RLJ > Straight to summons

[danfoto]

A headcam should help avoid being falsely accused, although it might be of less personal value if it helped to prove that the alleged offence was committed.

Quite so, m'lud, and a point which seems not to have occurred to some who are prone to posting their headcam footage on You Chewb ...

[Regulator]

Back to the OP...

You broke the law. You got caught. Stop whinging...

[michael42]

The Clerk to the Court will assist you so no solicitor is needed.

I wouldn't heed this advice. He's better qualified than the well-meaning buffoons sitting up above him perhaps, but he's not on your side.

Strangely, the offence has no points attached.

Points to what?

[Pete Owens]

Just a question about the facts of the situation. The offence is created when the white line is crossed when the lights are on red. Crossing the junction on red is not an offence. Therefore from what I see the offence was committed before the OP came to a stop and not when he subsequently set off across the junction. The question therefore is what did the police actually observe to issue the notice. Because as written, the bit about crossing the junction, which seems to have triggered the stop, is not illegal. They would have had to observe you cross the white line on red. And as we know from ASL's if you don't observe the stop line being crossed, its impossible to prosecute the offence.

From the account, it would appear that the lights were continuously at red from the point at which the OP originally passed the police car till the point at which he was observed crossing the junction. Even if they couldn't tell exactly at which time he crossed the white line, they have sufficient observations to prove that it must have been while the lights were at red.

[michael42]

Pushin on:
How did you identify yourself?
I couldn't have done. They'd have had to take my word for it - or take me down the police station!

I rarely carry anything with me that could give my name and address - other than my mobile phone, but someone would have to ask Vodaphone, and the police would have to raise this question officially. Fine in an emergency if I'm injured, but not for general ID.

If you are a car driver, they have your details on the DVLA data base ........... but cyclists?

How do they know who you are?

I think they probably judge it on your attitude. i.e they ask you who you are, where you live, DOB, place of birth - and they can check their database for those details.

Buffoons stopped at the side of the road that make up stuff are not usually in the same creative ballpark as our greatest writers and poets. You can see the gears whirring as they are thinking up answers and most of them forget the first DOB they gave if you ask them for it twice, for example, if not every detail they gave. If nothing comes up on their DB - or they think you're lying, they may well arrest you until they've identified you (if you watch the "reality tv" cop shows, they often do this with car drivers where it's not clear they are the person named on the V5 or if they think the license may be fake or someone else's. It often turns out that people are using a relations license)

Giving false details is probably a bigger fine (and it would be another fine on top of whatever else you've supposedly done) so it's a bit of a gamble to take. If you're a budding Frank Abagnale, you've probably got someone else's id with you rather than none.

If 2 police officers say you did something I doubt you'll get away with it, without strong evidence against their statements.
That said, even in circumstances where you are guilty, you still might want to consider offering mitigation and pleading circumstances to reduce any fine you get.

[thirdcrank]

I see the OP has not posted further.

[Tonyf33]

AFAIK under PACE you can only be arrested (for failing to give your details) if there is evidence that you have endangered yourself or others. That was how I read it anyway...

[thirdcrank]

AFAIK under PACE you can only be arrested (for failing to give your details) if there is evidence that you have endangered yourself or others. That was how I read it anyway...

I suppose that might have been a fairly reasonable interpretation of "breach of the Peace*" which was the only way to arrest anybody for anything other than a felony which didn't have its own specific power of arrest in far off days gone by, but it doesn't apply to the power introduced under PACE to arrest somebody who can't be properly identified.

*capital P for The Queen's Peace

[Pushin on]

Thanks for the advice guys. I thought I might have gotten away with it, but received a summons yesterday.
The police statement was sent with the summons as the evidence against me. It's mostly accurate, but omits the fact that I stopped at the lights (over the white line) and waited for the lights on the other lane to turn red before crossing the junction.

I'm going to plead guilty by post, I assume that will be cheaper than going to the court date, is this right?
Should I bother writing this in the mitigating circumstances? If i give mitigating circumstances, and they're not accepted, will I be given a larger fine?
How big of a fine am I facing?

[thirdcrank]

Carefully read everything you have received. Fines are partly set in accordance with known income and if that info isn't provided, they have to assume you are on top whack. It's also easy to assume that instructions ignored = indifference, when it may be somebody swamped with the legal paperwork.

The posts above already include advice about this. I'd recommend paying attention to daveg. He's a serving magistrate so he knows the type of thing going through their minds. In this context, he mentions the apparent absence of the offer of a fixed penalty, rather than a report for summons. If the reason isn't clear in the police statements, make the point - in a polite way - that you were not offered the benefit of the chance to pay a fixed penalty.

It can be daunting attending court and it's generally time consuming but a polite apology in person cannot do any harm (again see daveg above.) Bear in mind that lay magistrates deal with endless lists of 'guilty by post' and 'proved in absence' cases.

On the subject of mitigation: There are a couple of different ways cases are dealt with but if you receive papers offering the chance to plead guilty by post, there will also be space for your mitigation. If you put anything which means "I'll plead guilty but I didn't do it" they should adjourn the case and offer you the opportunity to plead NOT GUILTY. The will only accept an unequivocal GUILTY plea. If your mitigation is "I committed the offence by crossing the STOP line, but the prosecution evidence does not make clear that I waited just beyond that line until it was safe to continue" that would be accepted because you are admitting the offence (although I've no idea how your explanation might be received.)

I'm not up-to-date with fines, but whenever I see any reports, the fines imposed on cyclists seem harsh. The one that sticks in my mind was a cyclist in Brighton on one of those police reality type programmes. He was riding along the pavment in the dark without lights and eventually passed a red light, although he did wait at the actual junction. IIRC, the total bill was something like £750.
viewtopic.php?f=15&t=43040

My comments are based on being a fairly experienced prosecutor, but without recent experience. I've found it virtually impossible to check the current position because google just brings up ads from solicitors eager to drum up business.

[thelawnet]

Might be worth seeking advice at pepipoo

http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?showforum=5

[thirdcrank]

I think it's widely believed that two-wheelers are safer at the head of the queue waiting at traffic lights, on the basis that they can be clearly seen. This is the thinking behind avanced stop lines (I think the safety objections to ASL are to do with how cyclists get to the front, especially when the approach lane involves passing other vehicles down their nearside.)

I said "believed" but it may ell be that this is proven to be the case in some respected publication eg something from the Road Research Laboratory. I don't know.

I said "two-wheelers" because I get the impression that motorcyclists justify going to the head of a queue on safety grounds, rather than convenience etc. Again, I don't really know.

It may be that a motorcyclists' forum has some useful tips.

My only word of caution is that an argument of this kind has to be handled carefully, to avoid provoking a burst of lesson-teaching.

Incidentally, I should have made clear I am not a lawyer. I've also based my comments on your declared intention to admit the offence.

[daveg]

Carefully read everything you have received. Fines are partly set in accordance with known income and if that info isn't provided, they have to assume you are on top whack. It's also easy to assume that instructions ignored = indifference, when it may be somebody swamped with the legal paperwork.

The posts above already include advice about this. I'd recommend paying attention to daveg. He's a serving magistrate so he knows the type of thing going through their minds. In this context, he mentions the apparent absence of the offer of a fixed penalty, rather than a report for summons. If the reason isn't clear in the police statements, make the point - in a polite way - that you were not offered the benefit of the chance to pay a fixed penalty.

It can be daunting attending court and it's generally time consuming but a polite apology in person cannot do any harm (again see daveg above.) Bear in mind that lay magistrates deal with endless lists of 'guilty by post' and 'proved in absence' cases.

On the subject of mitigation: There are a couple of different ways cases are dealt with but if you receive papers offering the chance to plead guilty by post, there will also be space for your mitigation. If you put anything which means "I'll plead guilty but I didn't do it" they should adjourn the case and offer you the opportunity to plead NOT GUILTY. The will only accept an unequivocal GUILTY plea. If your mitigation is "I committed the offence by crossing the STOP line, but the prosecution evidence does not make clear that I waited just beyond that line until it was safe to continue" that would be accepted because you are admitting the offence (although I've no idea how your explanation might be received.)

I'm not up-to-date with fines, but whenever I see any reports, the fines imposed on cyclists seem harsh. The one that sticks in my mind was a cyclist in Brighton on one of those police reality type programmes. He was riding along the pavment in the dark without lights and eventually passed a red light, although he did wait at the actual junction. IIRC, the total bill was something like £750.
viewtopic.php?f=15&t=43040

My comments are based on being a fairly experienced prosecutor, but without recent experience. I've found it virtually impossible to check the current position because google just brings up ads from solicitors eager to drum up business.

Ahh. The dreaded day in court .......

Strange stuff does turn up but appearing in person does always help. There are many times that the Magistrates will take a measured view after listening to mitigation. Anyone who doesn't appear gives the prosecutor carte blanch to lay it on thick and without mitigation Magistrates will take the case at its worse.

On the cyclists appearing in the dock, my favourite was a lad who was charged with going through a red light. Much to everyone's surprise he turned up in court to offer some mitigiation. In doing so he apologised to the court and said he simply hadn't noticed the red light as he was busy on his mobile to his mate..... Oh dear.

[thirdcrank]

... appearing in person does always help. There are many times that the Magistrates will take a measured view after listening to mitigation. Anyone who doesn't appear gives the prosecutor [icarte blanche to lay it on thick and without mitigation Magistrates will take the case at its worse. ...

That comment about prosecutors leads me to explain to anybody still reading that AFAIK, there are two ways a case may be dealt with in the absence of the defendant. (Being represented by a solicitor is another but that doesn't count in this context, since they are there to represent the defendat's interests.)

One is what used to be and may still be called MCA or Magistrates' Courts Act procedure. This involves the prosecutor serving a notice on the defendant with the summons which includes a "Statement of facts." ie what is alleged. This is usually kept to the bare minimum needed to prove the offence to avoid provoking the defendant into a dispute over side issues. In the event of the defendant indicating a GUILTY plea, nothing else may be said in court on behalf of the prosecution, no matter what mitigation is offered.

The other is proving service of the summons but thedefendant has not attended court. The prosecutor can then apply to prove the case in the absence of the defendant. In the majority of cases, the prosecution will have served statements under the Criminal Justice Act 1967 with a notice that they will be read to the court unless the defence requires the attendance of the witnesses. Those statements will generally be used to prove the case. Occasionally, the witnesses will be called but that's only really likely if the defence has indicated a NOT GUILTY plea, required the attendance of the witnesses and then there is no appearance by the defendant, either in person or through a solicitor. The court will then hear first hand from the witnesses.

In short, I'm saying that the prosecutor only gets and sort of chance to wax lyrical when the defendant has been given a clear explanation of what is going to be said and has chosen to ignore it. There's usually such a caseload that the temptation is to keep it short and sharp.

Finally, for anybody who concludes that these procedures are shortcuts to unfairness if the defendant doesn't know the case is being heard, there is a procedure for the defendant to declare that that's what has happened and the case is then re-heard.

[pete75]

Pushin on:
How did you identify yourself?
I couldn't have done. They'd have had to take my word for it - or take me down the police station!

Can't remember if it was Spike Milligan or Groucho Marx who, when asked to identify himself, looked in a mirror and said yes that's me....