An0n0m0us

just after reading the good news of the householders not being prosecuted for killing their attackers I then see the law still doesn't seem to understand the seriousness of dangerous driving and the appropriate sentences required when someone is seriously injured or killed

http://news.sky.com/home/uk-news/article/16084369

5 years up from 2 years? It's still not strong enough. If someone drives a car in a manner that is dangerous/reckless and then causes the sort of injuries that little girl has in the article or even worse kills somone then they deserve a minimum of 10 years. That little girl has had her life taken away from her in as much as she is never going to recover from her horrendous injuries Why should the person that caused that suffer for only a couple of years and then get on with their life whilst their victim suffers for the rest of their life?

The law is an ar$e and that is putting it mildly.

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

I could agree 100% with you......except that the definition of dangerous driving needs to be looked at.......someone could go away for a long time for something that was, in essence, an accident.

scud8

iTrader: (1)

The new sentences for causing death by dangerous driving aren't out of line with sentencing in cases of manslaughter by gross negligence (the non-motoring equivalent). In theory this can carry a life sentence, but in practise ~3 years seems to be the norm. The reason there is a special offence for motoring is that juries were very reluctant to convict in motor manslaughter cases because of the possibility of a life sentence (and possibly a case of "there but for the grace of god").

I definitely think cases like the one cited in the article deserve to have the book thrown at them, but we need to recognise that every time we get behind the wheel of a car there is a risk we could kill someone. We obviously do our best to minimise this risk but accidents do happen. The difficult thing with applying manslaughter to motoring is that a lot of the case law doesn't deal with this very well. For example http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R_v_Cal...d_R_v_Lawrence adopted a test which meant you could be guilty of manslaughter if you performed any act which created a risk of killing someone, whether or not you thought about the risk - and crucially the test does not attempt to quantify the risk (it simply states it must be obvious).

Leslie

Wouldn't you say that it is not so much the laws which are the ***** but those who actually make them?

The ***** are also often the ones who administer them.

Les

mrmadcap

It's just a big game where sentencing concerned, the other month they jailed some bugger for five years for stealing a bottle of water during the riots.

The legal profession are laughing all the way to the bank.