Stueyb

Cant quite put this into words without getting angry.

Basically last night my mother was hit up the **** of her z3 (no jokes please) by a drunk driver. As soon as she got out the car to speak to him, he was wobbling all over the place and smelt of drink. Now this wasnt some nober chav, he was driving some minibus/zafira thing.

She got his reg and his details etc and then went to ring the police for him being drunk and the to$$er sped off at speed. When the 999 people picked up she was asked if she knew she had dialed 999 to which she replied yes. She was then told to ring the local police and promptly hung up on.

Rang the local police, 30 mins later (14th in the queue ffs) They basically fobbed her off and said there was very little they could do because they didnt have the evidence to pursue it. Police - as much use as a chocolate firegaurd. They are much more interested in getting your money into their scamra, sorry camara van projects.

yoza

Its not the fault of the Police if they are too thin on the ground. If they are told to go and hide behind a bush with a speed gun thats what they will do.
If they are told to do cartwheels across a motorway bridge because it will slow down the traffic, they would probably do that too.
They are very good at doing as they are told.

I believe they should be fighting worthy crime and not sneaking around with speedguns or pulling people for illegally spaced plates.

But thats just me.

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

Police since Thatcher: Enforcers, thugs and tax gatherers for which ever government they can prostitute themselves to.

Alcazar

TDT

The law is the **** here but as usual it's much easier to blame the Police. Something people on Scoobynet seem to love doing.

Go and be a traffic officer for a day washing people off the road bacause some nobber has ploughed into them at 130mph "'cause I'm a really good driver"

The Police go round to the registered keepers house, enter the property in order to obtain a specimen of breath, and find the driver sat in the chair with a bottle of whisky.

How do you prove that the driver was UTI at the time of the accident?

Discuss.

Geezer

It seems a bit odd that they were so reluctant to do anything though. Apart from the fact that they only had her word that he had been drinking, an accident obviously had taken place and he had left the scene. That is an offence surely?

It would be easy to prove forensically that his vehicle had indeed hit hers, and if they bothered to go and breathalise (sp?) him they would have know whether he was over the legal limit to drive at that time even if they could only prove it was his vehicle in the collision at a later date.

Is that too simplistic?

Geezer

David Lock

I would be angry too. But what could the cops do? Go to his house where they find driver with large scotch in hand who says "Just had a prang and needed a drink to calm my nerves". Hope mum OK. DL

mad_dr

I don't get it. Surely a criminal offense has been committed and the Police are obliged to persue it. "No evidence" is a poor excuse. Seems very tempting for them to let the phone ring for half an hour, answer it and say "Sorry - they'll be long gone by now"...

I replied to TDT's first post by the way : "Read the Road Traffic Act and you'll realise why there's nothing they can do about it"

BlkKnight

I thought it could be done by analizing a blood sample?

hail-hail

Can the **** head not be done with leaving the scene of an accident....

Happened to a mate of mine a number of years ago, he crashed into somebodys house, reversed and drove off. Think he got a 6 month ban for 'leaving the scene of an accident'

Geezer

No, alcohol is absorbed at a certain rate, and the body dipsoes of it at a certain rate. You can tell how long the stuff (and to what level) has been in

Geezer

Stueyb

I would have thought it could be done by the amount of alcohol absorbed over time. ie it takes time for it to have an affect no ?

TDT

They can "back date" a BAL.

A criminal offence has been alleged. You can be sure it will be followed up one way or another (See hail-hails post)

If there are no mobiles available then there are no mobiles available. For example, we had a stolen vehicle go through one of the fixed ANPR sets a couple of weeks ago, but there were no uncommitted mobiles anywhere near. The paraffin parrot was broken (again ) so we couldn't do anything. We had to watch it disappear on the CCTV.

It'll turn up again.....as will the drunk driver I suspect.

There need to be more police out & about, not something that will happen in the near future IMHO

Stueyb

David she is fine. Just angry.

Jap2Scrap

Tell us the reg. number... Go on, you know you wanna..

Stueyb

TBH, I dont have the reg. could get it though. However I do have this gimps address. He lives 3 streets away !! Hmmm paint stripper

Jap2Scrap

You know where he lives? I'd have paid a visit by now I think. In a non-threatening "are you gonna pay for the damage" type way

JoeyDeacon

Few months ago my girlfriends car had the window smashed and the tax stolen, police not interested. Be honest with you I half expected them to turn up and do me for not showing a valid tax disc.

Friend of the Families boyfriend (who's a chav) is driving around with no licence (didn't bother taking a test, why would you), insurance etc. Phone the police to tell them about this and where he lives and again not interested.

I buy an ex-mod car at auction and insure it on the VIN number to allow me to register it and get the registration document, tax, mot etc. Document comes through and I get the plates made up and start driving the car. Police stop me one afternoon and want to do me for having no insurance (on the VIN number doesn't show up on their database apparently). Now I admit I should have got the inurance changed to the Reg number as soon as possible but I do have insurance! Got a warning and told to change it as soon as possible.

Basically I think it boils down to the fact that it is getting virtually impossible to prove a crime has happened these days. If they try and prosecute a chav they know full well they won't turn up at court and then what are they supposed to do. Honest law abiding citizens are obviously going to confess to the crime and this goes towards the figures.

Best one of all I have heard is pie keys stealing a brand new land rover engine from the dealer my dad works for. They find out who has got the engine (as they are trying to sell it) and the police's advice is to buy the engine back from them. Guess it would go against their human rights to try and prosecute them??

Sith

Go down the station. Make a noise and demand to see the man in charge. If he is not forthcomming then say you will goto the papers and write a letter to your MP and the Top brass.

Brendan Hughes

I think you'd get a Daily Mail headline with the story.

Stueyb

Well im gonna start by writing to the head police pusher, ie Chief constable and see what that gimp says. No doubt i'll be fobbed off with some BS. Problem is that my mother isn't really one for pushing things. At the end of the day, its none of my business in their view, but in the real world it is.

warrenm2

Dont let the old "hipflask" defense put you off, its doesnt hold water these days (pun intended!).......

lmsbman

Stueyb

What part of the country do you live as a matter of interest? I know some Police Forces refuse to attend non-injury RTC's unless the is a bad obstruction. Personally, I think that is a very poor attitude, coz whilst it just might be a bit of bent metal, its still traumatic for those concerned. If it had happened in my area, I would like to think a unit would have been dispatched straight away to the scene.
Obviously, if the bloke lives a few streets away, then they are unlikely to catch him before he get's home. The problem then arises if he refuses to answer the door, because if there is no injury to any person other than the driver and the Police Officer has no substantive grounds for believing the driver is drunk, then they have no power to force entry.(Isn't the british law wonderful!) In that scenario, the driver would have to be reported for fail to stop/report accident. However, that's no excuse for not bothering to attend, coz the bloke might have been stupid enough to answer the door

Felix.

Sometimes it the call takers who do not have a clue about the law etc or do not listen properly to the victim. I have had occasions where people have been getting broken into and have had a similar response when they have phoned us.........madness..!!

99% of the crews driving the police cars would attend stuff like this, however if the control room staff don't tell us - we don't get to know.

Stueyb

Sorry for the late response, thought this thread had died a death. The incident occured in Ellesmere Port (Cheshire). Felix - appreciate what your saying mate. It just seems sheer lunacy !

DJ140

It makes you wonder how much work the Police actually do. With all the speed camera's around, you'd have thought they'd have plenty of time for more important crimes.

People generally these days have little or no respect for Plod, not suprising really is it?

And it's no use trying to defend this situation, it's a fact. Maybe it's partly the Governments fault, but not all.

Redkop

Good grief that has to rate as one of the stupidest comments on SN for a long time.

Scoob99

iTrader: (1)

Surely this guy can be dione for leaving the scene of an accident

homerdog

There's a lot of competition!

scoob_babe

isn't failure to give insurance details also an offence? Hope you manage to get everything sorted asap

Felix.

Something to think about. I work in a typical busy town. Last night we had 14 PC's on the shift and started the night at 7.00pm with 114 individual jobs on the que which all need police response. Through the night we had about 30 immediate response jobs which tied some crews up for most of the night. The rest of us battled to bring the job que down, but a soon as you get rid of one job another new one will arive. Don't forget that most of these jobs require further enquiries etc.

Most of us worked a 12 hour shift with no meal or any other kind of break and worked our socks off. We ended the night with more jobs on the que than when we started.

We do try our best for you folks.