Driver fined $750 for killing rider

roundman58 · Post by **roundman58** » Sat Apr 29, 2006 12:27 pm

A 24-year-old man has been fined $750 for driving without due care and causing an accident that killed a motorcyclist in South Australia.

Benjamin Paul Staveley of North Haven, in Port Adelaide, also had his licence disqualified for eight months.

Staveley's lawyer pleaded guilty on behalf of his client in the Port Adelaide Magistrate's Court today.

The magistrate said Staveley had a momentary lapse of concentration when he turned into the path of a motorcyclist at an intersection in Ethelton in 2004.

The victim's mother, Julie McIntyre, says she is disappointed with the result.

"I feel as though my son has been treated as road kill by our justice system," she said.

"There is something strange about a justice system when you consider that fines that are issued by our courts are presumably worth less than the lawyers' fees involved in defending the charges."

ninja9 · Post by **ninja9** » Sat Apr 29, 2006 12:49 pm

That's incredible. You get worse for excessive speeding without injuring anyone. It's about time the courts starting treating bikers as equals to other road users. If a biker had killed someone due to similar reasons I wonder what the result would have been?

stevew_zzr · Post by **stevew_zzr** » Sat Apr 29, 2006 2:26 pm

Well as it turns out, motorcyclists are 'disposable' because 'we accept the risks'.

Well I accept some level of risk, but I don't accept that drivers should be friggen clueless and mow us down all the time.

RG · Post by RG » Sat Apr 29, 2006 2:57 pm

Who is this magistrate?
Hasn't he/she got any brain?
Why not just fine the driver $1? It's still the same level of insult.

ZZRCHIKKY · Post by **ZZRCHIKKY** » Sat Apr 29, 2006 4:44 pm

750 and had his licence disqualified for eight months, hmm yer good one

Exscuse me while i get in my metal cage and run over a padestrian

. . .

. . . sorrie there fault they shouldnt walk on foot paths

TICK TICK TICK . . thats rather pissed me off alot !!!

kypez · Post by **kypez** » Sat Apr 29, 2006 5:44 pm

ninja9 wrote: That's incredible. You get worse for excessive speeding without injuring anyone. It's about time the courts starting treating bikers as equals to other road users. If a biker had killed someone due to similar reasons I wonder what the result would have been?

yeah, drink driving and the such attract thousands of dollars worth of fines and years on end of disqualification...

How much longer do we have to deal with such injustice?

chameleon · Post by **chameleon** » Sat Apr 29, 2006 7:22 pm

Injustice? It was an accident, plain and simple. You can kill someone in a car and get the same penalties, just cause ya ride a bike doesn't make you worth more if your dead. Bikes are easier to have accidents with because they have smaller cross-sectional areas, hence are harder to see. I would be interested to know if the bike had a headlight on, or wether it was on older one running without.

I-K · Post by **I-K** » Sat Apr 29, 2006 7:47 pm

chameleon wrote:Injustice? It was an accident, plain and simple.

Really? Then why was he charged with

driving without due care

An accident is something that happens despite the parties' involved best efforts to avoid it. When someone mows someone down in traffic because they can't be bothered to look, that's negligence, not an accident.

You can kill someone in a car and get the same penalties, just cause ya ride a bike doesn't make you worth more if your dead.

That's not what people have been saying. They have been asking for *parity* in sentencing.

People who have taken the trouble to look into the applicable court proceedings have found that the discredited horseshit you go on to dribble below is exactly how courts think, despite the fact that studies have shown that turning across the path or pulling out in front of other vehicles does not occur because they don't see them, but because they don't look.

Had there been a fire engine with its lights and sirens going, chances are the guy in this case would still have turned across its path.

Bikes are easier to have accidents with because they have smaller cross-sectional areas, hence are harder to see. I would be interested to know if the bike had a headlight on, or wether it was on older one running without.

Just to reiterate, what you say above is prejudiced, uninformed crap. Studies have shown it to be so, but because experts don't know what they're talking about, people, and courts, continue to hand out the short end of the stick to the victim in cases like this.

ZZRCHIKKY · Post by **ZZRCHIKKY** » Sat Apr 29, 2006 8:04 pm

motocyclests should have sufficient training unlike the older fellows who had to go get a coppa lunch and come back in one peice .

during licensing today u get taught where to sit on the road so that cars are more likley to see u ( if the car driver bothers to look!)

But the point is . . .

shouldnt this be at least a manslaughter charge ????

stevew_zzr · Post by **stevew_zzr** » Sat Apr 29, 2006 8:13 pm

I think with manslaughter you have to have some intent to injure, but not to kill? Like you are provoked, or some such, and 'accidently' kill them.

Either way ... I personally find it ridiculous that people jump in cars, and then kill someone - and it's completely different to when people grab a shovel and accidently kill someone. Like somehow they aren't in control of a car the same way they are in control of a shovel.

Now before people point out the obvious - a car isn't a shovel - the fact is, a car has alot of power and potential. If people don't realise this, and don't responsibly use cars - then why should they be let off when they kill someone with a car just because it's easier to kill someone with a car than with a shovel? If people aren't able to control their actions and the actions of the car they are driving ... then they should take a good look in the mirror, then cut up their license, move to Dumbarseville (somewhere in the USA i think) and - most importantly - get off the f*&^ing road

ZZRCHIKKY · Post by **ZZRCHIKKY** » Sat Apr 29, 2006 8:18 pm

not stupid even !

a car can do more damage than a shovel and u het less for hitting someone over the head witha car !

getting in a car and acting like a fool is knowing that u could hurt someone with ur actions .

its not like anyone would get ina car and think they were an invinsable cage is it ???

ProblemChild · Post by **ProblemChild** » Sat Apr 29, 2006 8:19 pm

the pr*#k should have been garotted with a spoon. the judge too

(hope my spelling is o.k

)

HemiDuty · Post by **HemiDuty** » Sat Apr 29, 2006 8:31 pm

This is absolutely ridiculous. Like others have said that fine is more like a speeding fine, not a penalty for killing someone through stupidity.

All this says to people is "Ok, if you kill someone on a bike it isn't so bad, don't fret, you may have to pay a small fine, and might not be able to legally drive for a while, but it is no big deal. It's not like you took drugs without harming others, went 40 kms over the speed limit without killing or hurting anyone, or tried to use industrial action to get a livable income or anything else so sinister. All you did is a kill a guy on a bike, and we all know he had it coming because bikes are dangerous..."

Every day people are put in jail or otherwise heavily penalised for much less than this, without even hurting anyone else. This is more like open war on bike riders than a slap in the face.

And yet still we will hear more of the same tired old "speed kills" dogma, when independant study after independant study confirms this is simply not the case. People like this dickhead kill. Not speed in and of itself. But hey, he wasn't hooning or anything so why throw the book at him? Idiots and drivers who simply couldn't care are rewarded whilst good attentive riders and drivers who go too fast occasionally are treated like criminals. And we keep allowing them to keep it like this.

Condolences to relatives and friends of the poor rider, RIP mate.

roundman58 · Post by **roundman58** » Sat Apr 29, 2006 8:52 pm

ProblemChild wrote:the pr*#k should have been garotted with a spoon. the judge too (hope my spelling is o.k )

Spelling is almost okay, but do you actually know what it means to garrote someone?
I don't believe it is possible with a spoon.

Gosling1 · Post by **Gosling1** » Sat Apr 29, 2006 8:58 pm

roundman58 wrote:
ProblemChild wrote:the pr*#k should have been garotted with a spoon. the judge too (hope my spelling is o.k )
Spelling is almost okay, but do you actually know what it means to garrote someone?
I don't believe it is possible with a spoon.

its probably better than being spooned with a garotte....

the $750 fine is just an insult. Sounds like a good excuse to break out those barrels in Snowtown, for Mr Staveley.........