country lanes of Co. Down.
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12 comments
No such thing as cloned plates in Australia, as the genuine plates are extremely difficult to fake; criminals resort to stealling plates but then the theft gets reported and the stolen plates get put on the ANPR system.
I am not surprised at any police force doing nothing about this.
I reported a close pass to the Met police in December 2021.
They initially issued an NIP for a close pass but then recently told me the plates were cloned and they had no way to trace the vehicle/driver to pursue the case so were closing it down.
So the driving itself was dangerous enough for an NIP AND then they also found the driver had false plates on the car... but they still chose to stop their investigation thus letting the driver off the hook for TWO offences.
(I have often said that petrol stations should have their CCTV linked to a national database of wanted/illegal vehicles, to try to tag them to whoever pays for fuel...)
At last the police accept that actions of some drivers amount to attempted murder. Let's hope they have the courage to persue this as such and bring the appropriate charge and prosecute. Hang on! Back to reality.
"Number plate cloning, or vehicle identity theft, has often been used by criminals seeking to evade the attention of the police, by replicating the plates of cars with ‘clean histories’ – in other words, with no points or fines on their licence – and using them on their own vehicles."
Since when could vehicles get points or fines on their licence?
Have you not heard of the new-fangled autonomous vehicles?
'used by criminals seeking to evade the attention of the police'.. not vehicles; but then, such criminals are hardly likely to hold a licence in the first place.
"described by police as attempted murder" ... But being treated as a motoring offence, and as such virtually zero effort is being expended.
But if ever caught, the perpetrators wont be prosecuted as the 14 day window will have elapsed.
Obviously the victim made the rookie error of not being a serving police officer. We've seen how the cops go the extra mile for one of their own.
Do cars have VIN numbers in the UK? Chassis numbers? Surely there's a way to figure out the owner of the car other than the number plate‽
Perhaps a stolen car with a cloned plate?
My plate was cloned last year. After I reported it, I was stopped by a traffic officer on the M5. He checked the VIN over the radio, so the process is clearly as simple as we imagine once the vehicle is found.
Yes they do but this was almost certainly a stolen vehicle, there are some pretty dumb criminals out there but even they know about the other vehicle identifiers besides numberplates; if they were the registered owners it would most likely have ended up at the bottom of a quarry pit or in a crusher.
Just disgusting.