So there is clearly more to this case cannot believe it is open/shut like it looks.
I saw this on the BBC and thought you should see it:
‘Distracted’ hands-free driver Samantha Ayres jailed for fatal crash - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lincolnshire-42251581
Could be a test case though…
Why? Clean case and hopefully more idiots like her will be taken off the roads.
I mean more the handsfree argument…
The responsibility is on a driver to pay attention to their driving, and she was found guilty of being distracted from that. Seems pretty straightforward to me.
That she happened to be a hands-free call in this particular case is irrelevant, it could have just as easily have been another passenger in the car or changing stations on the radio. Just because it is not illegal to make hands-free calls does not give them any sort of legal protection.
Given the photos in the story she was on an unlit country road at night, so a situation where you need to be extra careful. It also says she had been involved in the call for a long time, so clearly she was making it somewhat of a priority rather than waiting to find a safe place to stop and talk or until she reached her destination.
So it is not difficult to say that such behaviour fell below what would be expected of a “competent and careful driver,” which is the requirement for a conviction of dangerous driving. And what the jury decided.
I always thought that being on a call, even if on a handsfree meant you were pretty much guaranteed to be found guilty of there was a crash…
I suspect the jail is also because she’s deemed to have lied about the pothole rather than admitting fair cop
Among the bullet points under the heading ‘The Law’ within that report it is stated that ‘Research has shown drivers are up to nine times more likely to be involved in a collision while using hands-free phones’.
If that’s the case how is it that its only illegal to use hands free phones where they become a distraction?
The advice, well it’s not advice it is company policy to switch phones off when driving in company vehicles, or when driving your own vehicle on company business. Not to do so is considered gross misconduct. That policy has been enforced for a couple of years now. Partly because of a court case a couple of years ago when a driver was prosecuted for driving without due care and attention resulting in an accident when they on a hands free phone.
This case is not specifically about the use of a hands free mobile, it is about the evidence.
The standard of driving fell well below that expected of a reasonably safe and competent road user and that duty of care went out of the window because she became so engrossed in her conversation even though she was on hands free.
She failed to see the motorcyclist and then lied by saying she had hit mud and/or a pothole which caused her to loose control when in fact neither existed.
But examining her mobile phone records showed that she had not only lied, but she had been on the phone for the previous 27 minutes and was till on the phone at the time of the collision.
So there is nothing in this that makes it a test case, there have been a number of convictions previously, all the press have done is emphasise the fact that this involved a hands free system as opposed the usual hand helds which is highlighted on a regular basis.
Is chatting with other passengers just as distracting ?
Because laws that are that specific are generally problematic. Rather than try to list every conceivable way of being distracted and banning all those, if you just make the act of being distracted the thing that's illegal you don't have to keep adding things to the list.
Among the bullet points under the heading 'The Law' within that report it is stated that 'Research has shown drivers are up to nine times more likely to be involved in a collision while using hands-free phones'.
If that's the case how is it that its only illegal to use hands free phones where they become a distraction?
National Treasure
Sometimes the specifics are useful - in the case of mobile phones, for example - where they’re considered problematic enough that it ought to be both an easier test and an easier thing to publicise.
It can be and has been evidence to convicting for careless sriving
Is chatting with other passengers just as distracting ?
Longshanks
It is when it’s the missus badgering you
If that's the case how is it that its only illegal to use hands free phones where they become a distraction? National Treasure
They do not become illegal. Neither does it become illegal to walk on the pavement if a driver decides to gawp at you instead of pay attention to the road.
As a driver it is your responsibility to avoid unnecessary distractions. What was illegal in this case was the driver’s behaviour, not the use of the phone itself. The call was just evidence that she was not paying full attention to the road.
