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mrmo.
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October 5, 2015 at 9:24 pm #24888
ciderman_100
Amazing how much attention to the sad loss of a father of two has on the news tonight. Straight away it is murder, perhaps if they said it was careless or due care the driver would come forward. At what point does a death caused by a car become murder.
answer:-
When you’re a police officer.so there you have it
we live in a world that denotes the severity of the offence by the clothes you wear.
Discuss
my condolences to the family
andy thomas victim of careless driving
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fullers1979 wrote:
Regardingfullers1979 wrote:Regarding the media attention to this. To me it seems fairly simple. How many police officers are killed each year in the line of duty? Answer – not many. How many cyclists are killed each year? Answer – far too many. There you have it. The media will sensationalise everything to make it sound more interesting
Which you could argue means the defendant will be unable to receive a fair trial, your point on numbers is true, and the only real solution is more police and actually catching drivers when they break the law.
The law cannot and does not get changed depending on who the victim is. As much as people like to berate the British legal system it is widely regarded as one of the best in the world due to the fact it is seen as incredibly fair. There will be no favouritism by the courts in relation to this.You can argue the laws don’t change, it is far harder to argue about the application of laws. Consider the current media stories about child abuse, or Hillsborough. You can argue that is the past, but is it really?
We will not agree on this subject however I can assure you that cyclist are not seen as second class or given a lesser service due to who they are. Not by me anyway!Police officers are people, some are racist, some are sexist, some are anti-cyclist, you would hope the numbers are small but as demonstrated by how the GMP and the Met have ignored the Home office guidelines on pavement cycling you do have to wonder.
Regardless of the details, this is a shit situation, and a discussion about whether a driver using a car as a weapon to kill a policeman v a woman using a car as a weapon receive different treatment by the media and the police/CPS is one that we should not be having. There should be no perceived difference in treatment.
severs1966
WiznaeMe wrote:…the driver
WiznaeMe wrote:…the driver […] drove straight at a person, reckless as to whether they would suffer great harm…This happened to my wife. There were 46 witnesses. Fortunately she wasn’t killed. Unfortunately, she was both on a bike, and also not a police officer. Therefore the police couldn’t care less.
We received a lovely polite phone call from Leeds police to tell us that they would not investigate.
Obviously, this case involved a death so it MUST be investigated; the two events cannot compare for that one reason. Attempted murder of a non-police officer is, however, apparently completely OK.
vonhelmet
Well, it was the police
Well, it was the police themselves who set off calling it a murder investigation, not the media.fullers1979
I do agree that the facts
I do agree that the facts need to be looked at prior to it being plastered about. However all investigations are dealt with as a suspicion and different types of investigations are carried out in very different ways. Just the sheer mechanics of how the incident in Merseyside appears to have happened will suggest they will look at a criminal offence rather than a driving offence. However that does not mean that one cannot become the other after further investigation. I also agree that there are times when it may look like police are playing down certain situations like collisions. Luckily the average member of the public doesn’t experience that many, officers will experience many many collisions and its that experience that they use to form their investigation plan in the first instance. They will always be occasions where they initially get it wrong that’s just the way it is. If a cyclist decided to place himself in the way of an offender who was actively trying to escape from police and that driver deliberately drove into him then that would also be dealt with as a murder investigation. Thankfully that scenario would happen very infrequently. Despite how it may seem at times there aren’t many people in the world who would deliberately take the life of an unknown person. However there are far too many people who don’t pay anywhere near enough attention whilst at the wheel of a 2 tonne lump of metal!As for the media……don’t get me started!
Thank you for your reply it
Thank you for your reply it was not meant to be inflammatory it was meant to open discussion which I think it did. The point I wanted to make was it is not a level playing field. I have had both positive and negative experience with the police. One of which was not unlike the incident which is in the papers now where the woman rammed the cyclist into a van . In my case the police officer was more interested in trying to fine me for swearing in a public place, rather than getting the facts from both parties. Where as the police officer who died it was immediately classed as murder. All I am trying to say is that all the facts should be looked at before banding about allegations by the media and police before people have been even found let alone charged.Ciderman
The point you seem
CidermanThe point you seem to want to make is that the police and media are prejudiced towards the police and equally prejudiced against cyclists. You even say that the severity of the offence is denoted by the clothes you wear. The reason your thread touched a nerve is that by its design your thread is inflammatory. You may not have designed it to be, however it is. The whole point of it is to suggest the cycling world is seen as second class or of less importance to that of others.
I have a foot in both camps and a reasonable amount of experience in both.
Oldstrath has hit the nail on the head. We cannot know what the offender was thinking unless they tell us. A mind probe has yet to be invented. However the mens rea of the offender is key when seeking any conviction of any kind. Often the persons actions give this away to some extent. However without being there ourselves we will never be in possession of the full facts.
Regarding the media attention to this. To me it seems fairly simple. How many police officers are killed each year in the line of duty? Answer – not many. How many cyclists are killed each year? Answer – far too many. There you have it. The media will sensationalise everything to make it sound more interesting. The less often something happens the less they need to sensationalise it. That is their job, like or dislike it. No one road death is more important than the other. Unfortunately some people are a lot more vulnerable and therefore lose their lives in greater numbers.
The law cannot and does not get changed depending on who the victim is. As much as people like to berate the British legal system it is widely regarded as one of the best in the world due to the fact it is seen as incredibly fair. There will be no favouritism by the courts in relation to this. They have no side to take. Yes the police will throw more resources towards this incident than perhaps they might for a cyclist being killed. One of their own has died and they are a family. People naturally want to protect their loved ones and people that they have an affinity with. You are obviously a cyclist and therefore will want to protect them even if you don’t know them. It’s natural behaviour.
Yes my earlier post was pointed and rash. It was late and in reaction to your initial post which riled me. We will not agree on this subject however I can assure you that cyclist are not seen as second class or given a lesser service due to who they are. Not by me anyway!oldstrath
To use the phrase offered up
To use the phrase offered up by many on here when a cyclist is killed by a motorist “I don’t suppose he went out that night intending to kill someone”. Clearly he did kill someone, and that is both sad and wrong, but I still struggle to see how this can be described as any more ‘intentional’ than the actions of motorists who deliberately pass too close, or reverse into a cyclist, or destroy a hair salon while attempting to hit a cyclist.Surely the issue , in reality if not in law, is that we can never actually inspect someone’s intentions. Any rational person will show remorse and claim non-deliberation after the event – this proves nothing except, at most, good advice.
fullers1979 wrote:I don’t
fullers1979 wrote:I don’t normally get drawn into these kinds of discussions however this has touched a nerve!! if you wish to make such a strong argument then you must at least have some slight notion about the subject!! Clearly there are a lot of trolls on here tonight!!If you have no dealings or training in the judicial system I would suggest keeping your mouth shut for fear of making yourself look a right numpty, like some the others here have!!
Please Roadcc delete this entire thread!
I have a notion about this
car was stolen, police deployed a stinger to puncture the tyres, car tried to avoid the stinger through this action a person was killed. I do not have any legal training but I do have a modicum of intelligence and I find it quite offensive that you think that you can stifle this discussion just because you say so. Nobody on this thread has said anything inappropriate about the officer who sadly lost his life. It is a discussion as to how the media and police see death with a motor vehicle when its not a cyclist. So if you can not get your head round that then I am sorry for any offence caused to you.ciderman_100 wrote:Why are
ciderman_100 wrote:Why are they using the term murder is it not death by dangerous drivingBecause it seems it was intentional.
Honestly, I don’t get what is so hard to understand here.
I don’t normally get drawn
I don’t normally get drawn into these kinds of discussions however this has touched a nerve!! if you wish to make such a strong argument then you must at least have some slight notion about the subject!! Clearly there are a lot of trolls on here tonight!!If you have no dealings or training in the judicial system I would suggest keeping your mouth shut for fear of making yourself look a right numpty, like some the others here have!!
Please Roadcc delete this entire thread!
Why are they using the term
Why are they using the term murder is it not death by dangerous driving
bobbinogs
ciderman_100 wrote:This is my
ciderman_100 wrote:This is my point the police say drove at them cyclist says squeezed me into the kerb/parked car and knocked me off, they tried to kill me officer. No sir that is careless driving. Which then gets back to my original point of murder if you’re police careless if you’re cyclistWhat he said, my thoughts exactly. The amount of times I have read tosh excuses for killing a cyclist and yet even getting charges of careless driving to stick seems hard. One case of a policeman killed and it is widely regarded as murder, no ifs or buts. Don’t get me wrong, I am not denigrating the fantastic job ‘most’ coppers do but it does seem to be a case of two different legal systems.
700c
Sounds like murder to me.
Sounds like murder to me. Perhaps it’ll end in a manslaughter charge, who knows but either way that description, and the public outrage about such a callous act, seems completely appropriate.It seems wrong to me to liken this to cyclist/ car collisions on the road. Even if that debate still needs to be had, there’s a time and a place and this isn’t it. To raise it now, about this news story, just sounds like a cyclist persecution complex which gets in the way of sensible debate all too often on here.
DivineChorus
ciderman_100 wrote:This is my
ciderman_100 wrote:This is my point the police say drove at them cyclist says squeezed me into the kerb/parked car and knocked me off, they tried to kill me officer. No sir that is careless driving. Which then gets back to my original point of murder if you’re police careless if you’re cyclistIntention.
Did the driver who squeezed you into the kerb intend to do you harm or was it a poor standard of driving ie careless? It sounds as if the driver of the stolen vehicle drove at the PC ‘with intent’And to the poster who said that it’s a different rule if you are wearing a uniform of the ‘Establishment’, I would say no, colleague was stabbed at Notting Hill Carnival recently, the youth who did it got a 6 month Commmunity Rehabilitation Order or something as ineffective/insulting.
Remember this copper protecting the ‘Establishment’ was trying to stop burglars in the early hours of the morning after they stole someone’s hard earned property, and coppers elsewhere will be doing exactly the same tonight.
As someone else said, there is a time and a place to discuss the failings of the law and this isn’t it IMO.
This is my point the police
This is my point the police say drove at them cyclist says squeezed me into the kerb/parked car and knocked me off, they tried to kill me officer. No sir that is careless driving. Which then gets back to my original point of murder if you’re police careless if you’re cyclist -
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