If you have been caught on camera and are not the registered keeper of your vehicle it could be some time before you receive notification (in the form of a notice of intended prosecution/NIP) from the police asking for information as to who the driver was on the date, and at the time, in question.
Typically a driver will receive an NIP within 14 days of the driving incident in question. Indeed the law is that the registered keeper of the vehicle in question MUST receive an NIP within 14 days and that failure by the police to comply with this time limit will be a bar to prosecution. However, there is a common misconception amongst the public that if a notice of intended prosecution is received more than 14 days following the incident that triggered the request for driver identity information it does not require a response. This is WRONG and if someone ignores a notice of intended prosecution, whether it is sent within 14 days or outside the 14 day time limit, a prosecution will follow for failing to identify the driver which carries 6 penalty points and a maximum £1,000 fine on conviction.
What should you therefore do if you receive a notice of intended prosecution out of time?
The first thing to check is whether you have recently changed your address, vehicle or other details with the DVLA as the police systems will check registered keeper contact information against the DVLA database prior to sending out an NIP. Recent changes in address or recent vehicle acquisitions have been accepted by Courts in England and Wales to excuse breaches by the police of the otherwise strict 14 day limit.
Many people drive vehicles that are either leased to them or provided to them by their employers. This can mean that the person driving the vehicle is sometimes the third recipient of the NIP (or “link in the NIP chain”) as it will first be sent to the company owning the vehicle or being its registered keeper. The law affords each recipient of an NIP 28 days to respond. This will inevitably mean that by the time each link in the NIP chain has responded and nominated the next link some months could have passed. There is nothing improper about this and this will not invalidate the NIP or offence provided that the first NIP was sent to the registered keeper within 14 days.
If you believe that there is no justification for receiving a late NIP you should respond to the NIP giving full information as to driver identity. In your response you should confirm when you received your NIP and state that you believe that it is out of time. The resulting summons for speeding, contravening a traffic signal or other camera captured offence can then be defended on the basis that the late NIP precludes a bar to conviction.
What should you do if you cannot recall who the driver was?
Receiving an NIP some time after the original camera offence can cause problems where the vehicle has many users and the person receiving the NIP cannot recall who was driving the car at the material time.
If you cannot recall who was driving you must exercise “reasonable diligence”. This essentially means that you must use your best endeavours in order to ascertain who the driver was and that if you cannot establish who the driver was at the material time you should be found not guilty of the ensuing failing to identify driver prosecution. What constitutes reasonable diligence is a matter of fact and degree for a Court to determine at trial. However, from experience of representing many clients in such cases I know that what is accepted as reasonable diligence by Courts can vary dramatically from geographical region. I would therefore recommend that anyone facing a situation where they cannot recall who the driver was contacts us to get specialist advice as soon as they receive the NIP. This is because for any reasonable diligence defence to succeed it is essential that the recipient of the NIP acts promptly and makes their enquires with all potential drivers when their memory is freshest and at its best. What you do on receipt of the NIP cements your chance of success at trial!
Our motoring offence Solicitors have represented many people in this situation and won cases where people have been unable to confirm who the driver was in shared vehicles even where the NIP was received within the usual 14 days.
We have defended, and won, cases where the NIP was received out of time due to postal strikes and the weather. We would advise anyone to obtain legal advice from a motoring offence solicitor on how best to deal with situations where an NIP has been received out of time to ensure that you act appropriately and, most importantly, in accordance with what the law expects of you.
For specialist legal advice in this regard and for legal advice regarding all motoring offences please contact Julie Robertson on 0161 819 7221 or julie.robertson@bootes.co.uk Twitter @DriverSolicitor. The initial call is always free!
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