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news
Justice (Lonpicman, Wikimedia Commons)Driver who seriously injured cyclist when overtaking group ride fined
A driver who seriously injured a cyclist when overtaking a group of riders on a blind bend in the Scottish Borders has been fined £1,000 and banned from driving for three years.
Anthony Chester, aged 67, hit cyclist Anthony Clarke when he was attempting to overtake the group on a blind bend on the A6088 road between Hawick and Carter Bar on 20 June 2019, reports Edinburgh Live.
Edinburgh Sheriff Court heard that Chester, from North Shields, Tyne and Wear, drove into the cyclist to avoid a head-on collision with a car coming in the opposite direction.
He denied causing serious injury by dangerous driving, but was convicted by a jury and was sentenced last Friday.
Sheriff Daniel Kelly, sentencing Chester, said: “This is a serious charge of which you have been convicted of by a jury. It is causing serious injury by dangerous driving.
“I recollect that the cyclist Anthony Clarke said he has never really been able to cycle again and that he was a keen cyclist up until that point.
“So it has had a serious impact upon him along with the serious injuries he received.
“The roads in the Borders are tricky ones and you do have to take care as they are windy and are there a number of bends.”
Besides fining Chester £1,000, the Sheriff also ordered him to pay Mr Clarke the same amount un compensation.
He will also have to take an extended driving test before he can regain his driving licence once his ban ends.
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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37 comments
"He won't be able to cycle for the rest of his life; so I'm giving YOU a three year driving ban".
Entirely logical, no?
As we transition from novice to experienced cyclist we recocgnise when dangerous situations are developing.
One of the first things we learn is that being overtaken on a blind bend (railway bridge etc.) is not good.
Getting in primary position does not always help.
The rule is "They never go for the head on collision, they always involve you in their accident"
You're making quite the assumption there that the cyclist somehow should have been aware of what was going to happen. I've been in situations where a driver has been following me good as gold, patiently waiting for a safe place to overtake, then for whatever reason suddenly decided to make a dangerous overtake at high speed. There's not a lot one can do to prevent that happening - take primary, they still may do it, take secondary, you'll get close passed.
You are correct, in what you say.
There are a lot of sub plots in this scenario.
One that scares me is the timid driver who sits behind and misses several safe oportunities to overtake, then suddenly goes for it on a blind bend, possibly because there is a que of impatient drivers building up behind.
Edit - the timid ones may be more dangerous than the Standard MGIF type.
Their driving style shows they are not confident of making speed/distance decisions.
None of them go for the head on collision though.
It's like playing a game chess on the road with your life as a stake.
I was on a blind bend near my home monday, with a driver attempting an overtake and alongside me on the blind bend, then almost ramming me because of an oncoming car. The driver only decided braking was a reasonable option when i smashed their mirror while beeping. This led to an angry shouting match further down the road, with the driver apologising near the end a few times. The kicker? The driver pulled into a driveway about 15 metres from there...
They'll happily kill cyclists just to save less than 10 seconds.
Ban these people for life. It's the only way to make roads safer.
Banning people from driving also has the benefit of reducing congestion and pollution. I think short bans should be used in lieu of the broken "points" system. Instead of 3 points, you get a 3 month ban (and driving whilst banned should be an automatic prison sentence).
A perfect example of my point.
(It's not my point at all, I'm only sayng what most of us already know)
Another couple of seconds and the driver may not have had time to brake and he would have just taken you out.
I've also noticed that when a motorist has to abort an overtake on a twisty road because on an oncomung vehicle they often drop back and are perfectly behaved. It's as though they have suddenly realised that there could be another stupid driver coming around the next bend.
As I said it's like playong psychological (cycle-ogical) chess
Think of the terrifying consequences though once they've worked it out...
https://youtu.be/aEcIdSjCADw?t=36
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02rnyr1
This, unfortunately, sounds so typical. Similar thing happened to me last year. Bus was at the bus stop, I pass the bus, car decides to overtake even though there is a bend, oncoming car, car pulls in and clips me - even though I do an emergency brake. All on video, all sent to the police. No response, so I chase the Police, they reply 'that they will review' and get back to me. They don't, I chase again, they reply with same. They still don't get back to me after months. So I Iet it be. Perhaps if I had been knocked off and seriously injured the Police may have posted a letter or something to the driver.
This is exactly what would happen if a vehicle is illegally overtaking a cyclist and crossing over double or single unbroken white lines and encounters an oncoming vehicle- steer into the cyclist. The practice has been legalised in Lancashire, because Lancashire Constabulary refuses to take any action against the drivers.
A very lenient sentence for damaging the life of someone forever, even more so when he could, with a toss of the dice, have killled them. I hear the calls for a prison term, but I think a life ban from driving would be more appropriate, especially given that the civil case will be extremely expensive for his insurance company. Maybe it's time that these insurance companies started giving advice to their drivers to take a bit more care around cyclists to save themselves a few million quid.
It's all about money, which is why I belong to CUK, their lawyers royally screw the drivers' insurance.
Caused a collision with cyclist to avoid a head-on with oncoming traffic? What about applying the brakes and pulling out of the manoeuvre? Pitiful and paltry sentence considering the guy will never ride again
"He denied causing serious injury by dangerous driving", does this mean he pleaded not guilty? He lucked out with the sentence if he did.
It is rarer now to get a close pass but fuck me, some of the places people are choosing to overtake are insane.
Blind bends, brows of hills, and my recent fav, on a blind 90-degree right-hander over a humpback railway bridge with double solid white lines.
Hmm, I have overtaken them, now I have put myself in danger so to protect me and my precious car I will now swerve back into someone who is only protected by flesh and blood AND will only give my car some scratches at most. No I don't think it is dangerous driving at all.
Exactly that happened to me on Saturday, driver decides to overtake me on a blind bend with double white lines, then when the inevitable occurred swerves in with squeeling tyres and just avoids rear ending me. On video so sent in to the Police though I will be surprised if I hear anything beyond the automated acknowledgement of receipt.
Not defending the driver, but I have wondered sometimes if it's just a natural reaction to swerve away from the on-coming car as opposed to a pre-thought out response?
I've had the same a few times and I chaulked it up to panic caused by their own stupidity...
Do you often drive on the wrong side of the road?
My natural reaction is to brake.
It might be, but people are supposed to drive and think at the same time, and if they can't overtake safely, perhaps the task is to much for their limited brains; ergo, they shouldn't have a licence to drive.
Driving licenses result from a test pass.
Is this scenario part of the DVLA Test syllabus so likely to have been demonstrated during a test?
Is there any feedback loop from road traffic collisions to the DVLA syllabus?
(Continuous improvement)
I do wonder what DVLA examiners are looking for, my great neice has just failed her test because she drove at 27/28mph in a 30 limit, apparently examiners are OK with speeding but not with going under the limit.
Absolutely, I have made this point before that in a driving test you get encouraged to treat the speed limit as a target (well I was 30 odd years ago and your great niece's experience seems to confirm it is still the same).
The root of the problem is that for years we have concentrated on making cars and roads "safer", when as the joke goes, the most dangerous part in a car is the nut behind the wheel. Unfortunately no government policy these days ever focusses on driver attitudes. I am old enough to remember all of the road safety information films that the government used to put out, including one about giving bikes enough space when overtaking!!!
LICENCE
DOOR MIRROR
( Have I left any out ?)
ANAGRAMME
Or they just got lucky there were no scenarios that occurred on the test requiring real thinking?
I think you are absolutely correct.
A competent driver would not get themselves into that position in the first place. Any response to the situation must necessarily by definition be informed by incompetence.
Might well be what they actually thought, but more accurately should have been "I have failed to overtake them".
So yet again the courts fail to admonish the endangerment of a human beings life.
Until people are held properly accountable, they will treat it as a joke.
I bet if a young fit cyclist had seriously injured a person his age, then there would have been uproar, yet drivers think they can just go over riders like they're tanks in tien a min square, and nothing gets said.
Should be in jail for that.
And for more failure to understand any road use see one of the comments
"Maybe if cyclists didn't insist on cycling 2 abreast taking up a whole lane while chatting merrily he wouldn't have taken this course of action. Think about it 🤔"
No wonder it was only a majority verdict.
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