Bloody hell, grammer/spelling police on here now!!
Just one question, if as a parent you are worried about you're/your (I don't care wish one is right) child, then, apart from not speeding, wouldn't you just take the child with you to speak with the officer?

That'll be "grammar" (sorry... ) ...

Be true to yourself. That way happiness lies...

@ the Doctor

Very good points raised , there was quite recently a death of a photographer/paparazzi that ran across a busy highway to photo what he hoped was Justin Beiber after his Ferrari got pulled over, it turned out that it was a friend driving the car, instead of placing the pap in the "safety" of the police car, the officer told him to do one, so he proceeded to recross the busy highway, this time unsuccessfully and the resulting instruction from the police officer may have lead to his death

Now you can argue that he shouldn't have been there in the first place, but the actions of the police officer IMO lead to his death, I'm sure in the USA they have jaywalking rules, and I assume the same rule will say a highway is for driving on not crossing the road,should the police officer detained him for his own safety? Former Mod/Member, with the most post & Chicken George Arch nemesis

dont care really he was an annoying photographer producing crap picture for no doubt range of crappy supermarket magazines, no great loss. the cop rightly told him to get lost, but didnt tell him not to stop look and listen


thats me on a sympathetic day too  At work
At home

"I can't always believe facts I read on the web" - Charles Dickens

winner by default of the tractor vs caravan race

piattj wrote:

That'll be "grammar" (sorry... )

Weeellllll...
1. Use of you're, rather than 'your'

]] AARGH! My fault. I often let the iphone spell checker sort out the your/you're bit and this time my laziness caught me out.
In my defence, I was typing on the iphone without my reading glasses and I was on the bog at the time...


2. Again, without the facts...

]] Without the facts you could argue anything you like.

3. Drivers at school drop off / pick up ... an irrelevance - not applicable on a motorway hard shoulder

]] You're correct. I think I was on the verge of a general rant. What I said is still true though.

4. How long does it take for a toddler to panic if left alone?

]] I assume the child in question would be strapped into a seat? So even if it was having a little panic all we be ok again when mum came back to the car?

5. ...a woman with a small child (although admittedly speeding) does not need to be treated in an offhand way

]] Maybe she was offhand with them? Who knows. We only have her word for what really happened (third hand of course).
I might have expected the Police to pull her over and then just tell her to proceed to the next exit for safety though.
Noone, with or without child really wants to be hanging around a hard shoulder.
As for being offhand, the Police see the results of accidents all the time. I can imagine them being disgusted with the woman for driving way over the limit with a child in the car. She deserved a .
Explain to me how "a woman with a small child" is in anyway different to the rest of us?

6. You're on an iphone. Apology accepted

]] Phew!

At the end of the day, I don't see having a child as an illness or a disability. On the contrary I think it demands more from your sense of right and wrong and personal responsibilities. Just because this woman had a child with her doesn't mean she should be treated differently to anyone else.

Npinks, as for the pap who got run over, you think the police were partly responsible for his death? Can you explain that one please? If anyone decides to run over a road for whatever reason, it surely is that person's responsibility to take appropriate care.

I don't know. I seem to have a warped view of what passes as common sense and what passes for personal responsibility. It seems to me these days that everything that happens has to be someone else s fault.

The Doctor wrote:

Lets just say another vehicle lost control and ploughed into her car killing the child. You could have the 'but for' test in place. It could be argued that 'but for' the actions/demands of the police officer, the child would have been with the mother. Although very difficult to prove, the police owe a duty of care to people they deal with and if she could prove that firstly the duty has been breached by the officers actions and that the breach caused the loss, she could sue in negligence. The force would be held vicariously liable for the officers negligence.

Stooby, quite easily as said, the pap was ordered back to his car which meant he had to recross a busy highway, he should have been detained and driven back to his vehicle etc Former Mod/Member, with the most post & Chicken George Arch nemesis

That could go on all day though Apache. You could say that if the police officer hadn't bothered pulling her over she wouldn't have been sat there or if she had chosen a different road to speed on etc etc. The obvious place to point the blame would be to the person who caused the RTC, assuming of course it wasn't something beyond their control and it was a case of driving without due care etc.

The reason I mentioned the officers actions with the 'but for' test, is that you could argue a direct causal link. The woman's speeding is directly linked to being pulled over but not directly linked to the child being left in the car. If she caves in to the officers demands and an RTC occurred, then there is a direct causal link between the actions of the officer and the child being in the car.

I know what you are getting at though. In a criminal appeal case (name escapes me at the mo), a chap appealed his murder conviction because although he shot the victim, the victim only died as a result of a negligent act of a surgeon. The appeal was dismissed on the 'but for' test. 'But for' the appellants actions, the victim would not have been in hospital having the surgery.

Slightly different approach with criminal law because the courts seem keen to stretch the boundaries a little because the purpose of criminal law is to censure wrongdoing. LL.B (Hons) - University of Derby
LOT (Lord of Time) - University of Gallifrey

Last edited by The Doctor on 23rd Feb 2013 4:53 pm. Edited 1 time in total

What gets me re all this speeding stuff is why manufacturers are allowed to produce and sell vehicles that exceed the national speed limit of any given country.

That's lame, why are manufacturers of guns allowed to make ones that shoot real bullets, it's not the guns fault if someone is shot.

To get back to the origins of the thread, it would appear she was caught at 98, we don't know the car involved but as with all vehicles the speedo would have been indicating quite a bit North of 100.
IMO anyone these days caught doing wrong in this country immediately looks for sympathy or to blame the other party.
No one has a second thought for the safety of the officer involved, he had to get out first to have a word with her, had he been killed what would have been her reaction, probably that he had stopped her for nothing and it was his fault.

It should be universally adopted that once a driver is alerted to being wanting to pull over, he/she should make their way to the inside lane and proceed to the very next exit where they and the police can safely stop.

The stopping of drivers in cities etc is a farce also, as soon as the 'blues and twos' sound the car pulls over and stops even in a bus lane, double yellows, half up a pavement, on a crossroad or at the traffic lights.

Obviously the exception would be the criminal fraternity, but they would soon let the police know their intentions.

...

This seems to have raised more hackles than you'd find in a Findus Cottage Pie...

...  ...

Be true to yourself. That way happiness lies...

Right here goes...

1) If the police signal for you to stop you must do so where it is safe. The hard shoulder is deemed the safest part of a motorway. If there is a junction half a mile up the motorway as long as you acknowledge the police and signal your intentions you could not be accused of failing to stop.

2) If there is no junction close then pull over, wait for the officer to approach you and say you are not comfortable on the hard shoulder and will follow the police to the next off slip.

3) If you are suspected or deemed to be driving dangerously or unfit through drink, drugs etc the police will not let you drive further. If a dangerous or drugged driver wiped out a family further down the road the police would be liable.

4) There is no power other than arrest to remove you from your car.

5) The reason they want you in their car is so you can talk in the relative quiet, checks on you and your vehicle can be done if necessary, you can be shown the error of your ways on DVD and your conversation and the officers behaviour are also recorded.

6) Osman v UK is caselaw for the police to take certain action if they believe a life is in danger, most commonly used when they receive intelligence that someone intends to harm a third party.

Most (not all) officers are there to help and will use common sense on motorways. They pick up enough bits of bodies to know how dangerous it is. If you ask to relocate to a service area etc they will oblige if they can. _________________
Gone - 2010 Rimini XS

Last edited by Aero_383 on 23rd Feb 2013 6:18 pm. Edited 1 time in total

I wonder what she does with the child when she fills up with petrol and goes off to pay...........