The driver of the lorry involved in the death of cyclist Ying Tao at Bank junction in the City of London will not be charged in connection with the incident last June.
According to the London Evening Standard, the City of London Police and the Crown Prosecution Service decided after a six-month review that there was insufficient evidence to secure a conviction.
Specifically, they concluded that the standard of driving had not fallen below that of a “competent and careful driver” required in a charge of causing death by careless driving.
They also established that the lorry had no defects at the time of the fatal crash.
A spokeswoman for the City of London Police told the newspaper: “The investigation has come to a conclusion, with no further action to be taken.”
Ms Tao, originally from China and a graduate of both Oxford and Cambridge universities had been cycling her work at PricewaterhouseCoopers when she was struck by the left-turning lorry.
The 26-year-old had recently celebrated her first wedding anniversary and her husband Jin Chan Zho said: “She was the perfect wife and perfect in every way. She was smart as well as beautiful.”
Following her death, both the London Cycling Campaign and Stop Killing Cyclists organised vigils at the junction, which the City of London Corporation now plans to bar to all motor vehicles other than buses between 7am and 7pm.
> Cycle safety protests at Bank
Unveiling the proposals last November, Michael Welbank, who chairs the Corporation’s Planning & Transportation Committee, said: “Bank Junction is dysfunctional, dangerous, dirty, congested, and polluting” and that it was “completely inappropriate to form the heart of a modern city.”
> Radical overhaul of Bank Junction planned
Donnachadh McCarthy, co-founder of Stop Killing Cyclists, told the Standard: “We are disappointed at a lack of prosecution.
“We are, however, pleased that the corporation is responding positively to the call – after the huge protest following the awful death of Ying Tao – that Bank junction be made into a safe space at the heart of the City for cyclists and pedestrians.”
15 thoughts on “No charges for lorry driver involved in Bank Junction cyclist death”
Why are “stop killing cyclist
Why are “stop killing cyclist” upset at the lack of prosecution? An exhaustive 6 month investigation has concluded there are no charges to answer. I get that road safety is important but saying “i’m annoyed an innocent person hadn’t been prosecuted” to further our political agenda makes you sound like an ass.
swampy wrote:
Absolutely. Not every motorist involved in an incident with a cyclist is at fault. Sometimes it’s the cyclist and sometimes the lines are so blurred it’s inappropriate to apportion blame. If you choose to travel on the public highway there is a risk – accept that or stay indoors.
mike the bike wrote:
Absolutely. Not every motorist involved in an incident with a cyclist is at fault. Sometimes it’s the cyclist and sometimes the lines are so blurred it’s inappropriate to apportion blame. If you choose to travel on the public highway there is a risk – accept that or stay indoors.— swampy
Is that what you say to your H&S officers – “oh, there’s always some risk at work”? We could try to assess what caused the collision, and we should be holding drivers to higher standards, bevause they cause the danger.
oldstrath wrote:
Agreed up to a point, which is part of the point of presumed liability. And the case for better infrastructure and traffic management is also compelling. But ultimately the public realm isn’t a workplace and we really wouldn’t want it to be be treated like one.
Duncann wrote:
Presumed liability would only kick in when you claim off the motorist’s insurance. I can’t see it having any influence on driver behaviour (for example tailgating is endemic despite the car behind being at fault if there is a collision) but would make it easier to get compensated for your loss/injuries after an incident.
But in this instance the HGV driver was working, his cab will be a no smoking zone as it is a workplace. The public realm is already being used as a workplace but not with the same protection for the public.
I’ve been on construction sites that have policies in place to prevent vehicles manoevering around workers on foot without banksmen in place to offer assistance to the driver but as soon as they leave the site the driver has to manage on their own.
The difference is stark and down to the level of investigation if an incident happened and who can be found criminally responsible.
oldstrath wrote:
My point was really twofold. First, we should not expect drivers, or cyclists, or anyone, to be perfect. With the benefit of hindsight it is possible to spot flaws in the conduct of most road users and that will always be the way things are. The best we can hope for is ‘reasonable’, a word that crops up time and time again in English law.
And secondly, I’m sure the police and the CPS have done precisely what you ask, they have assessed the causes of the collision. And their conclusion was that no charges should be brought.
Life can be tough, you must accept this or you are doomed to a world of disappointment and high blood pressure.
mike the bike wrote:
My point was really twofold. First, we should not expect drivers, or cyclists, or anyone, to be perfect. With the benefit of hindsight it is possible to spot flaws in the conduct of most road users and that will always be the way things are. The best we can hope for is ‘reasonable’, a word that crops up time and time again in English law.
And secondly, I’m sure the police and the CPS have done precisely what you ask, they have assessed the causes of the collision. And their conclusion was that no charges should be brought.
Life can be tough, you must accept this or you are doomed to a world of disappointment and high blood pressure.— oldstrath
I see no reason not to expect something closer to perfection from those given the privilege of a driving licence. And saying that the police and CPS have failed to find enough evidence to prosecute is hardly the same as saying the driver was blameless.
swampy wrote:
no the 6month investigation has concluded that there is insufficient evidence to pursue a prosecution on a death by careless driving charge, the police & cps have been very careful in the wording of what theyve concluded and not sought to label any party involved innocent or guilty, as ultimately that is for the courts to decide.
There are 3 potential causes
There are 3 potential causes – driver, cyclist or infrastructure. Since the junction has been acknowledged as flawed there is sufficient cause for reasonable doubt, unless there is cctv or a whole host of witnesses to prove poor driving.
And also,on a small point of
And also,on a small point of order-the decision on whether to bring charges or not is the sole responsibility of the CPS-the police gather and present the evidence to them,and they may or may not offer a professional opinion on the incident which the CPS lawyer may or may not take into account-ultimately the final decision is with the CPS
Problem is that CPS will only prosecute if they feel there is a realistic prospect of a conviction-that threshold ,though supposedly objective, is inevitably influenced by each individual lawyers own experience and views (this applies for all cases,not just ones such as this)
This can mean that an inexperienced or nervous or feeble CPS lawyer,when “testing” the evidence,will anticipate even the most ridiculous and nonsensical defences to the charges and use these to refuse charge and therefore remove the ability to “let the court decide”
Believe me this is a source of much frustration to investigating police officers who on many occasions disagree with the (non) charging decision but have no recourse to challenge it.
Well if the lorry had no
Well if the lorry had no defects, it must have been part of the 0.0001% that are road legal HGVs
more luck, than good management of the company I’m sure.
“insufficient evidence” is
“insufficient evidence” is why we use cameras
tonylen – the Police do have
tonylen – the Police do have recourse to challenge a decision the CPS make, i’ve done it before. Also whenever i have sought CPS advice for a charging decision it has always been a senior crown prosecutor who decides the outcome, very rarely will a brand new lawyer be given a case such as this to decide the outcome.
I just think it is
I just think it is unfortunate that those with real responsibility (i.e. the clowns who “design” junctions like this) can’t be held to account. It is a fact that HGVs have massive blind spots, anything up to 5 metres on the nearside, and 3 metres immediately in front of the lorry. NExt time you are at a set of traffic lights in London, look where the “cycle lanes” actively encourage cyclists to go. You got it, up the nearside blindspot, and possibly into the front blind spot by virtue of an advanced stop line.
Oh, and in response to the comment about 0.0001% of lorries not suffering a defect, they are MOT’d every 12 weeks, and poorly performing operators do have their licence taken off them.
One final point before Iget off my soap box, lorries only go into city and town centres in order to deliver things that the residents want. If supermarkets in cities could not receive there deliveries by lorry, they would either have to close or have a literally never ending stream of smaller vans delivering. A large van may have a payload of as much as 2.5 tonnes, whilst a typical artic used to deliver to city centres would have a payload approx 10 times that.
I’m surprised that cyclists
I’m surprised that cyclists never seem to complain about the notion of careless driving being defined as below that of a “careful and competent” driver etc. The amendment to the Road Traffic Act that created this rationale is only about ten years do and could be repealed if there was a strong enough lobby against it.