summons for driving uninsured, at court TOMORROW

[sailor sam]

Hi very long story cut short

 

- in July i was pulled for driving uninsured on way to hospital after my partner had been rushed in after going into premature labour.

 

We had an extremley dificult pregnancy with my other half being in and out of hospital and it came to a 50-50 chance for the baby.

 

The car had been insured but was cancelled as we missed a payment and didnt get the letter for over a week as my partner was in hosptal

so not getting post (we dont live together)

 

when the letter was recieved i parked the car in my private off road garage and it remained there until the day i as pulled.

 

son the day i made a rash decision and drove uninsured towads the hospital as in my eyes it was an emergency as we did not know if the baby would survive..

 

i was pulled over and the police told me i was been reported and told me to drive home and leave car off road.

 

i did that, and my daughter was born a few hour later.

 

I am aware i shall be punished and i agree i should be.

 

I am having difficulty in whether or not to plead mitigating circumstances and ask for a short term ban

rather than 6 points as this would result in my licence been revoked under the new drivers act.

 

I would lose my job as i am a driver and it would also cause huge problems for my family as i have two other children,

one who is disabled and uses a wheelchair very often,

she has specialist appointments monthly in a city two hours away which i need to drive her to as public transport is a nightmare.

 

it is a 3 hour train journey each way and i have to take both kids out of school for the day to attend

as they are always around 9am appointments and rush hour trains and wheelchairs dont mix.

 

losing my newly got job would also cause grave financial hardship as JSA plus housing benefit does not cover my rent let alone bills and living costs.

 

can anybody advise me as to what to write in my letter to court

(which i shall post at court on my way to work at 5am in the morning as my hearing is at 12.45 and i cannot get time away from work)

 

i want to beg the court to give me a short term ban rather than the points that will revoke my licence

or if that is impossible ask them to not hit me with the double whammy of banning me as well.

 

i enclose a copy of my driving license (can anybody tell me what I000 means under the other section of endorsments?)

 

If the police allowed you to drive home, are they not permitting you to commit a further offence? Surely this should help you case as you can argue that as they 'told you to drive home', they may as well have allowed you to continue with your emergency journey to the hospital. OR as it was a potential life or death situation, they could of taken your partner in their car using their blues and twos.

 

Basically if your story is accurate, the police officers have questions to answer. If they cannot establish adequate insurance is in place then under sec 165a of the RTA, and you are not able to prove that you are insured to drive, then they should seize the vehicle. By letting you carry on, they cannot prosecute you under sec 143 as far as i'm concerned. A good solicitor would have fun with this.

 

Please Note

 

The advice I offer will be based on the information given by the person needing it. All my advice is based on my experiences and knowledge gained in working in the motor and passenger transport industries in various capacities. Although my advice will always be sincere, it should be used as guidence only.

 

I would always urge to seek face to face professional advice for clarification prior to taking any action.

 

Please click my reputation 'star' button at the bottom of my profile window on the left if you found my advice useful.

[sorrylittlelot]

hi sam, my partner wasnt with me in the car, she was at her sistrs and it was her who rushed her to the hospital.

 

i phoned for the result today and was told that it had been adjourned as they was considering a ban.

 

maybe i should get legal rep for the new hearing?

 

they let me drive home as they couldnt verify if it was insured still as the office of my last insurers wasnt open on a saturday

[crem]

 

I don't know if 6 and below is acceptable under new drivers, or if it's 6 and over... ???

 

"6" is the magic number. i.e. if any new points make the total on your licence 6 or over, the new drivers act is automatically invoked.

 

It is possible, therefore, to have more than 6 on your licence and not to be revoked if the points were present prior to taking your driving test. However, should you receive a single extra point in the 2 years following your test, your licence will immediately be revoked and you will have to pass your tests again.

[sorrylittlelot]

not looking good

[Yukiko]

I'd guess that begging the magistrate under hardship to fine you heavily and not impose points wouldn't work as the minimum sentance is 6 points + £100 fine.

[sorrylittlelot]

so what do i do?

[havinastella]

Did you not attend court?

[sorrylittlelot]

no as i couldnt get time off work, i pleaded by post and wrote my situation on the form

[Aretnap]

Well if your preference is for a short ban rather than points, the fact that they're considering banning you is good news I suppose. You will have to attend the new date they give you - work or no work.

 

I actually think you might have half a chance of getting away with neither points nor a ban. The magistrates can impose neither if they find "special reasons not to endorse" - which is basically some very strong mitigation related to the offence itself (not to the offender - so not hardship which would be caused by an endorsement) which would make it unjust to impose the usual penalty. The most common grounds are that you were mislead about the car's insurance status by someone you had good reason to trust (doesn't apply) or that you drove without insurance because of a genuine emergency which fell short of a defence (might apply).

 

With drink driving, the HIgh Court has suggested that special reasons would apply if "a sober, reasonable and responsible friend of the defendant, present at the time, but himself a non-driver and thus unable to help, would have advised in the circumstances, to drive" (DPP -v- Bristow). I would suggest that if your partner had just been rushed to hospital for a difficult and dangerous birth, a reasonable person might have felt that it was OK to drive a short distance without insurance to be with her, though ultimately that would be for the bench to decide - certainly you would need good answers to questions like why it wasn't better to phone a friend to give you a lift, or to get a taxi instead. If you want to pursue this line of argument I'd suggest speaking to a specialist motoring solicitor - you can expect them to charge a few hundred quid to represent you in court, but many will give a free initial consultation.

[Aretnap]

Basically if your story is accurate, the police officers have questions to answer. If they cannot establish adequate insurance is in place then under sec 165a of the RTA, and you are not able to prove that you are insured to drive, then they should seize the vehicle. By letting you carry on, they cannot prosecute you under sec 143 as far as i'm concerned. A good solicitor would have fun with this.

Why not? The question for the court is whether he drove without insurance, not whether the police did the right thing after he'd committed the offence.

 

Sending people without insurance to drive home was absolutely standard before the power to seize cars was introduced - that's why it was introduced. But even now it's discretionary - the law gives the copper the authority to seize the car, it doesn't require him to do so. Possibly he was unable to verify the insurance situation with certainty at the roadside and so didn't seize it. or possibly he was just being a decent bloke and didn;t want to pile yet more misery on the OP. Either way what he did doesn't change the fact that the OP was driving without insurance.

[sailor sam]

Why not? The question for the court is whether he drove without insurance, not whether the police did the right thing after he'd committed the offence.

 

Sending people without insurance to drive home was absolutely standard before the power to seize cars was introduced - that's why it was introduced. But even now it's discretionary - the law gives the copper the authority to seize the car, it doesn't require him to do so. Possibly he was unable to verify the insurance situation with certainty at the roadside and so didn't seize it. or possibly he was just being a decent bloke and didn;t want to pile yet more misery on the OP. Either way what he did doesn't change the fact that the OP was driving without insurance.

 

Yes because the technology was not in place to carry out road side checks then but it now is. As Far as i'm aware, the police need to be satisfied (or not have reasonable doubt) that the car (and/or driver) is insured. If the driver has DOC on his policy then there may be a grey area BUT the car should itself be subject to a policy under the continuous tax/insurance rules and as such, show up on the MIB data base.

 

Having said all that and re-reading the OP's info, I was originally under the impression that the OP was transporting his partner to hospital under emergency circumstances which may have made a difference into the police officers decision. I now see that wasn't the case and it's clear that the OP wasn't insured and further more, possibly was aware of that fact.

 

Please Note

 

The advice I offer will be based on the information given by the person needing it. All my advice is based on my experiences and knowledge gained in working in the motor and passenger transport industries in various capacities. Although my advice will always be sincere, it should be used as guidence only.

 

I would always urge to seek face to face professional advice for clarification prior to taking any action.

 

Please click my reputation 'star' button at the bottom of my profile window on the left if you found my advice useful.

[sorrylittlelot]

UPDATE.

 

my case was adjourned as the court wanted to consider a ban due to seriousness of crime.

I didnt attend the new date but let court know. got summons for arrest, turned myself in.

 

result - i pleaded extreme hardship and recieved a 21 day ban and fine/victim surcharge/admin charge or something along those lines totalling 350

[Bandit127]

Thanks for posting your result up for future posters to read.

 

I hope you think you got a reasonable outcome too.

[dx100uk]

good show

 

hope you are relieved

 

dx

[sorrylittlelot]

im very very happy with the result and feel rather lucky

[Bandit127]

Good one then - well done.

 

Don't forget that you will need to re-apply for your licence in good time - probably now. (We don't want to see you up here for advice on being caught for driving without a licence after your ban expires...)

[Aretnap]

No need to reapply for your licence as the ban was for less than 56 days

 

https://www.gov.uk/driving-disqualifications/overview

 

A good result all things considered - you must be very relieved.

[honeybee13]

Hello there.

 

That must be a huge relief and echo the thanks for posting it. Would you like your thread title changed? *WON* doesn't seem right and I'm not sure what would be better.

 

My best, HB

[sailor sam]

Fair result.

 

Please Note

 

The advice I offer will be based on the information given by the person needing it. All my advice is based on my experiences and knowledge gained in working in the motor and passenger transport industries in various capacities. Although my advice will always be sincere, it should be used as guidence only.

 

I would always urge to seek face to face professional advice for clarification prior to taking any action.

 

Please click my reputation 'star' button at the bottom of my profile window on the left if you found my advice useful.