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Collision letters investigation Coroners and road death investigation OVER 80% of families bereaved by a road crash will experience an inquest, and the police collision investigation report will be prepared for the coroner. The Ministry of Justice has recently launched a consultation on the secondary legislation of the Coroners and Justice Act 2009 in ‘Reform of the Coroner System–Next Stage, Preparing for implementation’. (www.justice.gov.uk/consultations/reform-coroner-system.htm ) Training needs of coroners and their staff are one of the key areas to be considered. RoadPeace will continue to argue the case for specialised training in road death investigation and disclosure. We will also repeat our call for a specific traffic death verdict instead of the current situation where they are lost under ‘accidental’ or in narrative verdicts. The consultation closes 1 July 2010. Please check our website for our response. amy.aeron.thomas@roadpeace.org ■ Collision investigation in London WITH a budget of £2.3 million, the Met Police has a total of 48 collision investigators responsible for investigating fatal and near fatal collisions. Between April 2008 and March 2009, they investigated 215 fatal collisions which resulted in 76 charges and summons. They also carried out 649 serious injury (life threatening) investigations. This accounts for one-fifth of serious injury collisions reported in London with all other reported injury collisions (some 22,000) being investigated by the Traffic Criminal Justice Unit based at Sidcup. Budget cuts have begun to be felt with the closure of the Central London Collision Investigation Unit based at Euston. This means a longer response time in investigating fatal and near fatal crashes in Central London as collision investigators have to travel from the outer London bases. The Met Police have also just received a ‘poor’ rating for road safety from Her Majesty’s Inspector of Constabulary. What makes a good investigation? WHAT makes a good investigation is the theme of a conference that RoadPeace is hosting in September. The focus will be on injury collisions involving vulnerable road users in London with sessions dedicated to pedestrian, cyclist and motorcyclist collisions. This conference is being organised in partnership with CTC, London Cycling Campaign, Living Streets, and the British Motorcycle Federation, with assistance from leading personal injury solicitors firms. Cyclist K/SI collisions The DfT has recently published a report by TRL on ‘Collisions Involving Cyclists of Britain’s Roads: Establishing the Causes’. This analysed cyclist K/SI collisions from 2005-2007. The analysis focused more on the circumstances than causes and did not include any prosecution data. It did report that ‘failed to look properly’ was attributed to car drivers in 57% and to the cyclist in 43% of serious collisions. Police were more likely to attribute the cause of collision to a child cyclist. The research concluded that: “Taking measures to reduce vehicle speeds and collisions with HGVs (particularly in cities) will clearly be important in reducing the number of cyclists who are killed and seriously injured.” The report can be downloaded from the TRL website. www.trl.co.uk/online-store/reports-publications/ Best practice in collision investigation THE Institute of Traffic Accident Investigators (ITAI) is a charity dedicated to improving collision investigation. ITAI’s council has decided that it should develop best practice guidelines in collision investigation and has launched a working party for this aim. RoadPeace has campaigned for over 12 years for national standards and welcomes this move. ITAI has stressed that “Best practice guidelines are not intended to be used as a stick to thrash a practitioner who has deviated from the guidelines”. RoadPeace appreciates that these are only guidelines, given the independence of each police service and the shrinking police budgets. But guidelines will be a major step forward and RoadPeace looks forward to contributing to the ITAI best practice working party. CRASH update The DfT’s £5 million new electronic system, Collision Recording And SHaring (CRASH), has been delayed with pilots in three areas now planned for early 2011 with national rollout by 2012. 6 newsletter
Criminal prosecution Causing death by driving IN 2008, there were 2341 fatal crashes involving 4088 drivers, of whom 1506 died. Among the 2582 drivers that survived, 257 were convicted of Causing Death by Dangerous Driving, including 31 young offenders. The most common custodial sentence was between three and five years. Causing death by driving custodial sentences (2008) Causing death Total ≤6 mths >6mths & >12mths & >18mths & >2yrs & >3yrs & >5yrs by... ≤ 12mths ≤ 18mths ≤ 2yrs ≤ 3yrs ≤ 5yrs Dangerous Driving 236 1 12 19 21 30 91 62 Careless Driving whilst Under the Influence 46 – – 3 3 9 24 7 Although 430 people are estimated to have died in drink related crashes in 2008, many of these fatalities were the drink drivers themselves. While 71 drivers were prosecuted for Causing Death by Careless Driving Under the Influence of Drink or Drugs, 49 were convicted, four of whom were young offenders. The conviction rate for the two charges above was 68%. The two new charges of causing death by driving did not come into use until mid August. By the end of 2008, only one driver had been convicted of Causing Death by Driving Unlicensed, Disqualified or Uninsured and two had been convicted of Causing Death by Careless Driving. ■ Dangerous and careless driving IN 2008, 4424 drivers were convicted of Dangerous Driving. Of these, 56% (2495) were convicted in the Magistrates Court with 173 imprisoned with 109 for more than three months. The average fine was £476. Of the 2,764 drivers prosecuted at the Crown Court, 1,929 were convicted. Of these, 321 received a community order and 468 a suspended sentence. Another 165 were sent to a Young Offender’s Institute and 829 were imprisoned. Of the 1212 sent to prison, 311 received six months or less, 609 between 6-12 months, and 253 between 12-18 months. Only 39 received between 18-24 months. Another 18,538 drivers were convicted of Careless Driving in 2008 with an average fine of £220. There has been no further notice on the government’s proposal to make Careless Driving a fixed penalty notice with a fine of £60. Vehicle confiscation of drink drivers A new scheme in Scotland has the police confiscating the vehicles of extreme and repeat drink drivers. Introduced during the Christmas period, the police have decided to continue it. Previously, vehicle confiscation has been primarily used with uninsured vehicles but RoadPeace has called for it to be extended to impaired and aggressive drivers, as these drivers pose a greater death threat than uninsured drivers. Code for Crown Prosecutors THE CPS is updating its Code for Crown Prosecutors. It was last reviewed in 2004. The CPS consultation asked if the evidential stage and public interest factors were explained clearly. RoadPeace has argued that the evidential stage should include clarifying if there is lack of evidence as to any criminal behaviour and when there is evidence that no criminal behaviour was involved, two quite different situations. Corporate manslaughter THE Sentencing Guidelines Council has issued guidance calling for stiff penalties for corporate manslaughter. Fines are to be seldom below £500,000 and may be millions of pounds. No company has yet to be convicted of corporate manslaughter following a road death. Transparency lacking PUBLIC service agreement 24 “Deliver a more effective, transparent and responsive criminal justice system for victims and the public”. Criminal Justice Strategic Plan for 2008-2011 Transparency is greatly needed with the legal outcome of injury collisions. Under the CPS Director’s Charging Guidance, the police have the authority to make the charging decision in injury collisions, except for those where a Dangerous Driving charge may apply and these must be approved by the CPS. Yet there is no central monitoring of the charging decision in injury collisions, with no records kept of the number of injury collisions involving a Dangerous Driving or a Careless Driving charge. Short prison sentences... ...are ineffective according to the House of Commons Home Affairs Committee report on the Government’s Approach to Crime Prevention. “Witnesses, including government ministers, were unanimous in their view that short prison sentences do not allow time for effective rehabilitation interventions to take place. Around 60% of adults serving less than one year are convicted of at least one offence in the year after release”. As shown above, most of the custodial sentences (70%) given to dangerous drivers are less than one year. spring 2010 7
Page 1 and 2: RoadPeace spring 2010 dangernewslet
Page 3 and 4: Letter Dear friends, WE are pleased
Page 5: Remembrance World Day of Remembranc
Page 9 and 10: Europe and beyond Europe and beyond
Page 11 and 12: Funds Fundraising We are pleased to

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