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Follow up on crash n court

by Gkam84
Wed, Oct 26, 2011 05:27
5

Thought i'd just do a follow up to this thread

/content/forum/37889-some-advice-needed-crash-and-police

To say thanks for all the input but in court none of this made one ounce of difference once the driver produced a witness (his passenger) bearing in mind he was alone in the car at the time.

So even with my insurance, LBS and police documented evidence that the bike had clearly been struck by "a moving object" they could not prove it had been said car and that the piece of bumper stuck in my spd pedal "could" have come from me launching my bike at his car, like he claimed while on the stand.

So apart from running me down, lying to the police, producing a false witness and lying while under oath, apparently this guy has done nothing wrong in the eyes of the law, because it was their word against only mine, the judge found in their favour and therefore either myself or my insurance has to pay for the damages to his car, on top of that, I was also fined £300 for criminal damage and a further £200 for "Dangerous cycling"

So £500 in total, this f**ks me off big style 2

My solicitor is looking into an appeal but has said its very unlikely because of his witness that an appeal will be heard and if it does, its even more unlikely that it will be overturned

So all in all its been a crap few months, run down, the did my knee in again, dislocated my thumb playing football, having to run around on my old "winter" bike and now having to pay the fine from what was going to be my new bike fund to put together with the insurance and get something top of the range, now i can't even get a brake lever, lol 14 14

If you're new please join in and if you have questions pop them below and the forum regulars will answer as best we can.

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5 comments

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A V Lowe | 13 years ago
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Surely the evidence of how the bike and car made contact will verify your story? I recall a challenge of who struck who with cars and the liar was revealed by the clear evidence of the way the vehicles were damaged (the direction in which the scratching was produced).

Who was representing you (CTC or BC legal support?)

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Gkam84 replied to A V Lowe | 13 years ago
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A V Lowe wrote:

Who was representing you (CTC or BC legal support?)

My views on CTC have been aired on this site before, so not it wasn't that and i don't know what BC legal support is?

My family run various businesses so have a legal firm that we deal with for everything, so it was done through them

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step-hent | 13 years ago
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The problem is that the courts expect people to take their oath seriously and not lie. For the most part, that's what happens - people tell the truth, or their lies are inconsistent and thus get found out. Unfortunately the system doesn't account for good liars...

GKam, sounds like you won't have much chance overturning the civil decision (balance of probabilities is a low standard, and will generally be won by the side with the best witnesses unless physical evidence couldn't point to anything else) but you might have more luck challenging the criminal conviction - the 'beyond reasonable doubt' standard means you've got a better hope of overturning, because you can show a credible alternative, which introduces doubt. His witness still makes it difficult to win, but you've a better chance than the civil case.

Good luck.

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Tony Farrelly | 13 years ago
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That sucks gkam, the driver sounds like a scumbag indeed, I'm amazed with the amount of physical evidence on your side that neither the police or the court considered the possibility that he and his witness might be lieing.

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the_mikey | 13 years ago
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This has made me angry, but it seems almost futile, given what you have said, it seems that the driver of the vehicle would have had to have killed you before imposing any penalty on the driver, what this is really down to is the drivers insurance company knowing the best way to defend it's customer(even if it means producing a false witness)and finding any other excuses for passing the blame on to you.

This does somewhat explain why there are so many helmet camera cyclists...

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