Not guilty of dangerous driving occasioning death

Our client is a 49 year old tradesman from Western Sydney.

At around 8:30pm he was attempting to make a right-hand turn into a carpark. He did not notice any oncoming traffic.

When he was partially into the turn a motorcycle hit his vehicle. The motorcycle rider died shortly afterwards.

There were a number of witnesses who gave statements to Police. Some of them suggested that our client had accelerated into the turn and was at fault for the accident.

Our client was charged with Dangerous Driving Occasioning Death and Negligent Driving Occasioning Death.

In our initial conference, our client disclosed that he had previously been convicted of Dangerous Driving Occasioning Death and served a lengthy imprisonment term for it.

Needless to say, he was extremely worried about the consequences if he was convicted of these offences and wanted the best representation in Court.

We immediately began preparing a defence strategy.

First, we subpoenaed the criminal and traffic record of the deceased which disclosed a number of speeding offences.

We also subpoenaed the autopsy of the deceased which revealed that he had an elevated blood alcohol reading.

We then subpoenaed the criminal and traffic records of witnesses whose evidence was adverse to our client. Speeding offences were revealed in these documents.

Finally, our specialist accident reconstruction expert was briefed to provide an opinion as to the cause of the accident.

Our expert noted that the skid marks of the deceased’s motorbike only began a short distance from where the collision occurred, suggesting that he had been speeding and braked much too late.

Upon receipt of this, the prosecution withdrew the charge of Dangerous Driving Occasioning Death but continued with the Negligent Driving Occasioning Death charge.

The matter proceeded to a defended hearing.

In Court we systematically dismantled the prosecution witnesses in cross-examination, highlighting inconsistencies throughout their evidence.

Ultimately, the Magistrate could not be satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that our client was negligent, and he was found not guilty.

At the verdict, our client and his family broke down in tears, grateful that our hard work had paid off.