£300 fine plus £1800 costs for "dangerous" rollerblading

[rooel]

How about this

BBC NEWS | England | Merseyside | Skating pensioner fined by court

for an example of the ridiculous attitude of the courts to road traffic offences (or in this case contravention of local byelaws)? If the pensioner had driven down a street exceeding the speed limit in a motor vehicle what would the penalty have been? £60, £100 maximum, perhaps? The magistrates in this case, like fellow members of the judiciary, and indeed the general public, are oblivious to the dangers to which we are all exposed by motor vehicles and when a relatively innocuous "vehicle" - roller blades - comes before them they impose an inordinate penalty. A cyclist caught "riding furiously" would probably be treated in the same way. Are our judges incapable of understanding the concept of momentum? No matter how fast a roller blader or cyclist may travel his or her momentum will never be anywhere near that of a motor vehicle weighing anything between 1 and 40 tonnes.

Here's hoping the roller blader will have better luck with his appeal to a higher, and one hopes more sensible, court. It will cost him a lot in legal fees and expenses however.

 

[flecc]

An utterly ridiculous penalty for something which happens all over the country, particularly as it was a byelaw offence in this case. Here in London we even have some roller blading commuters going to work in that way.

I feel sure his appeal will result in some alleviation of the penalties.
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[keithhazel]

An utterly ridiculous penalty for something which happens all over the country, particularly as it was a byelaw offence in this case. Here in London we even have some roller blading commuters going to work in that way.

I feel sure his appeal will result in some alleviation of the penalties.
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having watched the video he was scating in a way that would definatly i feel put the publi at unease,if a child was to run about there would be a chance of it getting flattened, if a biker was riding about he would be no more dangerous yet he would be clapped in irons...."that not literally for anyone who might think im being over dramatic"...however if he had not been warned at least once then he should have been befor being arrested....while we may have rights as pedestrians im not sure its the same for rollerbladers, after all its all to do with public safety and wastching the video through i dont feel he was either safely or in a manner which others around will feel safe...

 

[flecc]

I don't object to the conviction Keith, just the penalty and costs which exceed those often given for theft offences. I have the uncomfortable feeling it could be merely because of his age, possibly bigotry on the part of magistrates feeling his behaviour inappropriate for an adult.

If a teenager had been in court for the offence, would it have cost him £2100?

I doubt it.
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[Mussels]

He had been warned, he had sent letters to the Police about his arguments with pedestrians who thought he was dangerous, his only reason for not going somewhere more suitable was that he likes listening to music and he also kept interupting the magistrate during the hearing.
He's not done much to help himself, sounds like officials tried to do this the nice way and ended up in court as a final option.
If that was a teenager in the film most people would agree that there was a good reason to introduce the bylaw, just because he is a pensioner should he get away with it?

 

[Mussels]

If a teenager had been in court for the offence, would it have cost him £2100?

I doubt it.
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I think he had caused a lot more trouble and work than a teenager would, and he had done it deliberately to upset people.

 

[flecc]

So you're saying it was vindictive because he was awkward.

That should play no part in the penalty or judgement, it's an offence he was being tried for, not his argumentative way or cussedness in court. There are separate charges possible for those.
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[Mussels]

So you're saying it was vindictive because he was awkward.

That should play no part in the penalty or judgement, it's an offence he was being tried for, not his argumentative way or cussedness in court. There are separate charges possible for those.
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I'm saying that he caused a lot of pointless work for the authorities for no good reason, should the taxpayers foot the bill for that or should he accept responsibility.
I'd love to see the events leading up to the trial.

Is it the helmet argument at the end that you sympathise with.

 

[flecc]

Is it the helmet argument at the end that you sympathise with.

No, i hadn't bothered with his side of the story before, but I've heard it now.

I still object to the size of the penalty. We all know pensioners can be cussed, we even laugh about it, remember Richard "I don't believe it" Wilson? (One Foot in the Grave)

Hopefully we'll see what a senior court has to say on this matter in due course. I think they will be more generous in their view.
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[keithhazel]

No, i hadn't bothered with his side of the story before, but I've heard it now.

I still object to the size of the penalty. We all know pensioners can be cussed, we even laugh about it, remember Richard "I don't believe it" Wilson? (One Foot in the Grave)

Hopefully we'll see what a senior court has to say on this matter in due course. I think they will be more generous in their view.
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while i do agree that the fine is out of touch in comparison to people who committ much serious crimes i think if he had been so distruptive in court what option did they have ? .the total fine looks huge because of the court costs.....you have to ignore the age and look at the crime, you cant make allowances for him being old or you have to make allowances for people being young, his scateing looked very dangerous but if he had kept his trap shut in court i dare say just a caution and a scateing ban in public would have been the outcome, but the law system as we all know sucks as a good lawyer can and does get the guilty off and a bad lawyer sometimes cant get the innocent set free....clever talk is worth a million bucks in all aspects of life... if i had a spare million bucks i would buy some too.. ....

 

[flecc]

I don't think he was that dangerous Keith, the video just looks that way at times. Study it closely and you'll see that the majority of the people around don't even look at him. He isn't that close to them most of the time and it's only the lens foreshortening of distance when he's further away that makes it look risky when it isn't.

If he really was dangerous and really was persistent in this behaviour, ask yourself, why wasn't he in court for colliding with and causing grievous bodily harm to someone?

He wasn't because he didn't, and this is just another case of the nanny state mentality of thinking everything is far more risky than it really is.

I'd love to be able to rustle up 100 rollerskaters and invade the place en masse, showing them what fear really is!
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[John Fleet]

OK

Here's some facts. According to the press, the defendent was convicted of an offence under the Sefton Metropolitan Council's byelaws. If you're interested you can read the byelaw :here

The byelaw states that :
5. Any person offending against these byelaws shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 2 on the standard scale.

A level 2 fine shall not exceed £500.

That's the law. You may think it's mad, bad or whatever. Don't blame the magistrates. They are there to upload the law which ultimately protects all of our freedoms and is one of the cornerstones of our democracy.

Every case is treated upon its merits and for whatever reason it would seem that the bench on this occasion decided to impose a fine at 60 per cent of the maximum for this offence.

Why the costs were set at that level we simply don't know but I would speculate, based on my knowledge of costs in the Magistrates' courts, that the defendant probably ran a 'not guilty' plea and was convicted after trial. But I emphasise that's speculation on my part.

Courts don't make laws, nor do they bring prosecutions. So don't shoot the messenger - or in this case the magistrates!

 

[flecc]

The magistrates set the fine which to many is ridiculously high for the offence. The range of £1 to £500 was open to them, so I do shoot the messenger in this case.

If our magistrates court system (aka police rubber stamp) really is a cornerstone of our democracy, we really are in a mess.
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[rog_london]

The magistrates set the fine which to many is ridiculously high for the offence. The range of £1 to £500 was open to them, so I do shoot the messenger in this case.

If our magistrates court system (aka police rubber stamp) really is the cornerstone of our democracy, we really are in a mess.
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I take it most of us don't think he was unreasonably convicted, just that he was excessively heavily sentenced.

Don't you think that the penalty might have been influenced by whether the defendant expressed some remorse or not? The magistrates found themselves with an opinionated individual, who as far as I can see, treated neither the court nor the law with any respect at all, and they probably felt that a punitive sentence was the only course which might be appropriate. Clearly he was kicking and screaming all the way and insisted on making everyone and his dog turn up in court, and took his chances - and lost.

Unless I've misunderstood the story, he had been warned and chose to ignore the warning, and so what followed was hardly surprising. A little humility in court would have done him no harm, and he could have made his point in a rather more subtle way. During the video there were many people about, and I would have expected at least some of them to have felt intimidated by him. Just to get back on-topic, if I rode my bike at high speed round a town high street full of people, I'd expect some problems no matter how much apparent care or skill I was showing. Speed is relative, and people walking about among the shops are likely to be doing two or three miles per hour at most. What would he have been doing - twelve to fifteen? One moment of inattention, or an unexpected change in direction by a pedestrian, and there would have been little room for evasive action.

Rog.

 

[flecc]

He is entitled to disagree and express his opinion that what he was doing was safe Rog, and he can do that as long and hard as he wishes. Punishing him more for doing that just because it's inconvenient for the court is wrong in principle. An extension of what you and others argue is that appealing against a conviction is a further offence which should be punished.

It's precisely these attitudes that is so wrong in the administration of our law, and the best illustration of that is how the prison parole system works (doesn't). If someone has been wrongly convicted and imprisoned, they must admit their non-existent guilt before they can be paroled, a neat system that ensures the wrongly imprisoned innocent serve the longest sentences.

If this rollerblading man committed further offences such as those of public order or contempt of court, he should be additionally charged accordingly. The magistrates should not use the original charge to punish him for other behaviours, since that is punishment without trial.
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[fishingpaul]

Why do the courts always make an example of the wrong people (motorists and older people),young thugs can create mayhem and take up much police time,they are allowed to cause trouble over and over again,they then turn up in court in a suit and receive paltry fines that often go unpaid anyway.

 

[rooel]

In my original post drawing attention to this roller blading case, I referred to the ridiculous approach of the courts to road traffic cases. Here is an example today which contrasts with the way the roller-blader travelling at less than 9 mph was treated:

Texting death crash peer jailed

A Labour peer who sent and received text messages minutes before he was involved in a fatal crash on the M1 has been jailed for 12 weeks.

Lord Ahmed, 51, was driving his Jaguar when he hit a stationary car in the outside lane of the motorway on Christmas Day 2007.

The driver of the other vehicle, Martyn Gombar, 28, was killed.

Lord Ahmed, of Rotherham, was sentenced at Sheffield Crown Court. He had admitted driving dangerously.

Mr Gombar, who was Slovakian, was living in Leigh, Greater Manchester, at the time of his death.

The court had heard how Lord Ahmed sent and received a series of five text messages while driving in the dark at speeds of, and above, 60mph along a 17-mile stretch of the motorway.

Mr Justice Wilkie made clear the texting incident had no bearing on the fatal collision.

He said: "After a full and thorough police investigation it's clear the dangerous driving had no causal link to the accident."

But he added: "It is of the greatest importance that people realise what a serious offence dangerous driving of this type is.

"I have come to the conclusion that by reason of the prolonged, deliberate, repeated and highly dangerous driving for which you have pleaded guilty, only an immediate custodial sentence can be justified."

Earlier, Jeremy Baker QC, defending Lord Ahmed, put a series of points of mitigation to the judge including the peer's years of service to the community and the country.

The barrister also pointed to Lord Ahmed's attempts to help Mr Gombar and how he took it upon himself to warn other motorists about the incident at some personal risk to himself.

Lord Ahmed will serve half of his sentence in jail and half on licence. He was also banned from driving for a year and ordered to pay £500 prosecution costs.

Outside court Lord Ahmed's solicitor, Steve Smith, said he thought his client had been used as a "scapegoat" by those attempting to drive home the message about not using a mobile phone while at the wheel.

He said he was launching an immediate appeal against the sentence.

​

See the full report here : http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/south_yorkshire/7909510.stm

Prolonged dangerous driving ending in an actual collision on the one hand, and persistent roller blading involving no collisions on the other hand. The latter was fined three-fifths of the maximum penalty, the former was jailed for three months which is one eighth of the maximum penalty for dangerous driving (not causing death). The costs awarded against the roller blader who dared to challenge the case against him are £1800, but against the dangerous driver £500 (he did apparently plead guilty, but had a forceful plea in mitigation, and his solicitor is intent on an appeal). I hope the appeal court makes use of its power to increase any sentence which is appealed.

 

[carpetbagger]

same old story,if you are famous you get away scot free....clarkson,furguson,numerous other celebs.....i suggest the blader hires their solicitor and he will get off on a technicallity....its the same same old story one law for the minority and a differnt law for the rest of us......

 

[Grumpy1]

I think that he got a big fine as he was charged with DANGEROUS use of rollerblades, not excessive speed. The fine was in line with a motorists offence of DANGEROUS driving. The more lenient fines for motorists are for excessive speed. If you drove a car down the road like he was skating you would get a very strict sentence so I think this was dealt with correctly. I think everyone is going soft on him and he has got so much publicity because of his age. That is ludicrous. He was acting dangerously and irresponsibly in my opinion. If some moron was skating around like that in a busy centre I would most definately have words!

 

[flecc]

The fine was in line with a motorists offence of DANGEROUS driving. The more lenient fines for motorists are for excessive speed.

But it was definitely not in line as Rooel showed above.

The peer charged with dangerous drivingof a particularly dangerous kind was awarded only 12.5% of the possible sentence with only £500 costs, the dangerous skater at only one fifth of the speed was awarded 60% of the possible sentence with £1800 costs.

There's no comparison between being hit by a 12 mph roller skater and that peer's 1.5 ton car at 60 mph, as witness the killed driver of the car he ran into.
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