This saga relates my
experience fighting a false Dangerous Driving accusation
through the Scottish Justice system.
“Improbability Driving in Dundee” was first published on my blog A Hitch Hiker's Guide to NE Scotland in 2005 and grew to 10 entries.
Over the
years it has been superseded by a number of discrete web sites (3 at the last
count) and I have given the blog a more apposite title and reduced it to a single summary page with a
link to one of the web sites:
The summary
A driver, angry at being held up on his local road, which he liked to use as a racetrack, had a temper tantrum and tailgated me;
this didn't satisfy his fury so he got together with an acquaintance and reported me to the police.
This acquaintance was a motorcyclist who pretended to be a witness.
For good measure he got his girlfriend to say she was riding pillion so that she could also pretend to be a witness.
The conspirators embellished their story with a number of improbable events; following the Douglas Adams space ship with its
Improbability Drive, they twisted the laws of space and time:
1 - the driver claimed his car was damaged, but a scuff mark on a tyre was all the police could find;
2 - he managed to 'remember' 2 registration numbers, despite claiming to be shocked and confused;
3 - the motorcyclist, who claimed always to keep to the speed limit (“up to 50mph”),
managed to keep pace with, and even overtake, my allegedly speeding car;
4 - he claimed he identified me when "he looked over and we looked back", even though he'd just said I was ahead of him;
5 - his pillion witness said she "got quite a fright" when observing the incident even though she was 20 miles away at the time;
6 - my magic Citroen twice overtook the witnesses's vehicles even though it was already in front of them;
7
- and finally, the least improbable fact (which Douglas Adams fans will appreciate) is that the complaining driver lives near Liff.
Unfortunately, a credulous Sheriff accepted their improbable version of events and convicted me.
After the trial, I unearthed definitive proof that a crucial part of the prosecution's story,
relating to the time and location of the main incident, was false.
The authorities were not interested.
The players
Me – heading home at a leisurely pace in my Citroen, listening to Eddie Mair
halfway through his PM slot on Radio 4, moving out to pass a heavily laden truck doing 25 mph, aware of a distant Astra charging up the outside lane…...
Peter AG Carnegie
(aka the Balgowan Bully),
the Astra driver – finding his route to speed heaven
blocked by a Citroen passing a slow truck, had a temper tantrum – tailgated, flashed and hooted;
and when he did get past he slowed down abruptly
in front of me…...
Miro
(aka the Perjurer) – roaring up
just after the tailgating incident, turned round in his saddle and gestured
towards the Astra with thumb and forefinger……
The Perjurer's Apprentice
–
Miro’s pillion passenger – a
phantom…...
Thomas Crookwank – my pompous solicitor and a man so pleased
with himself that he would mention his friends in high places at every meeting; he told me I was guilty and
said I was lying but denied saying so when I complained about him to the Law Society of Scotland……
AG McCulloch – the Sheriff – despite spotting some of the
lies told by the Crown witnesses, he refused to believe that all 3 could have conspired to tell tall stories in his court; unable to explain
why my story was so utterly different, he hit upon the notion that I was tired, thus accounting for my faulty recollection……
Full details can be viewed here.
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