Boating offences - disproportionate punishments?

[Tranona]

Daka Suggest you read the facts of the case before commenting. He was NOT fined 2500, but £460 plus £2000 costs. Details are in the first post on this thread. How can you judge it was a "slap on the wrist" event when you have no knowledge of even the basic facts.

The court which was in possesion of the facts thought otherwise. And the defendent had ample opportunity to present his defence. The fine was (I am not sure), probably near the maximum and the costs would not even pay the salaries of the court officials never mind the HM staff who had to attend.

IIRC the defendant said he accepted the court's verdict and had no intention of appealing either the fine or the costs.

Sounds like "Bang to rights to me"

 

[Tranona]

Michael. If you do ever get involved in these sorts of discussions again, might I suggest you read the chapter on sentencing in any basic text about the English Legal System.

Sentencing fulfils two purposes. The first is punishment and the second is deterrent. This principle has to be considered both when setting penalties by legislation and by applying them in the courts. The following three little scenarios based on the TSS case will illustrate.

DAKA to Deleted User (sitting on the back of Mike's boat in Majorca) "have you seen that case about the plonker who went the wrong way up the shipping lane? Got done 6 grand and 2 grand costs - thats twice my marina bill! Won't catch me doing that!"

Punishment was light. Fine was about 10% of the maximum. No idea why he did it because he pleaded guilty and did not enter a defence. Court took this into account, but also said he should have known better. Costs reflected the fact that there was little time spent in court - but would not have covered the cost of the spotter plane sent up to find out what was going on.

Email from bridge of 300000 ton crude tanker to head office. "Sorry guv. done a stupid thing - no excuses - steamed for 50 minutes at nearly full speed the wrong way up the lanes. OK haven't hit anything, but got caught by the spotter plane. Don't worry, the last bloke who got caught only got fined £6k and I will keep the costs down by pleading guilty."

Second email. "Sorry Guv, just realised the maximum fine is £50k so I guess you better call in the lawyers (sorry about that). And the bloke from the MCA just landed by chopper says he expects his boss will order a full audit of our procedures. Bet that will cost a bit! Promise not to do it again"

Signed "Soon to be ex Master"

Hope this helps sort this one out! And also explain (along with the Hamble incident, although not so clearly) why it is silly to use this as an example to support your opinions on regulation and sentencing. Influencing people in favour of your opinion depends on logical argument set in some kind of consensus framework - not just opinion. Otherwise law will regress and we will go back to the days of kangaroo courts and lynch mobs - which are not far behind us in time or distant in location.

 

[DAKA]

I presume speed guns would not work in that case or radar (land based or MARPA) which means the HM has to follow you ?

Some one would have to be oblivious to their surroundings not to notice the HM.

Would it stand up to a challenge in court ?
It would be easy to suggest the log was out due to impact to the log by debris.

If anyone has been fined for speeding I believe that would be wrong, unless they admitted to it of course.

 

[Tranona]

In Poole the harbour master uses radar guns. And they do prosecute some, but rely mainly on what you might call "wrist slapping" in the (correct in my view) belief that co-operation is better than persecution.

Because there is no "fixed penalty" offence, it has to go to court in situations where it believes the seriousness of the offence justfies the prosecution and let the court decide both the guilt or otherwise and the penalty based on the evidence, just like the Hamble case.

I guess the gun reading could be open to challenge, but equally don't think they would use to support a prosecution if it was not acceptable evidence.

As you say, the punter would be very unaware if it did not spot a Poole harbourmaster launch. Not the shy retiring type.

 

[DAKA]

This is how I think a boat would be going the wrong way in a TSS from Dover to the Nab, if this has been done please dont bother to read.




I know a pleasure boater that did this at Dover/Dungerness going the other way.
This is what happened

Set way ponits 2 m off dover from paper chart and 25 nm ssw of beachy head and then the NAb.

Then input to his plotter that was downstairs.

Off he went

Got to dover and checked downstairs for next course heading.



Now heres the bit which may also have caught out the pro skipper ?????

E changes to W as you cross Greenwich Meridian line, it is easy to input the correct figures but wrong w/e as that is already in from the previous waypoints.

My mate didnt bother to check too well and was now heading to France.

A plane flew over him and he herd some odd Radio messages.

He went downstairs and checked his plotter and saw he was in the middle of the TSS.

He headed for Beachy head and all was well, used a lot of fuel but didnt hear anything from CG.

Sorry you are right I did joint the thread half way through.
I dont know if this has been said or not but if you follow the error in reverse it puts a boat heading the wrong way on the TSS toward dover.
And for me at least I understand how a semi pro would be heading toward Dover in a Flybridge boat at 25knots the wrong way up a TSS.

The responsibility of such a small craft not have dangerous cargo should have just had his wrist slapped, comm endt taken away until a nav course retaken.

Some plotters force you to enter w e others automatically input it for you based on the previous waypoint.

I an sure the sailors who get around will have come across this many times, the way to check it is by looking at final distance

Portsmouth to Dover should be 100 nm ish, if w/e mixed up it would be 130 ish or more and sticks out like a sore thumb.

 

[Solitaire]

[ QUOTE ]
11 knots cog punching a current is excessive wash in many cases, but 9knts with the flow is acceptable most the time.

How do the speed limits work COG or log ?



[/ QUOTE ]

I think you mean SOG - Speed over Ground - COG is Course Over Ground.

 

[Tranona]

Maybe - but only speculation. Only the facts of the case will tell you anything. He went for nearly an hour and failed to respond to VHF calls so they had to put up the spotter plane to find him for identification.

Unfortunately we don't have his side of the story, nor from the reports I read did he submit any plea of mitigation. This suggests either he had no explanation or his lawyer advised that it would not help. Keep quiet and the court will be lenient - which it was.

I do not subscribe to the view of others that he is the victim of overzealous officials. I am sure many small boats stray every year and either realise their mistake or respond to a VHF call. I am equally sure the last thing the authorities want is a court case - when did you last hear of one? So they must have had good reason for prosecuting in this case. And £6000 against a max of £50000 has to be a light sentence.

However, the main point is that this is a poor example to use to support an opinion about unequal sentencing. We can have our opinions, but only the courts can decide. Or would you prefer a system of blanket fixed penalties and discretion on serving them by the official issuing them? In my opinion we already have too many of these and they transfer power away from individuals and the courts that protect our rights to unaccountable officials or even computers linked to cameras.

 

[whisper]

Surely not. It has to be SOG doesn't it, otherwise speed of the current will throw the calculation out??
It's certainly SOG in Salcombe. The SOG being calculated by GPS or possibly a radar gun.

Ah, too slow to post again /forums/images/graemlins/frown.gif

 

[flaming]

Nope, it's log.

Remember what these limits are for, they're not for the prosecution of boaters, but for the safety of river users. I doubt very much the harbour master would consider taking anything further where the speed recorded (and the rumour has it he does have a radar gun) was within the margin of error that the tide would allow for.

And also remember that the speed limit predates the widespread use of GPS....

 

[DAKA]

Thanks for your advice /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Log makes more sense, I dont see how a radar gun would work as waves would alter the point of reference.

In some faster flowing rivers the speed limits are even more complicated

Part of The Trent is 8 ? against the flow and 10? with the flow, this allows the barges to steer.

I think thats right, long time since I was up that way but there are two different speeds that is by word of mouth, there are not signs anywhere, the first time I went up from the sea I maintained 28 knots (slowed for narrow boats and the odd fisherman).

 

[Deleted User YDKXO]

Back again, Nonitoo due to new information. See Bartlett again in this month's MBY.
The same magistrates court who fined the delivery skipper £6000 for straying into the TSS has recently fined the skipper of a freighter for smashing his ship into the E Goodwin lightship a derisory £3700. Apparently the court did take into account the seriousness of the incident and the fact that it took place in one of the world's busiest shipping lanes. It seems that the mate on watch was sitting in an aft facing seat doing paperwork and the lookout was in the mess room and both these 'professionals' missed a bloody great red thing with a flashing light right in front of them. The lightship had to be taken off station for repairs
On the same day the court dealt with a collision between another freighter and a fishing boat in the shipping lanes. Apparently the skipper of the fishing boat was playing with his computer at the time of this incident and got a fine of £2700 for punching a 4ft hole in the freighter
So, there we have it. Three cases brought by the MCA in Folkestone Magistrates court. £6000 for a pleasure boat straying into the TSS but only £3700 and £2700 for commercial craft smashing into a lightship and a freighter. Sounds to me like a cosy little club in which the so called professionals get a slap on the wrist and the amateur is made an example of
Still care to argue that the £6000 fine was not disproportionate?

 

[Tranona]

This is a much better line of argument than comparing with penalties for unrelated offences. First you need to check that all three were charged for the same offence, or the offence at least carries the same maximum fine.

Not defending the magistrates because we don't have details of the reasons for the different level of fines, but I would imagine that they deal with most of the cases of this type so will be quite capable of applying some level of consistency.

You seem to think there is some kind of conspiracy going on here - but if the "pleasure boat" skipper felt he was hard done by he has the right of appeal against the fine - not against the verdict as he pleaded guilty. Has he done that?