You may remember how English driver Dale Lyle beat a speeding ticket by proving that his Civic’s top speed was less than the 98 MPH he was charged with driving. Well, the “my car can’t go that fast” excuse appears to have worked again.
Tex O’Reilly was alleged to have done 173 MPH in his Lotus Elise along a country road in England. His defense successfully asserted that the top speed of his car was only 127 MPH, and thus he could not have been going 173 MPH. While there was no specific testing of the car as with Lyle, the prosecution accepted the stipulation as fact.
For some reason that I cannot fathom, O’Reilly admitted to driving 105 MPH in his plea. As a result, he was 5000 pound fine (about $7240) and banned from driving for 2 years. Its a good thing he wasn’t going much faster, as the judge said that if he had been going 150 MPH, he would be going straight to jail. I still cannot understand why he would admit to going 105 MPH. I could understand if he was trying to admit some fault in hopes of getting a reduced sentence, but the absurdity of the charge against (being impossible and all) means the entire thing should have been dismissed outright. Afterall, if the only evidence of speeding was the physcially impossible 173 MPH the crown alleged, and that later stipulated as impossible, what exactly is the case against O’Reilly? It is in his admission, silly him!
Also of note is O’Reilly’s attorney’s statement that “They [Lotus Elises] are not built for that speed and the likelihood of one being able to keep control of such a vehicle at that speed is beyond comprehension.” Actually, it may be a handful, but I can completely comprehend such a car going that speed with the right amount of power. Of course, it makes his client’s case sound better when he says that, but that doesn’t mean I can’t call him out!
on March 23, 2009 at 11:23 pm Richard C. wrote:
Although our law courts are based on English ones, are you certain that they would have thrown away the whole thing outright after showing “proof” it can’t reach 173?
on March 24, 2009 at 1:42 am Noah wrote:
Any lawyer that says they are sure about any outcome in court is a lawyer that you fire and walk away from
That said, the charge as I understand from the article was traveling 173 where the speed limit was decidedly less than that. If the car cannot travel that fast, then the assertion of the state has been rebuked as impossible. I don’t see how the state could possibly assert that you were going any other speed with any credibility when it’s first “guess” was incorrect. That would be like saying “the suspect punched the victim repeatedly in the head, and only punched the victim” (ie, no feet, etc) and then bringing in a suspect with no arms. I don’t see how you could then assert that, well, the injuries were in fact caused by kicks.
Of course, traffic court tends to operate outside of the realm of normal court proceedings (in practice), so who knows.