Police target driving 'loopholes'
Reckless drivers who use legal loopholes to avoid conviction are being targeted in a new police initiative.
The Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) is training police and CPS lawyers to make stronger cases. ACPO is also introducing a team made up of a lawyer and a former police officer to help prosecute safety camera cases.
The association hopes motorists will avoid contesting their speeding charge because, if they lose, their costs will include up to £4,000 for the cost of the team.
Police also say they will be keeping a close eye on drivers who they think have been wrongly acquitted of crimes.
Meredydd Hughes, the chief constable of South Yorkshire Police, said: "There have been a number of cases where people feel that justice has not been done, both in the drink-driving world and where people have evaded the law having driven cars recklessly and at very high speeds."
David Frost, LARSOA press and PR officer, said: "LARSOA welcomes intelligence led policing if this means higher risk offenders are removed from the roads. Too often recently we have seen high profile examples of so called 'loop-hole lawyers' assisting celebrities, or the well off, to get away with breaking serious laws - either without penalty, or with derisory/minimum fines or penalties.
"Any road user who breaks the law must be seen to receive the punishment to fit the crime, regardless of their social status in the community."
However, the campaign group Liberty raised concerns that police may unlawfully target individuals. Spokesman James Welch said: "If Mr Hughes is suggesting that police officers are going to target people they consider have been unjustly acquitted - meaning they are going to stop them on a number of occasions when they don't have a good reason - then that should be wrong in principle, and is almost certainly illegal as well."
For the full story go to: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/5340846.stm 
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