Categories: General
      Date: Mar  8, 2010
     Title: Unreliable Speed Trap - Crown Court Victory!!

We have just won an important victory at Truro crown Court in relation to an allegation of speeding.

The Judge found that the speed trap at A30 Temple Junction - was potentially unreliable and the conviction in the Magistrates Court was unsafe....read more

The case was run by Jemma Hurrel, Senior Team Leader under Emma Patterson's supervision.

Date of offence - (Friday!) 13th March 2009. Speed check conducted at

Temple junction on the A30. Officer parked on hardstanding designed for

that purpose. Operating a Provida device carrying out a pre-fed check.

The reference points used for the check were the tip of directional

arrowheads for Colliford Lake and a painted square on the carriageway.

Raised concerns over Officer's ability to accurately see the first reference

point, which was 0.5miles away (about 8 full sized football pitches away).

From Officer's position, three large road signs formed

a barrier to a complete view of the road. Our client was adamant that the

officer began the speed check on a different car, which then braked

suddenly, and captured our client's car emerging from behind the screens,

giving a false reading of the client's speed.

In the Crown Court proceedings our client re-enacted scene, using video footage

from both Officer's position and overhead bridge, giving a different angle.

The Crown Court Judge stated that the only question to be considered was whether

or not he could be sure that the same car emerged from behind the barrier as

that which the Officer had begun the speed check on. He found that he could

NOT be sure, therefore the appeal was allowed.

To support our argument, we raised various points in ACPO which state that

the Officer carrying out the speed check must have constant and unobstructed

view of the vehicle in question throughout the duration of the speed check.

In this case, when measuring the time the cars were hidden behind the

screens on the video footage, it could be seen that the barrier is formed

for approximately 30% of the check.