Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone

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Thu 9 May 2019 17:24
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - Falkirk Bairn

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-48213106

6 month ban - he already had 6 points for speeding & was given another 6 today for using a mobile whilst driving.

A long time coming - "Loophole Lawyer "dug him out of some earlier charges when he was found not guilty.

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Thu 9 May 2019 17:59
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - FP

Another example, presumably, of a celebrity (like an MP) thinking that somehow the law doesn't apply to them.

Irritating, but hardly surprising.

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Thu 9 May 2019 18:24
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - kiss (keep it simple)

I always find it annoying that rich celebs can claim that they need their car for their job. Why can't they have a driver on hand 24/7?

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Thu 9 May 2019 19:15
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - Kekettykek

Almost all cars now come with Bluetooth and a handsfree function, was it beyond his intellect to set up his phone with the infotainment system?

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Thu 9 May 2019 19:55
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - Falkirk Bairn

It was said in the past that Beckham did not the sharpest of brains BUT surely he has a PA / Man @ Bentley who could have fixed it. Not the sharpest but he is said to be £00's of millions.

"Banned it like Beckham"

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Thu 9 May 2019 20:56
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - kiss (keep it simple)

Kids probably fiddled with it on the school run and messed it up!

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Thu 9 May 2019 21:19
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - gordonbennet

I feel sorry for people like Becks, always some envious creep around wanting to spoil things for them, another citizen spy recruit doing his/her best work there, the Stasi would be proud.

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Thu 9 May 2019 21:27
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - craig-pd130

I feel sorry for people like Becks, always some envious creep around wanting to spoil things for them, another citizen spy recruit doing his/her best work there, the Stasi would be proud.

Agreed. I'm sure the person who selflessly submitted the image has never committed any such offences themselves.

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Thu 9 May 2019 22:01
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - FP

Why does it matter who supplied the evidence? Why does it matter if they committed a similar offence? (Jurors, for example, are not disqualified for minor legal offences.)

People in the public eye should expect to be more rigorously scrutinised than the rest of us.

I have no sympathy for Beckham at all, and if it's true that he has managed to worm his way out of similar scenarios in the past because he has the wealth to employ lawyers most of us could never afford, then he has rightly got his come-uppance this time.

Edited by FP on 09/05/2019 at 22:02

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Thu 9 May 2019 23:18
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - craig-pd130

Why does it matter who supplied the evidence? Why does it matter if they committed a similar offence? (Jurors, for example, are not disqualified for minor legal offences.)

Because as GordonBennett pointed out, it has a disturbing Stasi / Nazi Germany feel about it. Every person on this forum has, at some point in their driving career, picked up a phone / eaten a snack / sipped from a drink bottle, cup or can / moved an item with their hand from one place to another while they are behind the wheel of a moving vehicle. All of those actions can, and have been classed as driving without due care when witnessed by police officers.

So if a zealous Dashcam Warrior submitted footage of that to the police -- even though no accident or near-miss had occurred -- would you really take the resulting points and fine and accept it as your 'come-uppance'?

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Thu 9 May 2019 23:25
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - RT

I see no issue with voluntarily sending dash-cam footage to the police - no different to calling 999 while witnessing an illegal incident.

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Fri 10 May 2019 00:56
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - FP

"Every person on this forum has, at some point in their driving career, picked up a phone / eaten a snack / sipped from a drink bottle, cup or can / moved an item with their hand from one place to another while they are behind the wheel of a moving vehicle. All of those actions can, and have been classed as driving without due care when witnessed by police officers."

By listing these actions together you are conflating a specific legal offence (holding a mobile phone) with other actions which MAY be interpreted as not being in proper control of a motor vehicle. (I believe they do not usually fall into the category of driving without due care and attention.) It is only handling a phone which is a cut-and-dried offence.

"So if a zealous Dashcam Warrior submitted footage of that to the police -- even though no accident or near-miss had occurred -- would you really take the resulting points and fine and accept it as your 'come-uppance'?"

Why not?

I don't understand why people are getting themselves into a lather about the way in which evidence was gathered. You mean it's OK if you're convicted on the evidence of a police officer, but not of a "dashcam warrior"? This is like one of the spurious arguments against speed cameras - they shouldn't be allowed because it's a sneaky way of getting evidence.

As is often said about speeding - if you don't break the law you won't get caught.

Edited by FP on 10/05/2019 at 00:59

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Fri 10 May 2019 09:32
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - craig-pd130

By listing these actions together you are conflating a specific legal offence (holding a mobile phone) with other actions which MAY be interpreted as not being in proper control of a motor vehicle. (I believe they do not usually fall into the category of driving without due care and attention.) It is only handling a phone which is a cut-and-dried offence.

I don't understand why people are getting themselves into a lather about the way in which evidence was gathered. You mean it's OK if you're convicted on the evidence of a police officer, but not of a "dashcam warrior"? This is like one of the spurious arguments against speed cameras - they shouldn't be allowed because it's a sneaky way of getting evidence.

As is often said about speeding - if you don't break the law you won't get caught.

All of the actions I mentioned have been successfully prosecuted as driving offences: handling a phone has simply been singled out for specific targeting as an offence, so I am not conflating. The law only changed last summer to increase penalties for phone handling.

And what I object to with dashcam warriors is the submission of evidence in cases where no actual harm - or even a close call - resulted. Read the original news article again. There was no bump, no near-miss. Yes, handling a phone behind the wheel is an offence. But as someone once said quite wisely, 'let he who is without sin cast the first stone.'

And you are conflating dashcam evidence with speed camera usage. Neither fixed cameras nor mobile speed traps are 'sneaky.'

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Fri 10 May 2019 12:38
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - FP

"All of the actions I mentioned have been successfully prosecuted as driving offences: handling a phone has simply been singled out for specific targeting as an offence, so I am not conflating."

My concern about lumping all these together is that handling a phone is an absolute offence, while the others are not. I really don't think that anyone is going to be prosecuted on the basis of being filmed by a member of the public while they were eating an apple at the wheel.

"But as someone once said quite wisely, 'let he who is without sin cast the first stone.'" I doubt that Jesus's words were intended to be about the rule of law. On the basis of your argument, as no-one is blameless, no-one should be responsible for the prosecution of anyone else.

"And what I object to with dashcam warriors is the submission of evidence in cases where no actual harm - or even a close call - resulted. Read the original news article again. There was no bump, no near-miss."

I don't need to read the article again, thank you. On the basis of this argument, speed cameras are unacceptable because they frequently catch people breaking the law by exceeding the speed limit even when the road is clear and no accident could possibly result. But you seem to have no problem with speed cameras.

"I was breaking the law, but it was OK because no harm came of it and the guy who filmed me is probably guilty of all kinds of things and was just being nasty because I'm rich and famous" will not work as a legal defence, nor as a moral one.

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Fri 10 May 2019 16:55
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - craig-pd130

I really don't think that anyone is going to be prosecuted on the basis of being filmed by a member of the public while they were eating an apple at the wheel.

This case set a precedent, when police successfully fined and awarded points to a driver eating a banana while stuck in a traffic jam: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3406669/Driver-pay-145-eating-banana-wheel.html. It's hardly a great leap to a member of the public submitting video evidence of similar to the police, and the police taking it further, given that a previous case has been successful.

And I was quoting 'he who is without sin' in the context of dashcam warriors judging and informing on others for things that they in all likelihood have done themselves at some point. Because I'm 100% certain that those who inform would be delighted for their own offences to be brought to account.

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Fri 10 May 2019 17:45
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - FP

"This case set a precedent, when police successfully fined and awarded points to a driver eating a banana while stuck in a traffic jam: www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3406669/Driver-pa...l. It's This case set a precedent, when police successfully fined and awarded points to a driver eating a banana while stuck in a traffic jam: www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3406669/Driver-pa...l. It's hardly a great leap to a member of the public submitting video evidence of similar to the police, and the police taking it further, given that a previous case has been successful., given that a previous case has been successful."

I am familiar with that case, but your suggestion that it's "hardly a great leap to a member of the public submitting video evidence of similar to the police, and the police taking it further" is a leap nonetheless. It's never happened, to my knowledge, and may never happen. My guess is that, for a prosecution to be successful, further evidence besides dashcam footage or a photo would be required.

"And I was quoting 'he who is without sin' in the context of dashcam warriors judging and informing on others for things that they in all likelihood have done themselves at some point. Because I'm 100% certain that those who inform would be delighted for their own offences to be brought to account."

You may well be correct, but we aren't discussing the failures of human character here - just the validity of evidence in legal proceedings.

Edited by FP on 10/05/2019 at 18:38

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Fri 10 May 2019 19:27
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - Leif
You suggest that someone who reports Beckham is sneaky, and yet the weasel has got off several times on points of law despite being guilty. Let he who is without sin cast the first stone. Well in this case many stones have already been cast, so is this a case of let he who is without sin cast the umpteenth stone?
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Thu 9 May 2019 22:02
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - Chris M

Shame there wasn't a "citizen spy" to catch the lorry driver before he killed the mother and three children who were stationery in traffic on the A34.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/amplifier/uk-england-37823457

Nothing against Beckham at all, but fiddling with a phone whilst driving needs to be seen in the same light as drink driving. Selfish.

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Thu 9 May 2019 22:28
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - Chris M

Hopefully a link that works.

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/video/2016/oct/31/lorr...o

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Thu 9 May 2019 22:51
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - John F

Justice should apply equally to Beckham or Bloggs, but the fine should be relative to income, as per Scandinavia, if the punishment for the offence is to be remotely equitable. Having just googled 'Beckham net worth', I doubt if the deprivation of a seven figure sum would make much impression on his well-being. £750 wouldn't even fill the tank of his jet.

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Thu 9 May 2019 23:29
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - Leif
Yes, well deserved. He only has himself to blame.
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Fri 10 May 2019 16:12
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - Happy Blue!

All my cars since 2006 have had Bluetooth installed. I had car kits before then.

Ignoring Beckham, in my travels around the Manchester region I see far too many people driving expensive cars which must have Bluetooth installed; yet they are frequently seen (usually youngish women) with one had clamped to their ear with a phone in between.

They are usually sufficiently technologically capable of setting up an iPhone and posting on Facebook etc so presumably they can get to grips with setting up Bluetooth. Even my wife can do her own car/phone connection without my interference (I am told to get lost if I try to help).

Therefore I have no sympathy for Beckham. I am sure one of his kids or his wife can set up the phone/car connection for him; even Bentley would have done it for him at no cost.

It is one of those situations that he simply couldn't be bothered. But if he had hit a child....

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Fri 10 May 2019 18:38
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - Chris M

100% agree with you Happy Blue.

My wife and elder son use a SuperTooth Buddy in their cars. They are placed on the sun visor and at around £30 they are excellent. Make and receive calls and texts safely. Son number two has an aftermarket Sony radio with Bluetooth hands free. It was around £100 and works as well as the factory fit system in my Astra.

Absolutely no reason for anyone to need to touch their phone whilst driving.

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Sat 11 May 2019 04:33
Bentley Bentayga - Beckham banned - guilty driving & using a phone - edlithgow

Re the Stazi thing, there's an overhead railway near the campus here which people park under, and since my car leaks, I'd been parking there too. Plenty of room, since its out in the sticks.

Then I got three hefty fines (with photo evidence) in the post and had to stop it, though other cars were still parking there.

Local best guess is I was specifically targeted by one of my students.

I'd think that's a potential downside to this kind of vigilante enforcement. Not necessarily even-handed justice, which one might hope for from the cops.

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