Driver not charged in daylight overtaking fatality



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Jasper Janssen <[email protected]> wrote:

(Chalo) wrote:
>
> >When someone _chooses_ to drive a car, and someone else loses his or her life because of that
> >choice, the driver bears at least a share of the responsibility. Banning drivers who kill from
> >continuing to drive is reasonable and proper, regardless of fault.
>
> To continue on your example, what you're saying is if strychnine is found in someone's sandwich
> and it's determined that he put it there himself, the person make the sandwich should be banned
> from making sandwiches, or that when someone takes a bottle of sleeping pills the issung
> pharmacist should be stuck with selling cough medicine henceforward.

Not really. The issue here is that it's not the mistake that causes a collision that makes a
collision deadly-- the critical factor is whether a car is involved. People or cyclists don't kill
when they collide.

Since only the car driver determines that critical factor, responsibility for fatality in a
car-human collision rests with the driver. Any other arrangement is not only unethical, but a
structural incentive to drive a car for everyone who can do so, because in doing so one can escape
the negative consequences of their actions.

Chalo Colina
 
> I cannot find any information on whether or not the families sued the driver. Considering the
> minimum liability requirement of $40,000 total bodily injury damage per accident ($20,000 per
> person), it is doubtful any of these families will see any more than $5,000 ($40,000 divided by
> eight) dollars for their loss.
>
> This is a prime example of what is wrong with the system. I can't find anything that suggests the
> driver even got a ticket. There has to be a better way of dealing with these "accidents,"
> especially when they result in someone's death.
>
> -Buck

I beleive there have been studies that show an exhausted driver is as dangerous as a drunk driver. I
beleive police do have the authority to pull you over and impound your car if you are falling asleep
at the wheel, unfortunately the outware warning signs are not there as with a slow reacting drunk
driver. It's hard to bleieve that a driver falling asleep at the wheel wouldn't fact the same
charges as a drunk driver. Then again, for years being drunk was a valid excuse for killing someone.
"Sure he mowed down 13 people, but he wasn't in his right mind."
--
_________________________
Chris Phillipo - Cape Breton, Nova Scotia http://www.ramsays-online.com
 
On Fri, 27 Jun 2003 18:50:28 +0100, "Just zis Guy, you know?" <[email protected]> wrote:
>On Thu, 26 Jun 2003 22:43:35 GMT, Jasper Janssen <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>In the case at hand though, I see no evidence in the newspaper article of "serious mistakes".
>>Looking away for a second or two, for example to your rear view mirror rather than the front, or
>>wherever, is hardly a "serious" mistake, or a mistake at all.
>
>Looking away for long enough to approach, draw up to, and hit a cyclist on an open road, though, is
>not momentary inattention, it's negligence.

How about looking down for long enough for the cyclist to swerve into the path of the truck because
a bee stung him in his eye, or he hit a pothole/bump and fell, or any number of other things that
could have happened? The article does not contain enough evidence to damn the driver, no matter what
else you say.

Jasper
 
On 27 Jun 2003 13:39:36 -0700, [email protected] (Chalo) wrote:

>Not really. The issue here is that it's not the mistake that causes a collision that makes a
>collision deadly-- the critical factor is whether a car is involved. People or cyclists don't kill
>when they collide.
>
>Since only the car driver determines that critical factor, responsibility for fatality in a
>car-human collision rests with the driver. Any other arrangement is not only unethical, but a
>structural incentive to drive a car for everyone who can do so, because in doing so one can escape
>the negative consequences of their actions.

Your insistence that you're not making political statements becomes more ludicrous with every post.
Now you're essentially saying that driving a car is in and of itself negligent (if it was not, it
wouldn't be an automatic you're-at-fault).

Jasper
 
Jasper Janssen <[email protected]> wrote:

> Your insistence that you're not making political statements becomes more ludicrous with
> every post.

I have never suggested that my postings were not political in nature. Where did you get that
impression?

> Now you're essentially saying that driving a car is in and of itself negligent.

It is. Cars are destructive of the human and natural environment even when nothing goes wrong. Their
tendency to kill people when crashes occur is indisputable. Car drivers know this when they strap
one on. Therefore if anything does go wrong, they should bear the liability.**

Chalo

** political statement (and ethically true)
 
In article <[email protected]>, [email protected] (Hunrobe) writes:

> Actually it could indicate any number of other things as well such as:
>
> The press officer had information he couldn't release for various reasons. The press officer may
> have screwed up. The reporter could have misquoted the press officer.

Okay, I'll allow those are valid points you raise.

> Editing for space could have snipped other comments. It could have been a slow news day.

But the two above are journalistically unforgivable.

> None of which have a damn thing to do with the actual investigation.

I guess we've got a cultural difference thing going on here. Up here in Canada, investigations and
subsequent proceedings are sacrosanct; outsider meddling is Simply Not Done. Or allowed. This is a
very, extremely fine edge -- the Press is obligated to report stuff (hopefully, uneditorialized
Truth), and Justice is supposed to proceed without taint. I take the side of Truth & Justice. I'm
stuck with being an idealist.

>>People are all too willing to take traffic fatalities as a "well, what are ya gonna do"
>>matter-of-course. It sux. Roads & streets aren't supposed to be a battlefield.
>
> I agree, roads should be safe but to expect millions of people to drive millions of miles each
> year and have NO fatal crashes is simply unrealistic.

I don't give up that easily. I'm an optimist. At least the glass has something in it.

cheers, Tom

--
-- Powered by FreeBSD Above address is just a spam midden. I'm really at: tkeats [curlicue] vcn
[point] bc [point] ca
 
On Fri, 27 Jun 2003 23:01:17 GMT, Jasper Janssen <[email protected]> wrote:

>How about looking down for long enough for the cyclist to swerve into the path of the truck because
>a bee stung him in his eye, or he hit a pothole/bump and fell, or any number of other things that
>could have happened?

There is an old common-law finding in the UK that "the cyclist is entitled to his wobble" - in other
words, it is reasonable to expect a cyclist to deviate from a perfectly straight path due to a
variety of factors including surface conditions, insects and so on. Drivers of motor vehicles should
take this into account.

Our Highway Code says that when overtaking a cyclist you should leave plenty of room. It
specifically states that "Motorcyclists and cyclists may suddenly need to avoid uneven road surfaces
and obstacles such as draincovers or oily, wet or icy patches on the road. Give them plenty of room"
(<http://www.highwaycode.gov.uk/20.shtml#189>)

Step 1 in reducing the death toll on the roads is to challenge the idea that most crashes are "just
accidents," some sort of Act of God. Most crashes result directly from the negligence of a driver.
Car crashes are the leading cause of death in children in the UK and probably in the US as well. I
think it's important to start challenging the hegemony of the car, despite its undoubted utility,
and get to a point where operators of motor vehicles display a level of care and attention which is
appropriate to a machine which has after all been involved in more deaths since its invention than
all the wars fought in the same period. If you want to consider this a political point of view then
you are free to do so. But then, so is the view that car drivers should be allowed to ride roughshod
over the rights of other road users - the "might is right" argument. It's an argument which is also
currently being played out between the drivers of SUVs and passenger cars, as per Keith Bradsher.

I drive a car. Carefully. I ride a bike carefully as well. Via longa, vita brevis.

Guy
===
** WARNING ** This posting may contain traces of irony. http://www.chapmancentral.com Advance
notice: ADSL service in process of transfer to a new ISP. Obviously there will be a week of downtime
between the engineer removing the BT service and the same engineer connecting the same equipment on
the same line in the same exchange and billing it to the new ISP.
 
All you guys full of righteous indignation and hunger for vengeance sound like people who think
they've never made a mistake themselves while driving/riding/whatever. I doubt if you are. Actually,
I KNOW you are not. You would condemn this guy in the van to all sorts of evil futures with zip
evidence as to whether he really deserves it. It was an accident people! An accident. No booze or
drugs involved. Accidents happen to everybody and anybody. They happen to excellent drivers and they
happen to poor drivers (just more often). If this was a person with a long and sordid driving
history, that's one thing and the law should come down on him like a ton of bricks. But if it's just
some poor schmuck on his way to visit a sick friend, who is normally a good driver, but just did not
see this other guy on the bike, hit him, killed him, and now feels like most people would in the
same situation -- like utter unadulterated hell, well then that's a different matter entirely. I'd
feel pity and sympathy and (thank you dear God) gratitude that I'm not the one that screwed up and
took that poor biker's life.

Get off the holier than thou high horse!

- GRL

"It's good to want things."

Steve Barr (philosopher, poet, humorist, chemist, Visual Basic programmer)
"Pete" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:0%[email protected]...
>
> "Just zis Guy, you know?" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
> > On Thu, 26 Jun 2003 15:49:21 -0400, Brendon Troy <[email protected]> wrote:
> >
> > >The radical view that I was suggesting, though, was that perhaps the driver does not deserve to
> > >be murdered (by unusual methods or not), and perhaps his children do not deserve to die
> > >destitute, because of his carelessness.
> >
> > No, there's no need to actually kill him I agree. Cutting his goolies off would be quite
> > sufficient, accompanied by a substantial fine and a long driving ban of course.
> >
> > Guy
>
> Revokation, or at least a long suspension, of his driving priv *is* the
same
> as 'cutting his goolies off'.
>
> Personally, I think that is where all death by motor vehicle incidents should start at. Banned
> from driving for some period of time. Say a year minimum. No 'drive to work' exemption, no
> 'permissable hours'. An outright ban. Plenty of people get aroud with no car. Let him figure out
> how to get to work. Maybe he'll start to ride a bike...:)
>
> Get caught driving during that ban? First time, it becomes permanent. Forever and ever. Subsequent
> violations involve actual jail time
>
> Notice I said *start with*. Circumstances may warrant a stiffer penalty.
>
> Getting off with nothing, which may or may not happen here, is simply not right.
>
> Pete
 
"GRL" <[email protected]> wrote in message news:[email protected]...
> All you guys full of righteous indignation and hunger for vengeance sound like people who think
> they've never made a mistake themselves while driving/riding/whatever. I doubt if you are.
> Actually, I KNOW you are not. You would condemn this guy in the van to all sorts of evil
> futures with
zip
> evidence as to whether he really deserves it. It was an accident people!
An
> accident. No booze or drugs involved. Accidents happen to everybody and anybody. They happen to
> excellent drivers and they happen to poor drivers (just more often). If this was a person with a
> long and sordid driving history, that's one thing and the law should come down on him like a ton
of
> bricks. But if it's just some poor schmuck on his way to visit a sick friend, who is normally a
> good driver, but just did not see this other guy on the bike, hit him, killed him, and now feels
> like most people would in the same situation -- like utter unadulterated hell, well then that's a
> different matter entirely. I'd feel pity and sympathy and (thank you dear God) gratitude that I'm
> not the one that screwed up and took that poor biker's life.
>
> Get off the holier than thou high horse!

Holier than thou? Is it so unreasonable to expect some penalty for causing the death on an innocent
person? If it can be shown that the MV operator is (or mostly) at fault in a ped/cyclist death, why
not revoke their driving permit for a period of time? Mybe it will make people think a little. It's
not like there aren't other ways to get around.

A 'long and sordid history' is far too late. Should we wait until he kills or injures 2 or 3 people?
5, 10, 20? How many is "long and sordid"? Last year here in Ohio, there was a case of a guy with
over 20 DUI convictions. Why? Because the car culture is so damned ingrained. I expect his history
started out with 'OK...DUI. No driving, except blah de blah..."

How about "No driving"? At all. period. 1 year minimum. If you are reckless enough to put others at
risk, or even cause their death.....you are too damned irresponsible to drive.

Vanishlingly few auto "accidents" are truly accidental. Inattentiveness, carelessness, speeding,
equipment fault...all are preventable.

You mention "It was an accident!" From the sketchy information, we don't know that. Was he bending
over to pick something up from the floorboard? Was he reading a map? Was he talling the kids in
the back seat to be quiet? Or did he simply not see the cyclist? (an adult size cyclist, on a
clear day).

And we may never know exactly what happened. Did the cyclist suddenly swerve out in front of the
car? Did the driver purposely hit him? We don't/can't know. But two of them do know, but only one
can tell us. And he has a vested interest in the outcome.

"I did not see him" is an admission of guilt, not an excuse. You are *supposed* to see things in the
road. That is part of the responsibility of piloting a potentially deadly motor vehicle.

Pete
 
Tue, 01 Jul 2003 04:21:38 GMT, <m%[email protected]>, "Pete"
<[email protected]> wrote:

>
>Vanishlingly few auto "accidents" are truly accidental. Inattentiveness, carelessness, speeding,
>equipment fault...all are preventable.

The wrapper on my fish&chips the other day was an article enumerating the 10 leading causes for
collisions.

Inattentiveness ranked first. Drowsiness and impaired switched between second and third in two
reports. Distractions inside the car was fourth. Speeding might have been sixth. Equipment failure
was mentioned too. I think it referenced an AAA study.

Compared to cycling or motorcycling, driving can be so incredibly boring that drivers 'zone-out' and
not remember how they got where they are. They use the distractions to keep from falling asleep. Or
they're so hyped up and frustrated with the pace of traffic they use drugs and distractions to
chill-out. Others are just over-worked "lifestyle" consumers who don't give a rat's ass for anybody
but the über ratz they emulate.

Car culture is a lousy substitute for the real thing.
--
zk
 
Mon, 30 Jun 2003 20:08:59 -0400, <[email protected]>, "GRL"
<[email protected]> wrote: \yadda yaddda
>Get off the holier than thou high horse!

He killed a person through his inattention or because he was distracted or because he was drowsy or
because he was impaired. Drivers must be ready to accept life and death responsibility when they
choose to operate dangerous equipment. Pedestrians and cyclists shouldn't have to pay with their
lives for others' bad choices

You're right, death by lawyer is cruel and unusual punishment. But neither should he just walk free
thereby letting other drivers know it's okay to kill cyclists with their cars too.

NO! Stop this nonsense. People in cars must be held accountable for their actions. When those
actions take a life they should be penalised in meaningful ways.
--
zk
 
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