"Richard Miller" <
[email protected]> wrote in message
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> In message <
[email protected]>, "
[email protected]"
> <
[email protected]> writes
> >It is widely thought that to be classed as a serial killer then there must have been acts of
> >premeditated/intentional killings on at least four occasions. Also for a conviction of murder it
> >has to be proved beyond reasonable doubt that there was intent to kill. I could be wrong but I
> >don't think driving offences usually come into that category, unless there was of course
> >intention to cause death by reckless driving. And for this to happen I would imagine it would
> >have to be in such dire circumstances whereby the driver had planned to mow someone down and
> >kill them?
>
> Having said that, this guy has already killed twice, and unless something remarkable happens to
> him during his six years in prison, there is every reason to believe he will kill again.
>
> Our laws relating to causing death on the roads are too lenient.
Not really: as you may yourself have observed in the past, hard cases make bad law.
>This case demonstrates that a life sentence should be available to the Court on a second separate
>conviction of causing death by dangerous driving (ie it wouldn't apply to one incident causing
>multiple deaths, but it would apply to a second separate incident also causing death).
>
> I also think that any charge of causing death through careless or dangerous while driving over the
> legal alcohol limit ought automatically to be charged as manslaughter. I think as a society we
> have now reached the stage when everyone knows full well that in driving over the limit they are
> risking killing someone; they should be punished appropriately if they decide to run that risk.
That may well be the case. I was interested enough in this subject to research it a little a few
months back.
It was, of course, originally the case that the charges open to the prosecution were murder or
manslaughter - and I found one early 20th century case where death by dangerous driving was
effectively prosecuted as murder. Defence attempted to plead the fact that the victim was blind as
mitigation - court not interested.
Then we had DbDD, because as we came up to the end of the 20th century, it was felt that juries
would not convict on even a manslaughter charge - so we had to have the 'lesser' offence in order to
get convictions.
And more recently, debate from the direction of senior judges as to whether we should not have,
effectively, four degrees of homicide - because the current set up, with mandatory life for murder
was also too restrictive.
Personally, I would agree with you on the point about sentence being too lenient - and would like to
see judges having a longer sentence available. But you have to admit that it would be very rarely
used. The outcry here is to do with the rarety of the event.
I also wonder why the Prosecution could NOT have tried for a greater charge: given the perpetrator's
past record, I would have thought manslaughter could have been attempted.
> --
> Richard Miller