Driver angered by cyclists "taking up the road" fined £1,000 after shouting abuse and careless driving

Muddy Ford wrote:

Is Loophole now using multiple logins so he can pat himself on the back for his nonsense that he posts here in the comments section? Is he really that thick?   

Now now.. misguided, egotistical, unscrupulous, narssasistic, possibly even a little derranged, but certainly not thick! How very dare you!

PS The lenient sentance has got many people angry.

A quick Google search came up with a record of 68 ponts and still driving

bikeman01 wrote:

First I'll state up front that the guy behaved like a bit of a tit and got punished, I've no issue wit that.

BUT the mob mentality here is quite unbelievable. The magistrate heard that he was a busines owner, employing two people and presumably needs his car to visit clients to do quotes etc. He employs two others and presumably, they would be laid off if the company is impacted.

Now of course I'm not condoming his behavour and he of course has a responsibiity to consider the consequences of his actions but he didn't try to kill anyone, he lost his temper and swore a bit. 

What sort of world do we now live in where there are calls for someone's lynching when they lose their temper. 

And publishing his personal details, whether in the public domain or not, is just incitement. I've a good mind to report this is a non-crime hate incident - look it up.

Get a sense of proportionment people.

I have a couple of issues with what you've written.

Firstly, the fact that he employs two people should be irrelevant to the carrying out of justice as otherwise big companies can just freely break the law and pop out the "but what about mah employees?" excuse.

Secondly, I don't believe anyone is calling for a lynching, but we want people with anger issues to not be on the road in charge of 2 tonnes of speeding metal. There's plenty of deaths out on the roads, so why should we take the risk that this out-of-control self-entitled idiot won't get even angrier next time and take someone's life?

Take away his licence - it is for public safety, and if two or three people have to find alternative employment, then so be it.

bikeman01 wrote:

he didn't try to kill anyone, he lost his temper and swore a bit.

He didn't just swear a bit - he endangered them by close passing and brake checking them (road.cc also says he drove close behind them, but I don't see that in the source report, so maybe they mangled that bit).

[Edit] I'm doing road.cc a disservice - it appears an earlier version of the story did say that he 'drew up too close behind them'. So endangered their safety at least three times - he may not have tried to kill anyone, but he wasn't trying very hard not to.

bikeman01 wrote:

First I'll state up front that the guy behaved like a bit of a tit and got punished, I've no issue with that.

Problem is when this happens with motor vehicles they are force multipliers.  So "behaved like a bit of a tit" and "lost his temper and swore a bit" - what humans do sometimes - has to be put in context: "after choosing to drive a motor vehicle".  If you lose your cool while walking and start shouting and throwing your weight around you're unlikely to kill anyone. You're committing some kind of public order offense or just merit a talking to.  If you're driving a motor vehicle and the other parties are not the risk of "inadvertantly" causing serious injury or death is much, much higher.  If only because while a car may be an extension of your body it's not so well controlled.

"he didn't try to kill anyone" - debatable but again with a car the distance between "threat" and "assault" can only be sketchy.

bikeman01 wrote:

BUT the mob mentality here is quite unbelievable. The magistrate heard that he was a busines owner, employing two people and presumably needs his car to visit clients to do quotes etc.  He employs two others and presumably, they would be laid off if the company is impacted.

Our legal system allows for flexibility.  Actually quite a bit.  Your "A significant fine and 5 points is proportional punishment." is in the eye of the beholder.  For me the fine is small there should be at least a temporary suspension of licence.  Disagree with that but note if you follow your logic we'll not be punishing anyone who owns a business or has children or parents or animals they need to look after...

Putting the address up here is not in great taste but as others have noted this is all entirely public.  Companies House and all that...

Well said - I completely understand your sentiment even if others don't. 

Gimpl wrote:

Well said - I completely understand your sentiment even if others don't. 

I understand the sentiment, but disagree with the conclusion. 

There are way too many cases in this country where dangerous drivers (and some behaving "like a bit of a tit" behind the wheel falls into that category) are allowed to keep their licence because it will impact on their family/work/company/whatever (delete as appropriate). 

Someone who relies on driving for those things needs to take responsibility for not driving in a way that endangers their licence (and other humans) and not suspending their licence at all doesn't reinforce that message at all, it reinforces a message that if their car is important to them they can get away with behaving like a bit of a tit behind the wheel. 

The "mob mentality" comes from the fact that readers on this site have seen it too many times without the prospect of it changing and are fed up of there being no genuine consequences for terrible driving. 

bikeman01 wrote:

First I'll state up front that the guy behaved like a bit of a tit and got punished, I've no issue with that.

BUT the mob mentality here is quite unbelievable. The magistrate heard that he was a busines owner, employing two people and presumably needs his car to visit clients to do quotes etc.  He employs two others and presumably, they would be laid off if the company is impacted.

Now of course I'm not condoming his behavour and he of course has a responsibiity to consider the consequences of his actions but he didn't try to kill anyone, he lost his temper and swore a bit. A significant fine and 5 points is proportional punishment.

What sort of world do we now live in where there are calls for someone's lynching when they lose their temper. 

And publishing his personal details, whether in the public domain or not, is just incitement. I've a good mind to report @benthic for a non-crime hate incident - look it up.

Get a sense of proportionment people.

A few things..... do you not think if he relies on his vehicle for his job that he should behave like a responsible human being?  I'm personally sick fed up of the old "I need my car for work" excuse being rolled out..... if you need your licence for your work don't act like a complete idoit.

Ok if you look at the sentencing council guidelines, he was given 5 points which is a Category 2 offence receiving a Band B fine which is 75-125% of weekly income.  Even if it was a Category 1 offence, it would receive a Band C fine which is 125% to 175% of weekly income...... so is it really a significant fine?

Publishing his personal details?  I assume you are also going to report the Inverness Courier for a non-hate crime incident?  I mean this is what they said "Iain Macdonald, of The Old Inn House, Moy, drew up too close behind them, sounded his horn repeatedly, and when the opportunity arose to overtake, he did so again too close to the six.".  They published his address in their article.

Address - again I don't think posting here is a good look.  However what is here is apparently from Companies House - that's public info.  More than that it's entirely up to you what you put in there.  Indeed by law you are entitled (even steered towards) providing a correspondence address which isn't your home address.  (You have to provide CH with a home address but they won't publish that unless you don't provide a correspondence address and / or ask them to keep your details on the public register - which is unusual).  Same with date of birth - you normally only see month and year unless you opt for the public register.  So that's a choice.  (Leaving aside the fact that by law Companies House has to record anything you write and almost never checks anything, and it's only moderately expensive to set up structures which make your ownership very difficult to trace etc.).

chrisonatrike wrote:

Address - again I don't think posting here is a good look.  However what is here is apparently from Companies House - that's public info.  More than that it's entirely up to you what you put in there.  Indeed by law you are entitled (even steered towards) providing a correspondence address which isn't your home address.  (You have to provide CH with a home address but they won't publish that unless you don't provide a correspondence address and / or ask them to keep your details on the public register - which is unusual).  Same with date of birth - you normally only see month and year unless you opt for the public register.  So that's a choice.  (Leaving aside the fact that by law Companies House has to record anything you write and almost never checks anything, and it's only moderately expensive to set up structures which make your ownership very difficult to trace etc.).

I know exactly how easy it is to obscure public info on companies house.  I deal with companies and company directors on a near daily basis as my job.  And the vast majoritiy of companies tend to use their accountants address as their registered office and to a slightly lesser extent directors correspondence address.  Most accountants offer this as a nominal fee service.

What was posted was a direct cut and paste from the directors details page on companies house.

bikeman01 wrote:

Now of course I'm not condoming his behavour and he of course has a responsibiity to consider the consequences of his actions but he didn't try to kill anyone, he lost his temper and swore a bit. 

'Ultimately, having admitted driving carelessly and threatening or abusive behaviour by shouting and swearing, Sherrif Ian Cruickshank said the offence was "at the upper end of careless driving"'

He didn't just lose his temper and swear a bit, he did that and committed careless driving offences by his own admission. Careless driving can encompass anything up to and including killing somebody with aggressive driving, so if the judge says the offence was at the "upper end" of the spectrum, it was pretty bad.

Then perhaps he should have thought how his own actions could affect others before acting like a douche-bag.
His driving seems to be totally over the top, yet still people want to defend him.
How very odd.

What if those cyclists had been children? Is he still just behaving like a tit? He was angered simply because they were cyclists, it had nothing to do with causing him a delay because he found the time to brake check and stop the car to bully them further. He believed he was tougher than 6 cyclists. Just like men who beat up women and children, they have no fear of their victims so they vent their anger at them. If he lost his job as a result, it might actually have been better for his employees as he is likely not to be a great boss given how he behaves when he believes he is superior.  Why are still posting on here Loophole? 

No one seems to have pointed out  that he was given 5 points by the judge so he wouldn't get banned from driving. Which means he already has 6 points on his license so is a serial offender on the roads. Whilst driving along with 6 points already in a vehicle he definitely needs and instead of being careful, tailgated, close passed, brake checked and then got out of his car and ranted and raved. 

So do you think he cared about his car usage, his company, or his employees whilst commiting multiple road offences previous to this day, and then multiple road offences on the day. Yet we should care for all this because?

AlsoSomniloquism wrote:

No one seems to have pointed out  that he was given 5 points by the judge so he wouldn't get banned from driving.

I didn't understand that at all, does Scotland have a different set of rules (I know they do in many matters)? In England the job of the sentencing magistrate or judge is to hand out the appropriate punishment for the offence, then if the driver is so minded they can make an appeal for "exceptional hardship", the court doesn't have the licence to reduce the punishment to avoid the driver getting a ban - they can't, for example, give someone two points instead of three for doing 35 in a 30 zone because that would keep them under 12.

bikeman01 wrote:

Now of course I'm not condoming his behavour and he of course has a responsibiity to consider the consequences of his actions but he didn't try to kill anyone, he lost his temper and swore a bit. A significant fine and 5 points is proportional punishment

Except when the Red Mist falls people get killed as a result  the most recent case being reported here a few days ago where both drivers were found guilty and now waiting prosecution  https://road.cc/content/news/two-drivers-convicted-causing-cyclists-deat...

I'm sure that neither of these two intended to kill during their spat but they did.  

You only need to do a search on road rage here within the site and you will see a huge catalogue of events where cyclists have been seriously injured or killed as a result of somebody's temper tantrum.

When I started driving I was advised not to get behind the wheel of a car if angry and if I felt my frustration edging towards anger when behind the wheel to stop when safe to do so and get out of the car for five minutes. We all get angry to some degree and we all respond to anger in varying degrees.  It's when we allow it to blind our judgment and thinking that things go pear shaped.

In reality while many of us on the site here may vent I reckon that we're all pretty reasonable individuals and won't go all Death Wish on errant motorists. Unfortunately I read more vitriol directed at cyclists and experience more antipathy towards me after our friend Littlejohn and his ilk pen some of their columns. 

An angry cyclist may slap the rear panel of a car whereas the angry motorist will drive their 1.5T of metal at speed at the vulnerablepiece of flesh and bone. 
 

It's not odd at all. The point of having a car is to be able to travel faster than other people, therefore if the driver can only use the road at the same speed as the people in front of them, those people must be denying the driver of that privilege. The fact that it's 6 people taking the same space on the road as the driver does in their vehicle isn't relevant because although they say the cyclists are "taking all the road" they really mean "denying me the privilege I paid for".

MACDONALD PLANT LIMITED

Company number SC240498

MACDONALD, Iain

Correspondence address
The Old Inn House, Moy, Inverness, Inverness Shire, IV13 7YP

Role Active
Director

Date of birth
November 1958

Appointed on
3 December 2002

Nationality
British

Country of residence
Scotland

Occupation
Contractor

Before anyone moans, that's as reported by the Inverness Courier and is all information already in the public domain.

I hope no one send him some sloppy dog shit through the post 😏