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news
Police tape (CC licensed by freefotouk on Flickr)Horrific hit and run on Swain's Lane – North London's favourite road for hill reps (+ link to video)
A cyclist has obtained CCTV footage of the terrifying moment a driver on the wrong side of the road knocked him off his bike at the foot of one of North London’s most popular climbs.
Medical student Josh Dey shared footage of the shocking incident with local newspaper The Ham & High, which has uploaded the video to its website.
The hit-and-run collision left him with injuries including a bleed on the brain, knee ligament damage, and his nose “broken into multiple bits."
Police, who are investigating the incident, asked him to try and obtain the footage.
He said: “What shocked me the most was when I looked up the CCTV was the way he was driving – he was on the wrong side of the road.
“I could even see the guy's face – it looks like he's smiling like it's just a normal day. He hit a cyclist and ran.
“I have seen drivers being reckless but never did I imagine I would ever myself have been hit by a car.”
“I don't think it'll deter me in the long-term [from cycling],” he continued, “but I can't see being back on a bike this year.
“I don't want to get back on a bike because I don't want to think about getting hit by a car.”
Anyone with information is requested to call police police on 101 quoting reference number CAD 5769 of April 21.
Swain’s Lane, which is flanked in part by the eastern and western sides of Highgate Cemetery, is the site of the annual Urban Hill Climb and is popular throughout the year with cyclists from North London wanting to do hill repetitions.
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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64 comments
Is there anyway we can close the comments on this thread. Now that an arrest has been made and all that.
And deny Halliwell and a few others the chance to apologies for some of the things they have said about the Police?
The idiot Pickles also proposed allowing some parking on double yellows, completely ignoring the effect that that would have had on congestion and safety. It's also the Tories that proposed Burt's favorite, the review on road safety, and then pandered to the anticyclist rhetoric and rapidly proposed new laws against Alliston. Because of the obvious this has seemingly found itself in the long grass, but I wager that this grass is shorter than the ones that surround the laws that will make us all safer. The recent Tories have been less War Mongerers than New Labour, to give them their due.
The motorist may not have deliberately driven into the cyclist. But the speed at which they were travelling, the side of the road on which they chose to drive and the failing to stop all were deliberate acts, all of which they decided to do.
I really hope that I'm not sharing the road with the sort of person who can do this deliberately, but sadly, I can't actually think of a good reason to be travelling at 30mph on the wrong side of the road outside that parade of shops. There's a roundabout just out of shot to the left too, which you'd have to approach on the correct side of the road.
The driver must be bricking it about getting his stern letter.
This is an act of extreme violence, extreme illegal violence. As we are using knife crime as some sort of benchmark, I would suggest that there have been more violent road deaths in London so far this year than there has been knife deaths, 29 as of yesterday, I believe.
The outcry if the victim of a stabbing had been asked to obtain their own CCTV evidence would be deafining, let alone the suspect being SENT A LETTER. Or that this process would have to be started within 2 weeks, (the ridiculous Notice of Impending Prosocution). You would think the seriousness of the Failure to Stop, may remove the NIP time limit, (but you know, war on motorist and all that) and could justify perhaps a knock on the door.
I may not wish to use Halliwell's language, and would perhaps not want to generalise quite as much but I do understand his anger.
Oh, and wishing and hoping mean pretty much the same thing.
As well as the delay for a NIP (it's 'Intended' rather than 'imminent', FYI), check outThe Deregulation Act 2015 and its requirement that except for some very narrowly defined circumstances, parking can no longer be enforced via CCTV.
No CCTV means more 'parking enforcement officers' need to be hired, and of course, 'austerity' means that there isn't much money to hire them.
Fewer parking penalties equals greater impunity for the selfish, sociopathic c**ts who are drivers, to abandon their cars wherever the fuck they want ... equals kerching, hear those votes for the Tories comin' in!
I thought that parking enforcement now falls into the hands of local councils except for when the parking is blocking access.
It does, yes. Hence my mention of 'parking enforcement officers'.
Sorry. I could have been clearer.
Just FYI, it Is 'Civil Enforcement Officer' - because they are civillian council employees who enforce civil offences, unlike traffic wardens who are/were employed by police forces (virtually all (if not all) councils have elected for parking offences de-criminalised in their areas - meaning that the police are no longer repsonsible for enforcing, and also the council gets to keep any fines).
Yes because most of societies ills stem from the Tories. I doubt a Labour supporter has ever assaulted, robbed, raped or murdered anyone. Only Tories and maybe those Green weirdos.
I voted Tory once and committed a home invasion AND blocked someone's drive in the same weekend. Never again!
http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/straw-man.html
Hope this helps.
One of my favourite stats to quote to the "pay some bloody road tax!" mob is that over 80% of people who ride bikes also happen to own cars. You'd do well to remember that.
Also, if you stop seeing absolutely everything in the world through the lens of national politics, your arguments might get taken more seriously.
I've said it before and I'll say it again - surely those of us who frequent this site have learned that labels solve nothing?!
I'm always amused by people who say or write things like, 'I've said it before and I'll say it again'. I mean, we're hanging on your every word, so we sort of know what you've already said.
Anyway, my last question before bed: what in my words or my online 'demeanour' gives you the impression that I give a flying shit whether you or anyone else 'takes my arguments seriously'? Are you so up yourself that you think I seek 'approval' from you or from 'my peers'?
It always amuses me that people who post their opinion on the web, accompanied by many swears, claim not to care what anyone thinks of it. Especially people who start a thread to tell a forum that they are moving to a different country. It's rather bizarre behaviour, and a complete waste of time, if you might as well be shouting into a void.
Not sure how that makes me "up" myself. Do you talk to people in real life in the same way you write here? Genuinely interested.
Yeah, but some of those who ride bikes and own cars put one of those ahead of the other in deterining their worldview. Some see the world primarily through a car windscreen, even if they might cycle for sport or recreation or a minority of journeys. It's not about being selfish or being Tories, so much as just your self-interest and experience determines how you see things. "Being determines conciousness", as someone (definitely not a Tory) once said.
I don't think it maps that well onto UK party politics in general. There are plenty of petrol heads and motor-industry lobbyists in all parties. But I thought Mr Legs was making a specific point about a specific bit of legislation. In that case it does seem that it was Tories looking for motorist votes.
Just as with Erik Pickles idiotic ruling that councils had to give a longer 'grace' period for parking bays (an idea that seemed the very definition of empty pandering, as the length of the base period for parking is surely set by councils in the first place, plus if one motorist parks for longer the next will have more trouble finding a space)
It's worth noting that the police in Kentish Town are seriously under the cosh right now due to a series of stabbings around Queens Crescent. It doesn't make it right that the victim was asked to go looking for CCTV footage but there is a reason for it.
It's also worth noting that the police are only 'under the cosh' because there are no coppers, and the reason there are no coppers, is because there is no money to hire them. And this is as a result of the changes in public policy in 1979, which (contrary to what most people think) were continued in 1997, and which are still in place today. That is: the language and ideals of free market capitalism applied to formerly public services, like the NHS, transport, education, utilities (gas, water, electricity), mail, and of course to the police. It is an obscenity which should provoke mass demonstrations, that the police are told they have a ‘budget’ and that if the money runs out then tough shit - you can’t investigate any more crime. You can’t police the roads. You can’t hire more officers. Just as it is an obscenity that the NHS are held to budgets. The NHS and the police should not be treated like companies. They need more money as there is more crime, then they get more money. Doctors need more money to buy kidney dialysis machines, or MRI scanners, then they get more money. A politician who refuses them that money, should be dragged by the hair into a public place and destroyed by repeated blows to the head, neck and upper torso from the sharp end of a claw hammer, and then left in public as a reminder of what happens to people who put profit before people.
As a slight tangent, one should also note that what money there is, the police get to spend more or less however they wish, and vanity projects like changing their logo or their ‘slogan’ (and having to spend a couple of million on changing the paint on all of their vehicles as well as buying new stationery etc), or ‘feel good’ tactics like devoting millions of pounds to a ‘positive arrest’ policy where ‘hate crime’ is concerned (which in the overwhelming majority of cases, really just means ‘someone can’t control his or her emotions and demands that the state punish someone who’s offended them’) are probably not the most efficient use of resources.
But globally, the mantra that ‘fewer coppers means more crime’ is only partially true. Most crime is economically motivated, and the official neoliberal mantra of ‘austerity’ to punish those who are already on the lower socio-economic strata for the crimes of the financial sector, and to pay for a bail-out amounting to roughly half a trillion pounds to the UK banks, has caused immeasurable hardship across the entire country with the possible exception of the south east of England. A reduction in policing is only the tip of that particular clusterfuck.
So being maimed/life changing injuries/killed by a person using one type of weapon (a motorvehicle for instance) - which happens very frequently in the UK is less of a concern than someone/people being stabbed, why?
How many stab deaths compared to motoring caused deaths, we know for a fact that KSIs are around 24-25,000 annually plus over 160,000 minor injuries. Stabbings/knife attacks are becoming a problem in some areas of the country but deaths and injuries to people by motovehicle have been a massive problem for decades and continue to be so. I'm not seeing why we should excuse police for not doing their duty because there are other matters at hand of an equally serious nature that has a huge effect on society, more so than stabbings in the vast majority of the country.
I don't go about worrying about being stabbed but I do worry about been killed or maimed whilst on my bike, not such that I would ever stop cycling but it's always there in the background virtually every single day.
There's some more info on the BBC: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-england-london-48146526/highgate-hit-and-run-cctv-shows-cyclist-thrown-into-air
Also: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-48146525
Yep sure, la la la, it must be awesome forever being right!
@madcarew - you're right about "useless cunts" not being constructive. In my mind, it's an appropriate response to a dereliction of duty. Your response to that was particularly nasty and uncalled for.
I don't know about getting the police "on our side" - as far as I understand it, they are paid to do a job and I don't care if they like or hate me as long as they do their job impartially.
I'd agree that the police being under-resourced is a major problem, but the people best placed to deal with that are the senior police who need to make their case for funding to the politicians or maybe have a series of high profile resignations if they are not being allowed to do their job. It's not fair, but necessary.
I know of no reason why police cannot ask for CCTV footage - where I work we've occasionally been asked for footage where our CCTV also covers a footpath and road. We're perfectly happy to co-operate and no warrant is required.
Clearly there is an institutional issue within policing where police are neither 'on our side', nor impartial. We, as a group, would like to change that. Calling them all useless cunts (even the ones on another article on this site today who speedily facilitated the return of a stolen bike) is worse than not helpful, it's damaging.
Winning hearts and minds has been a far more effective approach than 'because you're paid to' since roughly forever, and 'because you're paid to' isn't working that well for us right now, is it?
As for my response, Halliwell called an entire group of people useless cunts (about as strong an invective as available) and I suggested a number of reasons and opportunities for him to change his mind. I didn't direct any epithet at him, and even suggested he's probably a decent human being. I don' think that's disproportionate or harsh even. To be fair, suggesting that his mother be burgled or daughter be raped was a clumsy and coarse way of making a point that we all may need the help of the services some day, and may well be glad of the non-useless cuntery that may be on display at the time.
Police can ask for CCTV footage, they can not demand it without a search warrant or court order. I can imagine there are a number of reasons why someone might not be keen to hand over their CCTV footage, and I know some institutions will not pass it to authorities without a court order . One might want to ask the basic question how the rider had seen the CCTV footage, but not passed it directly to the police, or given them the contact, or is it in fact poor reporting, and it was someone's dashcam that the police don't have access to. It's all pretty flimsy grounds for calling them useless cunts.
I think I've made my point
However you did direct the following at Halliwell which I would consider to be a lot more vindictive than simply calling them a name:
All the Policemen* and women that I have had contact with; in a work capacity, as a first responder volunteer, as a victim of crime and on the wrong end of a ticking off for motorcycling just a bit too enthusiastically have been professional, fair and reasonable.
*Except the one who gave me a speeding ticket for 34 in a 30 when I was 19 - Obviously he was a total bastard.
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Always shocking to see something like this, even more so when it's local and a road I regularly ride. I hope they get the driver.
For those having a go at the police, I'm sure not every copper in the country is perfect, but articles like this https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/may/02/police-officer-london-lost-control-streets-knife-crime-cuts help provide some context. They have a hard and often thankless job and it's too simplistic simply write off front line police as uncaring when the picture is far more nuanced.
Being realistic, it's not unreasonable for the Met to ask if there is any CCTV - without it, there is no case unless there was a witness with accurate details. It is no secret that they are immensely stretched. A lot of problems with justice are not of the police's making, but every time a decent case comes to nothing or next to nothing it does make my blood boil - as it does the police's.
I was taken out in a hit and run last year - the police were outstanding and diligent in tracing the culprit . He turned out to be a villain, known to the police, with an alias and all recorded on the system. Driving licence etc in his proper name, car used in a different name (long story) which was the one he habitually used. Essentially summoned under proper name, listed in court under usual name, didn't turn up. Magistrate's Clerk bleated about are we sure it's the right person and made it clear that he, the Clerk, would insist on proof, which is something that the police had not expected given his previous record with the courts and it all fell apart. Police were furious, and said that if it were any consolation, they'd have him again soon for something, and that they would provide all the help they could in getting the insurance sorted. All I had was a witness statement from another driver who saw it and noted the number. All I could say was that it was a silver Vovo XC90. Without anything more than the latter, there would have been nothing the poilice could have done.
No, it should be the job of the police to check if there are any CCTV cameras covering the area. I wouldn't want CCTV footage to just be handed out to anyone who asks (though it is covering a public area) which is why it should be the police requesting the footage for the purpose of law enforcement.
Have a read of the Guardian article that I linked to. I agree that it should be the police's job, but if the picture painted in the article is true (and it is truly shocking) then it is easily understandable why they can't.
Where does the fault lie - the overstreteched copper or the politicians who aren't funding more of them (and the public who elected them)?
And the police have asked for the cctv evidence to be made available to them, by the most propitious avenue available. To demand it otherwise (as pointed out elsewhere) requires a court order or search warrant.
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