Motorcyclist in horrific accident cleared of Fort William dangerous driving charge

This Fort William dangerous driving charge involved a horrific accident.

Our client was riding a motorcycle on a straight stretch of road. While executing an overtake, he was struck by a car turning right into an unofficial car park. The accident, which was caught on dashcam, proved near-fatal to our client.

For reasons which escape us, a decision was made not to prosecute the car driver for a careless maneouvre. Instead, our client was prosecuted for riding at excessive speed, overtaking when it was unsafe to do so, failing to observe a vehicle turning right and colliding with it. The Crown had a body of evidence to support this Fort William dangerous driving charge, including a collision report suggestive of excessive speed. The most troublesome evidence, however, was dashcam footage which showed that the car was slowing down and signalling right for about ten seconds prior to the accident.

Our client had no recollection whatsoever of the incident so could not recall the context in which he had decided it was safe to overtake. In preparation for trial, we spent hours viewing and analysing the dashcam footage and other evidence. We were fully satisfied that  although our client had a firm defence against dangerous driving, there was a significant risk of conviction.

We had previously discussed this case at length with the Crown in attempting to have the case dropped. Ultimately we must have struck a chord because, on the morning of the trial, the Crown offered a plea to the reduced charge of careless driving together with sginficant deletions in terms of the allegations of excessive speed and failing to keep a proper lookout. In view of the amount of time that the car driver was indicating for, we considered that this was an offer that had to be accepted. Our client was thereafter cleared of dangerous driving and convicted of the lesser offence of careless driving.