speeding issues

[plasticpen]

Hi

Posting for a friend who as a problem.

Last year he left his car at his brothers garage for him to sell.His brother let somebody who was interested in the car borrow it with a view to buying it. Unbeknown to him the person who borrowed it picked up a speeding ticket.

Unfortunately he as let things get out of hand. His brother didn’t know who the person was so cant pass on the details of the driver. Other factors are my friends post is always ending up next door,so he didn’t receive the notice of the speeding offence for many months. He also is looking after his daughter who is severely disabled daughter 24 hours a day, a considerable amount of stress to deal with.He received the single justice procedural notice but didn’t act on it

This was in april of 2023,now he as bailiffs threatening action. He must be able to appeal this, is there a procedure he can follow to address this with the court, or is it to late.




Many thanks

[HandyAndy]

What was he convicted of (I'll be rash and hazard a guess that it was "failing to provide driver's details")?

Since he was aware of the court proceedings against him (that's what the Single Justice Procedure Notice informs him of) he cannot perform a "Statutory Declaration" (SD) to have his conviction set aside. His only route of appeal would be to the Crown Court and he would have to lodge that appeal within 21 days of being convicted, so he is out of time. That is just as well because, from what you say, he has no realistic chance of success with such an appeal and failure would result in considerable additional costs (about £1,300 if I remember correctly).

It's unfortunate but owning and driving a car means responding to matters such as this. That said, even if he had responded to the SJPN he would not have had much in the way of a defence. All he would have is that his post "...is always ending up next door," If that was his defence he would have to prove that to the court's satisfaction. He could not (as if often possible) have the matter reverted to speeding because he wasn't driving.

The speeding offence, incidentally, is an irrelevance. Nobody can be charged with it as the police do not know who was driving and even if they found out now it is too late to charge anybody.

[plasticpen]

Cant this be appealed on the grounds of him being under stress looking after his severely disabled daughter,the points on his licence severely affect his being a taxi driver,mitigating circumstances etc

[HandyAndy]

Cant this be appealed on the grounds of him being under stress looking after his severely disabled daughter,the points on his licence severely affect his being a taxi driver,mitigating circumstances etc

He may have had a chance of putting something like that forward had he responded to the SJPN. He would still be guilty and may have received a smaller fine, but the court must impose six points for the offence.

As it stands, he has nowhere to appeal to. He is out of time for his only route (the Crown Court) and he has no basis for appeal anyway. There is section 142 of the Magistrates Court Act which allows Magistrates to re-open cases to rectify mistakes. But there has been no mistake.

The time to put forward any defence or mitigation was following receipt of the SJPN. He could have either entered a Not Guilty plea and defended the charge on the basis that he did not received the request or pleaded guilty and told the court about his personal circumstances.

It's very unfortunate but you simply can't ignore important court documents (and an SJPN is rather like a summons) and then expect the court to put matters right when they have taken their course.

If the original offence occurred in April 2023, it is likely the case against your friend would have been concluded well before the end of that year. I can't see any court entertaining revisiting this now.

Of course this is only my view. Try posting the details on here:

https://www.ftla.uk/

You will probably get a wider range of opinions on there and one or two of the members are qualified lawyers. I subscribe to that forum as well but I won't respond unless anything new turns up. Be sure you make it clear than an SJPN was received but ignored.