Going to court on not suppling information to a speeding ticket

[grantshel]

My company (me) have been summoned to court for not suppling information to a speeding offence. I was unaware of the offence as i moved house 4 weeks prior to the offence and all the paperwork was sent to my old address. I didn't know anything about it until served with the notice by a police officer 6 months later.

Can they do me for not suppling information to the offence if i can prove i didn't receive anything?

[citizenkain]

they might turn round and ask why you didn't update your new address so they could contact you,Ive heard of people getting fined for that on top as failure to notify a new address is an offence,saying you didn't receive anything because you didn't update your details wont work with them

[MikeG]

To be valid, the Notice of Intended Prosecution for speeding must have been delivered to your old address within 14 days of the alleged offence. Worth checking.

[Raykay]

To be valid, the Notice of Intended Prosecution for speeding must have been delivered to your old address within 14 days of the alleged offence. Worth checking.

 

 

That would apply to a speeding offence, failing to nominate does not require an NIP.

[MikeG]

Is not the one consequent of the other? The NIP is sent and requires disclosure of the driver, and failure to nominate is the S172 consequence of not responding. If the NIP isn't served properly then the identity is moot. They will probably then dual charge - speeding and failure to nominate. I doubt they will drop it because it's still a numbers game but not knowing and pleading guilty should minimise the fine. Did you not have post forwarding? I'd update your documents at this point.

[Raykay]

Is not the one consequent of the other? The NIP is sent and requires disclosure of the driver, and failure to nominate is the S172 consequence of not responding. If the NIP isn't served properly then the identity is moot.

 

Two entirely different matters. A NIP is required to be served within 14 days in respect of speeding - s.1, Road Traffic Offenders Act1988, The requirement to identify the driver does not, s.172, Road Traffic Act 1988.

They are sometimes on the same sheet of paper, but there is no connection between them.

[MikeG]

They are separate charges and under different legislation but clearly there is a connection between them. Without s172 no-one would self incriminate, an argument that went to the ECHR. The other connection is that if the NIP was not served then there would be no reason NOT to identify in a speeding prosecution that would fail. Also, because they are on the same piece of paper, the NIP was not received so there was no actual s172 received, that is if what the Police brought round was a summons. Seperate offences, connected evidence.

 

The speeding offence has a timeout: the papers have to be laid infront of the JoP within 6 months of the alleged offence. If the Police spent time tracking you down before the CPS laid info then the window to prosecute might just have expired. The Court will have a date of laying.

 

 

Most likely the NIP/s172 was sent in time leading to the rebuttable presumption that it was served, i.e.: it was sent to the registered address so it is presumed served unless proven otherwise. It's then your responsibility to comply with s172, which you did not due to the house move. You're going to be in Court anyway so you get the opportunity to argue that 6 points is disproportionate for this admin error and that had it been presented to you within time limit you would happily have complied. If the Police could visit within the 6months + 28 days available to lay information for s172 (6 months after you didn't respond to the NIP) then they could have not prosecuted and just supplied a copy of the original NIP/s172, which would have saved everyone time money and effort.

[Raykay]

The defence argument for the OP is that the s.172 request was not received. It has nothing to do with the NIP and there is no legal connection between them - two totally different matters, except that they may be mentioned on the same sheet of paper.

Even if a NIP was not correctly served (or for an offence that did not require a NIP), a s.172 request on its own would still be valid.

[MikeG]

... except they were on the same piece of paper. That's the reality here. Do you think the Mags will consider them independently, two separate summons, two separate hearings?

@grantshel: what does the summons say?

[Raykay]

... except they were on the same piece of paper.

 

That is what causes the confusion for some people, two totally different legal matters on the same sheet of paper.

 

If both offences are on the summons, they would both be dealt with at the same time, but there would have to be an admission that the person was the driver at the time of the speeding, and evidence that they had failed to comply with the s.172 requirement.

[MikeG]

No confusion here, I'm discussing this on a practical basis because I think that's most helpful. Lack of actual evidence of driver does not stop the summons for speeding: it's part of the intimidation. Generally, when dual charges are laid, they are improperly treated as alternative charges. Whilst in theory they are independent, one exists because of the other and treatment is interelated, as is the evidence trail.

 

In this case the OP is in the situation where he could actually manage to get convicted of both, by admitting to the speeding. The best path would be to get the CPS to conditionally agree to drop the s172 charge should he agree to plead guilty to the speeding. This used to be their policy with dual charging - just pursue one. Note that this needs to be done prior to Court, which in theory can't drop either. However, if speeding was laid out of time then that's off the table. If both were out of time then no case to answer.

[Raykay]

I agree with the above reply, but it has nothing to do with NIPs. What has confused some people is that they have received an NIP which they - rightly or wrongly - thought was incorrectly served, and so ignored the s.172 requirement, not realising it was a completely different matter and then getting a summons for failing to notify.