- News
- Reviews
- Bikes
- Accessories
- Accessories - misc
- Computer mounts
- Bags
- Bar ends
- Bike bags & cases
- Bottle cages
- Bottles
- Cameras
- Car racks
- Child seats
- Computers
- Glasses
- GPS units
- Helmets
- Lights - front
- Lights - rear
- Lights - sets
- Locks
- Mirrors
- Mudguards
- Racks
- Pumps & CO2 inflators
- Puncture kits
- Reflectives
- Smart watches
- Stands and racks
- Trailers
- Clothing
- Components
- Bar tape & grips
- Bottom brackets
- Brake & gear cables
- Brake & STI levers
- Brake pads & spares
- Brakes
- Cassettes & freewheels
- Chains
- Chainsets & chainrings
- Derailleurs - front
- Derailleurs - rear
- Forks
- Gear levers & shifters
- Groupsets
- Handlebars & extensions
- Headsets
- Hubs
- Inner tubes
- Pedals
- Quick releases & skewers
- Saddles
- Seatposts
- Stems
- Wheels
- Tyres
- Health, fitness and nutrition
- Tools and workshop
- Miscellaneous
- Buyers Guides
- Features
- Forum
- Recommends
- Podcast
Justice (Lonpicman, Wikimedia Commons)Marine was put off cycling after being hospitalised by corner-cutting delivery driver
A Royal Marine has told a court that he has been put off cycling for life after being hit by a turning delivery driver while waiting on his bike to join a main road.
Devon Live reports that Adam Fradley was at the junction of Nutwell Road waiting to turn right towards Exmouth on July 19 last year when Mark Bettridge, driving a Vauxhall Zafira, turned right off the main road and smashed into him.
“He was sat in the middle of the junction when the defendant turned right and for reasons unknown failed to see the cyclist and collided with him,” said Lyndsey Baker, prosecuting.
“He caused the cyclist to be thrown into the air onto the windscreen and onto the ground. He suffered multiple fractures including ribs and clavicle.
“He was taken to the Royal Devon & Exeter hospital then taken to Derriford, spending eight days in total, four of those in the intensive care unit.”
Fradley said he didn't notice the van until it crossed the central white line and cut across the corner of the designated turning area. “I could hear the motor revving as he came at me, making no attempt to stop,” he said.
Bettridge said he did not see Fradley until he heard a “massive bang” and saw him go over his front window.
Fradley, who tended to cycle five or six times a week during the summer months, said he would never be able to ride on the road again.
"It is a void I'm going to struggle to fill – it’s put me off cycling for life," he said.
Bettridge pleaded guilty at Exeter Magistrates' Court to one charge of driving without due care and attention. He was handed six penalty points and fined £350 with £120 in costs.
District Judge Stephen Nicholls said the incident had been serious but was the result of a momentary lapse in concentration.
"The effect was that you collided with a cyclist, causing him severe injuries which have had a long-lasting impact."
Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn't especially like cake.
Latest Comments
- Rendel Harris 2 sec ago
No evidence on the video of any interaction between themselves and the cyclist so possibly they simply didn't get the reg number?
- Rendel Harris 12 min 43 sec ago
When I see SLOW HORSES I always think ah, so this is where the ones I bet on are kept...
- ktache 48 min 7 sec ago
The proximity to the Transport Research Labs at Crowthorne means that the area often gets weird new stuff.
- chrisonabike 54 min 11 sec ago
No great mystery in either case, surely? Both US politician and the motor trade say "choose us and your life will be better and easier!" And other...
- S.E. 3 hours 1 min ago
1. It's obviously more aerodynamic, even a small backpack or hydration pack can help, there are studies about this....
- stonojnr 3 hours 6 min ago
theres an attitude I encounter alot locally, and demonstrated in bucket loads by drivers on my commute home tonight, that cyclists shouldnt be on...
- Keesvant 4 hours 25 min ago
If the chains snap that is lack of build quality or material.....
- Hirsute 5 hours 21 min ago
"Wisdom is better than weapons of war, but one sinner destroys much good."
- Jaijai 5 hours 46 min ago
His life was only worth shy of 7 years ,that's too lenient in every book .Let alone drugged up and leaving him to die
- webbierwrex 5 hours 51 min ago
I came here to basically write the same thing, the floating bus stop near me has a very narrow cycling lane between a very narrow pavement and a...
Add new comment
41 comments
Stuff like this is enough to make you join the Mail brigade and petition for super prisons to be built, and a tripling of the UK's prison capacity. The desire not to overload prisons apart from the worst offenders lies behind much of the sentencing leniency.
should be far easier, killing a human being through reckless action (how you 'carelessly' kill someone I'll never know!) should be given a similar punishment, a death penalty means no extra cost to society for the worst in our society, similarly other serious criminals, why should tax payers stump the costs of these animals!
Seriously injuring someone should see them shamed in public and put on a register and castigated like a paedophile, banned from driving a motorvehicle for life, chipped so that they have to register every week with plod to submit to checks. Afterall the impact of harming a human being in this way does and has a lifetimes impact.
Our so called 'justice' system just allows those that kill and maim back into society to carry on as before without batting an eyelid, if their crime was using a large mass with an engine as their weapon of choice. This has to stop as the lack of action is a crime against society/humanity and is proven to be so.
crucifixion gets my vote - nail them up, nail some sense into them!
"Well, at least it gets you out in the open air."
/Python
Unfortunately its about as good a result as can be expected.
Had a driver pull out of a junction in front of me, winters evening, I did everything to make myself visible (lights/hi-viz) and they still pulled out in front of me. Result - cyclist face plants onto car, bike written off, helmet written off thankfully no significant injuries to me..... and the driver gets 3 points and £100 fine for driving without due care and attention.
Holy crap. "a momentary lapse in concentration."? Just "driving without due care and attention"? Oh, that's all right then.
This sounds like one for the CDF to appeal, to be honest. A Marine, who doubtless has showed courage while acting in the service of the country, no longer feels able to cycle on the roads of the country because of some prick who "couldn't see" something right in front of him? It's a fucking disgrace.
A momentry lapse in concentration you say? Well that's all right then.
In my (very limited) knowledge of the law - I understand that the cyclist can still make a civil action for damages (that is probbly badly pharased) - if he has insurance, then he should get help in doing this. The gilty verdict from the legal case should essentially prove liability.
it's the gold standard...
I see corner cutting all the time. It is not a lapse in concentration, it's a choice and a dangerous one; therefore dangerous driving.
Another rant: quote prosecutor "He was sat in the middle of the junction". He wasn't SAT, he was sitting. I despair when people who've had a university education can't speak English.
How the hell can this be seen as "momentary lapse in concentration" when the knob had made the deliberate decision to cut across the Corner??? It is clearly dangerous driving.
That's all that's required when one is drifting the corner at 60...
Cyclists fault. OC had warned them about cycling in camo suits....
they should make hi-viz camouflage
They do ...
hivis_camo.jpg
Wow. Makes your entire cock & balls disappear. Takes an ambient temperature of less than 23c to make mine do that.
Yup. 3 points and £100 for this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMD-aRyLrtU
I hope the judge's dearest get mown down by some imbecilic prick like this. What a disgrace.
Well, we will keep on employing judges with syphilis.
Get well soon Frads. Shame you're still at Headly Court while the RMCC is out on the 28th. Bet your gutted. Probably would get free wets all night.
Glad to see the ‘strict laws we have in place’ to ‘ensure’ justice is done coming into full effect again. And why can seemingly no fucker turn right properly anymore, for the sake of what, two seconds.
Bunch of cock.
I'm living in the US, at the moment, and as much as I dislike the tendancy to file law suits here over nothing, if this crash had happened here, the cyclist would be able to get a huge payout (which would fall to the drivers insurance company).
Cutting a corner like that is crazy. I've had the same thing happen when in a car, and the car cutting the corner used the left side of my lane as the apex for his cut ... so his car went between my left hand wing mirror and the left hand foot path. I was in a red honda accord, so very very clearly visible. The driver had just decided that the public roads were his private race track and he was going to do a Lewis Hamilton.
Drive like a knob, ten year ban. Drive like a knob twice, lifetime ban!!!!
The driver cut the corner, as so very many do. I can almost accept the momentary lapse of concentration but the fact he entered the junction incorrectly could only be a premeditated action. That therefore negates any momentary lapse of concentration in my book.
Well, exactly. Twats that cut corners when turning right really boil my piss. I turn right onto a main road every morning and the number of wankers who swerve across the junction is ridiculous. Mind you, it doesn't help that some cunt parks his BT van half on the pavement near the junction just make visibility that bit worse.
I'm lost for words at how much of a piss poor 'justice' system the UK has. A measly fine and points on his licence for putting someone in intensive care is nothing short of an insult.
Luck for the driver. If the Marine wasn't injured as badly, he'd have kicked sebmveb shades of shit out of the driver. Don't want to go upsetting RMs, they're hardy feckers.
Six points. You get that for driving without insurance. Pitiful.
"Bettridge pleaded guilty at Exeter Magistrates' Court to one charge of driving without due care and attention. He was handed six penalty points and fined £350 with £120 in costs.
District Judge Stephen Nicholls said the incident had been serious but was the result of a momentary lapse in concentration."
British justice at its finest. Six penalty points for being so incompetent that he couldn't even see a stationary object in front of him in broad daylight, exactly where it should have been, but he can get back in his van and drive again tomorrow. You can kill someone in a car and still drive; this is insanity and the law is an ass.
This wasn't by any definition driving without due care and attention, or a momentary lapse of concentration, it was dangerous behaviour with a deadly weapon and it is only luck that the victime isn't dead.
When is the government inquiry into safety on the roads reporting?
'momentary' my left B)**($k
this was a bad habit of his that he'd gotten away with many times before...
depressing...simply depressing.
I set off 3seconds early from a traffic light on my push bike and got fined £250. Maybe I'd have been better off getting in plods car and running him over...
Pages