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news
Near Miss of the Day 28 revisited – What happened next?
A road.cc reader has updated us on what happened after we published a video he submitted as part of our Near Miss of the Day series last August – and while it seemed at the time that the police would take no action, it transpires that a woman was last week convicted of an offence in relation to the incident.
The footage was sent to us by road.cc reader Andy, whose sister-in-law caught on dashcam the moment a car passed a cyclist at speed in Trafford, Greater Manchester, with the driver immediately turning right across the rider’s path.
> Near Miss of the Day 28: Driver turns across cyclist at speed
Andy’s sister-in-law passed the footage to Greater Manchester Police under its Operation Considerate scheme but was told no action could be taken because the cyclist involved had not come forward.
However, it now turns out that the incident did result in a conviction, with Andy’s relative receiving a court letter last week informing her that one Jeanette Sarah Fidler was found guilty of an unspecified offence last week and fined £745, with her driving licence endorsed with six penalty points.
Andy – a former police officer – told us that one possibility was that she had been convicted as registered keeper of the vehicle for failing to disclose who was driving it, which carries a maximum fine of £1,000 and incurs six penalty points.
He added that he sees it as “a good result” and one that “may encourage more road.cc readers to report incidents such as this to the police – there seem to be a vocal minority of contributors who complain the police never do anything and it's pointless reporting anything to them.”
We’ve asked both Greater Manchester Police and the Crown Prosecution Service for details of the offence of which she was convicted. We had not heard back from either of them at the time of writing.
We also asked if they could confirm that she is the same Jeanette Fidler who has made regular appearances in both the local and national newspapers - her name at times reported as Jeanette Sarah Fidler - as a result of having racked up more than 200 criminal convictions, mainly for theft, and who is banned as a result from entering every health club, leisure centre and hotel in the UK.
> Near Miss of the Day turns 100 - Why do we do the feature and what have we learnt from it?
Over the years road.cc has reported on literally hundreds of close passes and near misses involving badly driven vehicles from every corner of the country – so many, in fact, that we’ve decided to turn the phenomenon into a regular feature on the site. One day hopefully we will run out of close passes and near misses to report on, but until that happy day arrives, Near Miss of the Day will keep rolling on.
If you’ve caught on camera a close encounter of the uncomfortable kind with another road user that you’d like to share with the wider cycling community please send it to us at info [at] road.cc or send us a message via the road.cc Facebook page.
If the video is on YouTube, please send us a link, if not we can add any footage you supply to our YouTube channel as an unlisted video (so it won't show up on searches).
Please also let us know whether you contacted the police and if so what their reaction was, as well as the reaction of the vehicle operator if it was a bus, lorry or van with company markings etc.
> What to do if you capture a near miss or close pass (or worse) on camera while cycling
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
Latest Comments
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The bike industry is not struggling because high-end bikes have £10,000 price tags....
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Signed and promoted in a couple of my networks.
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Trying to work out why I need a £390 3d printed titanium bottle cage....
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Good point! Over 18 months later, and I haven't seen (could have missed it!) a long term review of this groupset
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What was supposed to be a 10-minute drive turned into a journey of an hour and 45 minutes The Joy, The Joy!
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A lake caused by a cycle lane speed hump/raised crossing will be a familiar sight to anyone who commutes on CS7 in London.
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I prefer "dressing for the destination" - so if I want woke headgear I'll just put my thinking cap on, thanks.
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Been using this light for 2 years now.....
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21 comments
I fail to see why the driver had a case to answer. From the footage, the cyclist didn't
needhave time to change direction.http://road.cc/content/news/239146-near-miss-day-116-close-pass-driver-w...
Its a daft section of road prone to high velocity, low attention Bellends, accentuated by shocking design by the planners and acceptance by Trafford council.
Its a busy road used by numerous cyclists to and from the City centre and Salford Quays
The section BEFORE where the incident does not have a painted lane owing to road width... I dare say it "may" have helped if one were present in that video..
If you look at the very start of that Video, the That new section of road past the new Tesco is a death trap....
I raised it with Trafford back in 2012 and they brushed it under the carpet hiding behind rules / audits / regulations.
I Said :
After driving down Chester Road in this direction on Saturday I noted the new junction had been finalised . I saw the new filter lane for traffic turning left into the Tesco store and outside of that there is a dashed line cycle lane that appears positioned for cyclists continuing down Chester Road, On the surface this appears like a good addition to what will no doubt be a busy junction .
After passing through the junction and noting the angles of the junction commented to my passenger that the Cycle lane appears to shoot cyclists at an incorrect angle towards the outlet from the new Tesco Store rather than straight on . The direction takes cyclists towards and against the traffic railings where when continuing southbound they WILL be squeezed against traffic heading from the same direction at a much greater speed, accelerating away from the junction. I thought that the road design lent itself well to a possible collision here by a rider being clipped by the passenger side of a vehicle heading southbound.
Sure enough when riding home yesterday this is EXACTLY what I found, the angle is completely wrong and you have to physically ride outside of the cycle lane to continue in a straight line across the junction. The cyclist friendly provision is in my opinion flawed and furthermore I discovered an even more perilous feature of the junction. Northbound traffic turning right into the Tesco store is allowed to filter across in the same traffic light sequence as the southbound traffic. Where southbound Traffic is queuing to turn right into Ravenswood road , this masks the visibility of cyclists heading southbound towards the misaligned cycle lane.
I was extremely lucky not to have become entangled with the nearside front wing of a vehicle turning into the Tesco store that clearly only saw me at the very last second and braked after starting their acceleration towards the stores car park.
And this on the very first day the junction has been in use whilst the store has been open.
It is my considered opinion that the volume of traffic combined with the misaligned cycle lane and the traffic light sequencing will result in a pretty serious accident at some time in the future involving a cyclist.
Then they responded :
The advanced cycle stop line and short length of cycle lane on the approach to the junction (southbound), is designed to enable cyclists heading south to move to the front of the traffic queue. Heading south across the junction, the new alignment does curve left to right to tie into the old kerbline outside the Leisure Centre. It is envisaged that cyclists should follow the curve of the new highway rather than cut across the area in a straight line. There is no cycle lane south of the junction due to the lane widths (an existing situation), however the nearside lane is wider than standard immediately after the junction to assist with the merger.
Let those two points sink in....
We've designed a road deliberatly badly to endanger cyclists, and provide them with no provision due to legislation...
I gave up after reading those two points...
Thankfully, Chris Boardman's team at GM are on the way to ensuring that road design like this (I know the junction well) will become the exception, rather than the rule.
Might I suggest you contact the Greater Manchester Cycle Campaign, to see if you could register with Trafford Cycle Forum and get involved?
I hope the publication of her name and address doesn't lead to any vigilante activity. Doesn't Wanksy live up her way?
Anyone with 200 + convictions should be permanently tagged and therefore easily traced, but at some point they should be locked up for a very long time.
anyone with 200+ convictions should give up on a life of crime; they are clearly crap at it
She appears to be quite good at getting away with not spending much time in prison.
Anyone with 200 + convictions (or even 50 convictions) should be permanently removed from society and the gene pool so that they cost the tax payer not a penny more and not ever be able to kill, maim and/or generally harm individuals and society and are not given a chance to bring up children that turn into the same chav scum and repeat the cycle.
prison is piss weak solution in some instances and the civilised thing to do is eradicate vermin.
Harsh but simplifies matters and helps weed out the shit parts of the human race.
On the face of it a good result, however somewhat cynically I suspect that Jeanette Fidler could be the go to girl for taking the rap.
Allow me to explain.....police examine video and check the reg of the Audi A3 (?). It comes up as being owned by Jack the Lad, who is well known to the police. Jack finds out that the police have been around his house asking about his car. He's shitting himself as he had lent the car to Big Vern for a dodgy job. So Jack goes to the local boozer and finds Miss Fidler (stage name). He bungs her £50 and gets her to turn up at the local nick claiming that she had bought the car off Jack the week before. She gets a short interview, admits owning the car, but won't disclose the driver's details. Gets summonsed to court. I'm guessing from the £745 fine that she didn't even bother to turn up to contest the case. Gets the mandatory 6 points, on a licence she probably no longer has. What's £745 when you are already paying off your many outstanding fines at 50p a week?
Alternatively I have too much time on my hands and watched too much Colombo as a child (ask your parents...)
However, thanks to Andy's sister-in-law starting the ball rolling, someone connected to that car has been inconvenienced - RESULT!
Anyone could claim to own the car. The important bit is who is the registerd keeper, which is who the letter goes to. Unless she has access to the DVLA database to change the V5 I'm afraid that wouldn't work. Who the registerd keeper are and who the owner is are two diffrent things, but the police are only interested in the first, which is the name on the V5.
I'm presently working my way through all the old Columbo series - Peter Falk was a legend.
ColumboMcGoohan.jpeg
"What do you want?"
"Well, sir, I'd like some information..."
"You won't get it!"
Okay, so this person may have been convicted for failing to disclose who was behind the wheel.
Shame this couldn't have been applied to that case a few years back where a hire car driver knocks someone off (rear ended) and caused serious life changing injuries. No one was charged because nobody fessed up to who was driving. Stupid loophole with the company not having it on record as to who was driving, I think.
I remember this case to, or a similar one. The registered keeper of a vehicle has to disclose to the police who was driving at the time (of the alleged offence, accident etc). However, this does not apply to hire car companies, who only have to disclose who the car was rented out to. The rentee (?) can then use the 'I'm not sure which one of my mates was driving' excuse and does not commit an offence for failing to inform the police. Or possibly does commit an offence, but in the circumstances CPS will not push a prosecution.
There is this case http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-35472617 £150 fine and 6 points plus insurance consequences..
On the other hand there was this ridiculous one
http://www.edp24.co.uk/motoring/no-action-against-a140-driver-who-drove-...
Thanks for digging these out Hirsute. In the first example it would appear that the police went to some effort to trace the driver.
However, in the second example, not so clear.
I sometimes wonder if informing the Motor Insurers Bureau (the umbrella group for car insurers) of bad driving by one of their customers would have more real world effect than reporting to the police.
Or just amend the law so that the registered keeper or hirers face the same penalty that the actual driver would have received for the incident.
YES THIS, ALL THIS.
It is - or should be - simple. Get served a s. 172 notice and fail to comply, and your vehicle is destroyed, whilst you are handed a one-year immediate custodial (of which 80% must be served before applying for conditional release), and a ten-year ban.
It would of course be a valid defence to prove that you could not possibly know who was driving. For example, your vehicle gets nicked and an hour later is used to knock a pedestrian down. You can't possibly be held responsible for that.
Making a fraudulent claim to avoid a conviction under s. 172 and you're handed a lifetime ban, a fifteen year custodial (of which 80% must be served before applying for conditional release) and your vehicle is destroyed anyway.
But of course, putting people in prison costs money, which means fewer tax cuts for the Tories' rich friends.
Wow, that name brings up some juicy hits on a web search.
Well done to the police for following it up and obtaining a conviction.
Could it be this lady? She seems to be well know to the police.
"Jeanette Fidler, 44, has clocked up 218 convictions over the past two decades"
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4872072/Heroin-addict-clocked-21...
"JEANETTE SARAH FIDLER, aged 45, of Cherry Avenue, Oldham, was given a community order, including a curfew, for using a fraudulent store card and attempting to exchange a bottle of aftershave by falsely representing that she owned it. She must also pay a £85 surcharge to fund victim services and £50 costs. "
http://www.theoldhamtimes.co.uk/news/15899234.Littering__driving_under_t...