"You think police would take a hit and run quite seriously" says disappointed Bristol cyclist who caught collision on camera

Dial 999 they say; hmmmm sure that'll work. Though there may be a case for us to do this with every incident as at least you'd get a reference number. If the many 'minor' incidents we faced each day added to the statistics or workload of the police then maybe they'd make improvements to their processes for dealing with this online...

My mate got hit but she didn't run and despite hospitalising him for weeks the police were satisfied he appeared out of nowhere with it being a road with no bends for literally 2 miles.

He can't remember the accident as such and she claims he materialised so no charges. Amazing.

I was knocked off in a hit and run and thankfully the police saw the driver and vehicle within a couple of hours and despite his denials/weak excuse that he didn't hit a cyclist, they were clearly shrewd enough to know he had done it.

The only way to get the police to actually follow through with these is to be constantly on their case until they get things done, because despite in my situation having competent officers dealing with it, the people in the "road justice department" were extremely sloppy and must have got sick of me ringing but I am glad I did because I didn't want the driver to get away with it.

In all likelihood this would go before a magistrates who, if there are sufficient witnesses/evidence will likely side with the victim, as they did in my case. Admittedly, the charges will be more about failure to stop with a bit of careless driving thrown in.

Whereas if the driver stopped, got out of his car and crossed the road speaking on his mobile phone whilst not looking and was hit by a cyclist.....?

Freemason

Wait, not trying to attribute especial competence to the department in question, but the statute of limitations on leaving the scene is six months? That might be a deeper problem here.

Shocking. As stated elsewhere ANPR should pick this up and the CPS convict the driver and or registered keeper, but I don't suppose that will happen, and so it continues....

Poor performance on this one by Avon & Somerset police. Even if there's no direct evidence of the collision, there's enough evidence of poor driving to send a warning letter.

What's more worrying is that they don't seem overly concerned that they can't locate the driver.

I've found them (Avon & Somerset) to be much better in general - I submitted a clip of a driver trying to muscle in on a bus lane that I was in and that got a response the following morning despite it not being particularly dangerous (slow speeds and no contact). However, I remember submitting a close pass during the summer that I never got a response to - maybe they lost some staff around then.

Even if the police have said, "Meh! Nothing to see here" you'd think that the dvla and the insurance company would be interested to know that the insured party/registered vehicle keeper either doesn't exist or doesn't exist at their stated address...

So much for the argument that 'cyclists should have number plates, so they are accountable as motorists are'.

Between cases of fake plates, not being able to identify who was driving a rental vehicle or a vehicle owned by a company, and now not having the right address for the driver, it seems as if number plates are of rather limited use.

They would possibly have started to do something before seven weeks had elapsed.

Pretty certain they could have found the driver if it had been one of their own involved in a hit and run.

What is this "statute of limitations" of which they speak, other than a foul freeing Americanism?  If they mean section 127 of the Magistrates Courts Act they should say so.

The car pulling out definatley caused the fall but it's not clear if there was contact and a jury would never convict on that (don't forget it would be made up mainly of drivers).  If the driver can't be traced it could be the van is on false plates and that's why the driver didn't stop.

Where in the RTA does it say you have to be struck?
170 Duty of driver to stop, report accident and give information or documents.

(1)This section applies in a case where, owing to the presence of a [F1mechanically propelled vehicle] on a road [F2or other public place], an accident occurs by which—

(a)personal injury is caused to a person other than the driver of that [F1mechanically propelled vehicle],

The driver pulled out and failed to give way and as result, the cyclist came off and sustained injuries.

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1988/52/section/170

Perhaps Bristol (Avon and Somerset?) Police could let us all know how many cameras are required in case we get hit from an odd angle. Perhaps we need a drone following us to get a 360 view

A spokesman said the rider got his injuries falling off his bike for some random reason, probably the wind or braking too hard.

The victim would have made a statement saying he was hit by the vehicle.

What the incompetent police investigator said, that the video "Footage the victim provided to us showed he was not struck by the vehicle"

It might not show the point of collision, but there looks to be evidence of an impact there, what it does not show is a lack of being struck, for example a definitive distance between rider and vehicle.

What they definitely don't have is the drivers statement, so are the police so car centric to be taking the awful drivers assumed point of view.

I would hope that the registration has been taken and would flag up any ANPR camera, for the very least failure to inform the DVLA about a change of adress, same with the insurance.

It all seems a bit dodgy to me.