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news
Broken bike (CC licensed image by garryknight, www.flickr.com)Custodial sentence for 20-year-old motorist who killed cyclist on Lancashire road
A motorist has been sentenced to 20 months’ custody in a young offenders’ institution after pleading guilty to causing the death by dangerous driving of a cyclist on a busy country road in Lancashire.
Christine Favager, aged 69, was killed instantly when she was struck by a car being driven by 20-year-old Ryan Martin in Scarisbrick, between Southport and Ormskirk, in July last year, reports the Liverpool Echo.
Liverpool Crown Court heard that Martin, aged 19 at the time of the fatal collision, had lost control of his vehicle on a bend as he tried to avoid colliding with a vehicle he was travelling behind, hitting Mrs Favager, who was cycling in the opposite direction, head-on.
Robert Golinski, prosecuting, told the court: “Mrs Favager was unable to avoid the vehicle. She was knocked backwards into a field where she died of multiple injuries.”
Mrs Favager’s husband Eric and son, Andrew Horton, said that she was “a bright and beautiful sprit who changed lives in many different ways.”
Andrew Scott, defending Martin, said that his client wished to apologies to the victims friends and family, saying, “What he saw, what he did and what the consequences are he will have on his conscience for the rest of his life.”
However, Judge Mark Brown, who also banned Martin from driving for three years, said that he had shown “little remorse” and that he should have exercised more care when driving near a cyclist.
He added: “She was a very enthusiastic person who had years of life ahead of her and her family would have expected that she would have continued to live a full life. “But as a result of your careless driving you have taken that away from her and her family.”
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.
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17 comments
Blind corner close to where I live and cars are always overtaking me there. Very scary indeed.
Makes me really angry this one. Not an accident, driver clearly at fault, driving dangerously and shows little remorse. Should be minimum of a manslaughter charge and sentence. Prick.
Bad news. He should have got a 10 year ban running consecutively after a 5 year prison sentence. The Echo makes it pretty clear that 'our Ryan' had no remorse.
I know exactly where that poor lady lost her life. The road is a regular training route and in no way a busy road. Unfortunately it joins another road at a 90° blind bend and the little t*t was doing 63 mph into a bend that can't handle more than 25mph. They now have red stripes into that bend in both directions but like so many rural roads and lanes the national speed limit needs to be lowered from 60mph to 50mph.
Murderous driving punished yet again by a short period of inconvenience. I have no doubt this particular driver will be back behind the wheel with no change in attitude.
Really, I guess the law is different south of the border
Under 21 = YOI. Can't have them corrupted by all those hardened over 21's.
The bit I don't understand while the sentence I welcome and the ban. Why is he going to a youth offenders place?
He's 20, 19 when it happened. Put him in a prison
I know this will sound controversial but I'd like to say this.
I wonder if the ages were reversed in this case whether it would have been the same outcome? We often hear about doddery older drivers who kill a younger person on their bike and they sometimes get off with a fine or the case is discontinued due to lack of evidence (that's always an interesting one).
The Courts' sentences often seem very arbitrary.
The custodial sentence is all well and good, but what the hell is up with these short bans? It's a privilege, not a right, and I don't see people eg getting their FAC back after misusing a firearm: it's simply established that that particular privilege isn't one you're suited for and that's that. Which seems to me to be as it should be.
The sooner the misuse of cars is seen as equivalent to the misuse of firearms the more rational the sentencing of both drivers and owners of vehicles is going to be.
As a clear point to press, how many owners and operators of the HGV's involved in fatal crashes are a) named and b) prosecuted. After all they have clearly failed in a duty of care by employing drivers with driving records like Denis Putz and Joao Lopes. In the latter case, his second fatal crash saw him prosecuted for rigging the tachograph sender unit with a magnet, and no clear identity for his employer (he was on one employer's payroll but apparently driving another operator's truck - neither seems to have been prosecuted for any involvement in the tachograph offence, or employing a driver with eyesight problems and letting him drive without glasses)
It's got to the point where I am just numbed by these cases, sentences etc.
How many more tragidies are going to be reported on this site (and others) before the laws and sentencing guide lines are changed so that little scrots like him get giving a proper custodial sentence.
20 months? seriously. Should be banned for at least 10 years also.
Banned for three years? He's taken a life - how about a lifelong ban?
The other thing is that unless the Judge makes a stipulation his ban begins with the sentence....so it may not even be 3 years...but a year and 4 months.!!!
And if he's good boy ... Only do a third of the 20 months..!!!
The law was changed in 2009 following a campaign by Jan Woodward whose daughter died in a car being driven by a drunk driver - the ban now always starts after the custodial sentence has been served.
"lost control of his vehicle on a bend as he tried to avoid colliding with a vehicle he was travelling behind"
So he was overtaking on a blind corner?