Splashing a bus stop.
MOTORIST COULD FACE PROSECUTION FOR PUDDLE DRENCHING
by James Woodward, Press Association.
A motorist who was filmed drenching children at a bus stop by going through a
puddle could face prosecution, police said today.
Kerry Callard's driving in Plymouth, Devon came to the attention of officers
after a 30-second movie clip was posted on YouTube.
The footage from inside the car captures the drive down Weston Mill Hill and
through the large puddle where the group are waiting.
Police said the 29-year-old had contacted them voluntarily about the incident
last Thursday and the evidence was now being reviewed.
A male voice is heard commenting on the clip saying: "Here we go, ready to
drench the kids.." and later "That was Brilliant! Awesome!".
Although the extract has been removed from YouTube there are several other
so-called "happy splashing" videos on the internet.
A spokesman for Devon and Cornwall Police said today: "We had three complaints
from members of the public and as a result a 29-year-old woman was interviewed.
The file has gone to the CPS for consideration."
Charges of careless or even dangerous driving could be brought for this type of
offence, the force said.
The spokesman added: "Although driving through standing water may be seen as a
bit of fun, potentially it is very dangerous.
"Not only is it showing no consideration to the pedestrians who may get a
soaking, but it could result in the driver losing control of the vehicle due to
the force of the water snatching the wheel from the hands, or by the vehicle
aquaplaning."
Callard has claimed the children asked to be splashed and would not have done
it otherwise.
She told the Daily Mail: "The fun factor is mostly gone from life these days
but they were playing in puddles, like kids always have done.
"If the kids weren't saying 'Splash me, splash me', I certainly wouldn't have
done it. I'm not a serial splasher."
The force said the children's possible agreement to the stunt would make no
difference to how the standard of driving was judged.
A motorist from Somerset who soaked a workman by driving through a puddle was
prosecuted in 2005. He was fined #150 and given three penalty points by
magistrates in Yeovil after he admitted driving without due consideration.
The AA agreed that soaking pedestrians was both "anti-social" and potentially
dangerous. The Association also reminded drivers that angry victims could film
the perpetrators on their mobile phones as evidence.
Paul Watters, the AA's head of roads policy, said today: "Drivers have always
got to look ahead for the possibility of accidentally soaking someone standing
at the roadside. Not only is it anti-social and leaves them open to prosecution
but also because, ironically, pedestrians can be armed with mobile phone cameras
too.
"Unfortunately, drivers can be caught out by poor road conditions, such as
potholes, drainage problems or just very heavy rain. In heavy traffic or poor
visibility, they may not spot the danger of splashing pedestrians until too late
or be unable to avoid the puddle.
"The best advice is to keep an eye on what's happening to the cars in front
and the state of the road. Drivers should slow down if pedestrians could be at
risk, particularly at bus stops."
Listen to PM
© MMIX~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~32~RS~)
Comments
Sign in or register to comment.
Small things...
Complain about this comment
She looked to be going a fair lick.
Complain about this comment
?? If this turns out to be a crime, what is footage of a criminal offence being committed doing on this website?!
Is it me?!
Complain about this comment
When I was driving a delivery van in the winter and got snow on the windscreen/windshield, I discovered that I could clean it off by hitting a puddle the right way.
Complain about this comment
I'm so glad that this 'abuse of school children' is amusing to this chap - maybe he should be treated like other child abusers are and run out of town by a baying mob before being added to the child offenders register. I bet he wouldn't find that so funny.
I guess it's a reflection of the attitude of car drivers who instantly become selfish as soon as they get behind the wheel - which is exactly why there are proportinately more fatalities involving car drivers than any other form of transport.
Complain about this comment
....oh and the idiot drivign clearly has never heard of aqua-planing either - such is the poor level of their driving knowledge. This story could easily have ended up as "driver crashes into bus stop killing several children"
....and we would have to listen to their sickening plea for lenience and their 'deep regret' in court - as we have done on so many other occassions...
Complain about this comment
I'm sorry, but I laughed like a drain when I saw - and heard - this. (It's nothing without the sound track).
Will I burn in hell?
Complain about this comment
Dunno.
Complain about this comment
JW 7, Not if somebody drives through a puddle near you down there.
Complain about this comment
If you don't say it too carefully, it sounds like, "Splashing a bus top."
Complain about this comment
I've been splashed by careless drivers many times, often while waiting to cross a road.
It's unpleasant, infuriating and unnecessary.
Complain about this comment
Old News Eddie. This was news on Saturday. I am pretty unimpressed that stale news from a local paper is being regurgitated here.
The Radio 4 PM Blog repeating what was done on The Herald website?
Search his name on them thisisplymouth website, and look them up on Facebook.
The front page of that paper today informs us of the driver of the Vauxhall Vectra in which Kimberley Grayson died on Embankment Road on the other side of Plymouth about a week earlier has been charged with death by dangerous driving. The roads aren't playgrounds are they? How many fatalities that have made big local news have happened when the roads have been wet? How wet will the roads of the South West be this winter?
Complain about this comment
Gosh it sounds a bit like Lenny Henry, which I'm sure it wasn't.
Complain about this comment
Sounds like Michael McIntyre commenting. Maybe he was running late for a gig.
Complain about this comment
There are no speed limit signs, so it's reasonable to think this is a 30 limit. It looks like the car was doing 45-50 added to the due care and attention
Complain about this comment
This is clearly an extremely dangerous thing to do. Others have mentioned the speed, the potential to aquaplane and other reasons why dangerous driving does appear to be an issue in this case.
However there is another side to this and I'd be interested to know whether there is any another potential outcome from the court case. The local authority/Highways Agency have a responsibilty to maintain the road. They ought to be forced to do something re such obvious potholes/drainage issues (i.e. get them fixed). I won't hold my breathe on that one though due to my own experience. For 5 years I reported to both agencies a huge dip in the middle of a dual carriageway coming into my city. For 5 years they put up roadworks in the summer and I presumed that the issue would get sorted out. In 2007 (hurrah) it finally got fixed but I dread to think how many cars were damaged as a result of this huge dip in the road. That doesn't excuse this driver's behaviour but it is an issue across the country. Our roads are a disgrace.
Complain about this comment
The Happy Splashing video will be seen by the Crown Prosecution Service.
If they laugh whilst watching it, the case should be dropped.
Like many people in the UK I'm getting grumpier and grumpier, and this clip has stopped me in my tracks. To hell with political correctness, let's have some fun and do stupid things occasionally.
If people getting wet ends up with their seeking counselling, then Britain has come to a sorry state.
Complain about this comment
Recycling four day old 'news' is seriously endangers the reputation of the BBC?
Complain about this comment
There you go Eddie, a serving suggestion for iPM, is driving within the law politically correct?
Complain about this comment
The Local Authority should be prosecuted for failing to maintain drainage and allowing the water to pool directly adjacent to the Bus Stop !!
Maybe the Police should consider doing something of real value here........
Complain about this comment
Hilarious! Send them down your honour, six months.
Complain about this comment
I can't see how it's possible the children wanted this to happen. If this driver feels it's all a bit of fun, they really need to be consistent and to publish their address so that total strangers can throw buckets of water over them wherever they go.
Complain about this comment
'political correctness gone mad' is now a catch all excuse when caught committing a crime is it?
The MPs expenses furore is political correctness gone mad?
Speed = Distance divided by time. Given the length of the film and the repetitive commentary it should be able to determine if they were speeding on that wet road.
Give Callard and Goff a medal for making Plymouth infamous for something other than Vanessa Geoege?
Complain about this comment
15. At 6:04pm on 14 Oct 2009, valveheadwork wrote:
There are no speed limit signs, so it's reasonable to think this is a 30 limit. It looks like the car was doing 45-50 added to the due care and attention
Good point. Lamp posts and no repeater signs = 30mph limit. A simple matter to do the run with a stopwatch and figure what speed she was actually doing down that hill.
Complain about this comment
Plymothians have form for recording themselves committing crimes:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/devon/7340765.stm
It begs the question if rednecks originate from Europe and whether the National Grid should have ended at Bristol.
Complain about this comment
certainly this is very anti-social behaviour and as someone who has been soaked on the way to work, a slight tad selfish as well. But what about other anti-social behaviour by some motorists - we are supposed to be encouraging children to walk to school to get more exercise but up and down the country pavements are used as extra parking spaces, in many cases meaning prams, children and wheelchair users have to walk on busy roads to get round them. Any in my home town of Dumfries the police actually enourage this because, guess what, if the cars parked on the road it might actually slow down the traffic and make the enviroment even more pleasant for pedstrians!
Complain about this comment
Unfortunately you don’t get a good view of the children so you can’t tell if it was a racially motivated splash
Complain about this comment
The police should prosecute the local Council for not clearing the drains?
They're too busy building New Labour's Big Brother Databases aren't they!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/hereford/worcs/8305209.stm
'Mathew Repton was charged in December 2008 over a fatal crash when a driver crashed into his parked fire engine.
Police took his DNA sample as standard procedure following his arrest but all charges against him were dropped.
West Mercia Police said it was considering his request but could legally keep his DNA record until 2021.'
Why aren't all MPs DNA swabbed and on the database then?
Eddie, any chance you could get a statement from each of the 3 main parties about when they'll comply with that EU Court of Human Rights directive about removing those that haven't committed any crime from the DNA database?
Surely the time and money the police are spending collecting data for the DNA database could be better utilised convicting criminals?
Complain about this comment
All very jovial to have Edmund King of the AA on yesterday to quote obscure legislation about puddle traffic offences but shouldn't you have him back to tell everyone about the sadly equally forgotten Road Vehicle Lighting Regulations 1989 about safe and proper and considerate use of sidelights and headlights? Especially at this critical time of the year when rush hours coincide with dawn and dusk twilight when sidelights really are the safer, glare-free, legal option.
Though we're all the poorer and less safe for most people forgetting it, the law calls for you to use sidelights in the first half hour after sunset and headlights thereafter, and in well street lit 30mph zones even at night sidelights are preferred in law and in common sense. The disadvantages of pretty much all but London black cabs failing to honour that rule are plain to see to anyone who drives in London. The vicious circle of trying to out-glare one another needs a drink-drive-style awareness campaign to break.
The blinding, disorientating, pedestrian-and-cyclist-and-indicator-obscuring, glare from modern headlights (and the demented modern day cult of showing off by blasting everyone full face with them) is rapidly becoming the most widespread and pressing road safety concern worldwide, as evidenced by the international websites groups such as the UK's www.dadrl.org.uk .
This is sadly heightened by the truly horrifying trend of even responsible, previously safety-leading, manufactures such as Mercedes jumping on the Daylight Running Light fad, their new E-class being a very serious cause for concern amongst anyone who has the misfortune to encounter its eye-piercing overly intense DRLs.
So puddles make a novel story, but the neglect of fundamental 'good neighbour' type traffic laws generally is a very much real live day to day problem.
Complain about this comment
There have been cases in the past where drivers have been prosecuted for soaking people at the side of the road. This act is not new. It's called "Driving without due care and attention" This is not political correctness, it's just sheer selfishness and lack of consideration for others. Prosecute the driver, large fine and several points.
Complain about this comment
with regards to 27. At 9:14pm on 14 Oct 2009, Thunderbird. The children at bus stop were of caucasian origen......however the driver / partner cld well have been of ethnic origen. Dont rule out racial attack.
Complain about this comment
It's a white on white crime. Kerry Callard and Alec Goff are both on Facebook you can check their ethnicity there.
Complain about this comment
T 31, So, they sounded 'other race' to you? I didn't listen to it, fill me in.
Complain about this comment
View these comments in RSS