Bicycle fines for running a red light?

Seve OB

shansey wrote: »

can anyone who has been through this tell me what kind of fine they go???

why? did ya get done?

iregk

jin.ie wrote: »

Yes but since when do cyclists always follow the same rules as motorists?

DirkVoodoo

I find it funny that people are bemoaning the fines and that they can't pay them. They aren't compulsory for cycling, if you don't want to pay them you just have to stop at any red lights you meet.

A minute or two a day onto the commute or €120 and a few hours lost in court dates? Pretty easy to work that one out.

Oldlegs

shansey wrote: »

can anyone who has been through this tell me what kind of fine they go???

Ah come on Shansey. Even just looking at the last page of the thread before your post would have given you the answer.

But in case you are still not able to find it,

jambalap wrote: »

was in court today with my lawyer for cycle breaking red. The first thing judge ask is are there any previous convictions. As I had none i was asked to pay 120 euro to the court poor box and the case was dismissed. Judge gave chance to every defendant in all the cases to explain from their side.

Chips Lovell

It's at the judge's discretion within certain limits.

One poster here got fined €200 and the judge told him the max was €1,000.

turbodiesel

Cyclists are road users and are bound by the rules of the road......simples.

I don't always obey the rules myself. If i was unlucky enough to be caught out then i'd say fair enough and cough up the fine.......be easier if it was an on the spot one rather than the overall cost to the courts system of having to go to court though.

KTRIC

I'm usually in Dublin City center most evenings and the amount of people I have to dodge on footpaths during busy periods on Dublin Bike's is unreal !! You say anything and all you get is abuse. You can't but get out of their way, getting hit by one of those tanks wouldn't be pleasant.

Jawgap

shansey wrote: »

can anyone who has been through this tell me what kind of fine they go???

Crucifixion.......

.....out the door, line on the left, one cross each.....

120 to 200 seems to be the going rate. A colleague of mine was 'done' recently (and seemed more narked when I declined to sympathise with him) and was fined €120. He said he just went in and admitted the offence. Another chap who was up before him started arguing with the judge and wanted to cross-examine the Guard - he was still done, except it cost him €450!

le petit braquet

Jawgap wrote: »

Another chap who was up before him started arguing with the judge and wanted to cross-examine the Guard - he was still done, except it cost him €450!

Many years ago I was in the District Court for a traffic offence. In one of the cases before me, a woman had employed a solicitor who started cross examining the Guard with no great purpose to his questions. The judge got quite obviously irritated and when the solicitor concluded, he then pointedly asked the clerk to tell him what the maximum fine for the offence was and then fined her it! Unless you have a really strong case I would plead guilty and not risk annoying the judge.

SerialComplaint

KTRIC wrote: »

I'm usually in Dublin City center most evenings and the amount of people I have to dodge on footpaths during busy periods on Dublin Bike's is unreal !! You say anything and all you get is abuse. You can't but get out of their way, getting hit by one of those tanks wouldn't be pleasant.

Sometimes, despite my best efforts to sidestep these, one shoulder often seems to stay in the cyclist's path and catch firmly against the cyclist as they come past me.

Lusk Doyle

SerialComplaint wrote: »

Sometimes, despite my best efforts to sidestep these, one shoulder often seems to stay in the cyclist's path and catch firmly against the cyclist as they come past me.

You should film that with your helmet cam and post it

shansey

€120..steep enough..but i suppose i was in the wrong so what can ya do!?..

seems like a fine in th post would be much simpler than taking me to court for a morning!

Anyway, pedestrians, cyclists and motorists all do stupid things on the road, as a driver i have been hit by a bike from behind, as a cyclist i have had more than one pedestrian step out in front of me...everyone should be a bit more careful.. i learned my lesson anyway!

seamus

Jawgap wrote: »

Another chap who was up before him started arguing with the judge and wanted to cross-examine the Guard

I've spoken to a Guard about this stuff, and they were saying that carrying out the prosecution themselves for minor stuff like this varies from mild amusement to outright frustration.
Most guys seem to think they're on some courtroom drama and can win it by coming up with revelatory piece obscure evidence ("My name is spelled with two x's!") but some pay good money for a solicitor who clearly knows that he can't win, but is obliged to defend, so asks the same questions over and over in the hope that the Guard is green and will slip up and change their story.

Usually the judge gives them (and their solicitor) a dressing down and hammers up the fine.

Moral of the story: Don't fight the charge unless you're innocent.

Lusk Doyle

shansey wrote: »

€120..steep enough..but i suppose i was in the wrong so what can ya do!?..

seems like a fine in th post would be much simpler than taking me to court for a morning!

Anyway, pedestrians, cyclists and motorists all do stupid things on the road, as a driver i have been hit by a bike from behind, as a cyclist i have had more than one pedestrian step out in front of me...everyone should be a bit more careful.. i learned my lesson anyway!

Only time will tell.

Jawgap

seamus wrote: »

....

Moral of the story: Don't fight the charge unless you're capable of proving in a rational, unemotional and logical way that you are innocent and have sufficient objective and unbiased evidence on which to base your position.

Given the amount of rigtheous indignation that flows in this country I felt your advice was bordering on dangerous so I fixed it!

Hungrycol

le petit braquet wrote: »

Many years ago I was in the District Court for a traffic offence. In one of the cases before me, a woman had employed a solicitor who started cross examining the Guard with no great purpose to his questions. The judge got quite obviously irritated and when the solicitor concluded, he then pointedly asked the clerk to tell him what the maximum fine for the offence was and then fined her it! Unless you have a really strong case I would plead guilty and not risk annoying the judge.

Ahh here. If the judge didn't get his breakfast roll that morning do I run the risk of being at the arse end of hefty fine because the Judge is "annoyed"?

Judge: Traffic violation XYZ, not stopping at a red light how do you plead?
Me: Not guilty
Judge: Mr Guard did he run the red light?
Guard: Yes
Judge: (looking at me with distain) You farted in my mothers face I fine you €86523.
Me: Bu...
Judge: You farted on my fathers grave another €95639. NOW SOMEONE GET ME MY BACON BUTTY.

Jawgap

Hungrycol wrote: »

Ahh here. If the judge didn't get his breakfast roll that morning do I run the risk of being at the arse end of hefty fine because the Judge is "annoyed"?

Judge: Traffic violation XYZ, not stopping at a red light how do you plead?
Me: Not guilty
Judge: Mr Guard did he run the red light?
Guard: Yes
Judge: (looking at me with distain) You farted in my mothers face I fine you €86523.
Me: Bu...
Judge: You farted on my fathers grave another €95639. NOW SOMEONE GET ME MY BACON BUTTY.

In a word - 'yes' - if you want to vindicate your rights and you make him swear the Guard in to give evidence rather than a brief summation of the facts you'll get a fantastic illustration of what happens when power and authority combine to your disadvantage.

If you do swear the Guard in, make sure to get him to admit he ordered the Code Red....

SerialComplaint

Lusk Doyle wrote: »

You should film that with your helmet cam and post it

Yes, I guess all pedestrians should wear helmets, all the time -

le petit braquet

Hungrycol wrote: »

Ahh here. If the judge didn't get his breakfast roll that morning do I run the risk of being at the arse end of hefty fine because the Judge is "annoyed"?

Justice and the law are often mutually exclusive. A friend of mine was in court one day when a judge was dealing with a load of motorists who all had been caught at the same speed trap on the same day. He gave them all a standard fine (say 200 euro) regardless of the amount they had exceeded the speed limit. A guy who had exceeded the limit at the lower end of the scale started to protest because he was being fined at the same level as others who had in his view been "more guilty" when an exchange along the following lines occurred.

Judge: Fined 200 euro!
Motorist: But I was only 10 km over the limit and the last guy was 30 km!
Judge: Fined 250 euro!
Motorist: But that's not fair, the last guy ...
Judge: Fined 300 euro!

Undercover Elephant

le petit braquet wrote: »

Judge: Fined 200 euro!
Motorist: But I was only 10 km over the limit and the last guy was 30 km!
Judge: Fined 250 euro!
Motorist: But that's not fair, the last guy ...
Judge: Fined 300 euro!

That's either an ... er ... artistic impression of what actually happened, or grounds for appeal.

le petit braquet

Undercover Elephant wrote: »

That's either an ... er ... artistic impression of what actually happened, or grounds for appeal.

Well I did make it clear it wasn't verbatim! Clearly one can always appeal, but that also involves the expense and time of another day in court and spinning the legal roulette wheel one more time.

Jerome K Jerome, author of Three Men in a Boat and Three Men on a Bummel, has a piece on the law in the latter book which I often feel is a valuable maxim for life. One of the characters remarks that if someone approached him in the street and asked him to hand over his watch he would resist, but if threatened with a law suit for the watch, he would hand it over straight away and think he had got off lightly.

morana

possibly judges have been told to get as much money as they can thru fines and I reckon they are doing it across the board. it would be interesting to see the income from fines over the years

magicbastarder

i would suspect that if the justice system was being run as a revenue generating system, they'd have to charge a hell of a lot more than €120 to justify the time and expense of doing someone in court.