A Reasoned Approach to Tougher Driver Penalties & Imprisonment
There are many dangerous creeps behind the wheel who need to be permanently removed from the road system. But there are also some who make a mistake with large consequences. Emotional reactions bent on quick vengeance is never a solution. But reasoned understanding of root causes, with early interventions in troubled lives, have been known to provide much more effective and long-lasting positive results.
Our society is troubled by the presence of dangerous persons and reacts by increasing penalties and imprisonment. This is seen as the solution that will reduce those incidents.
Intermixed with this are persons who are not so dangerous but who make mistakes. A classic example would be a tired driver travelling to work in the morning who passes through a red light and kills a child pedestrian. A very tragic circumstance but one that anyone could encounter without being a dangerous criminal. It relies on our police, prosecutors, judges, and ourselves, to consider those circumstances.
Ironically, if the struck pedestrian was a robber running from police, with a bag of stolen money in his hand, the reaction might be different. It would be the same act committed by the same tired driver but he might even be applauded by some for stopping a criminal act.
Twisting the scenario one more time, if the driver was impaired by alcohol the reaction might be different again. An impaired driver killing the child would be highly unacceptable. But what if this was a first drinking offense by a young man who became drunk with no initial intent to drive until the alcohol affected his judgment? Certainly it would be an unacceptable act, but where would it fit within the scale of the other scenarios? Might the reaction be different if it was an alcoholic who had committed other offenses? Since it is known that alcoholism is an addictive sickness are we prepared to treat that alcoholic as a patient who needs treatment or are we interested in punishing him no different that the robber with the bag of money?
The reality is that bad consequences and the character of the person who creates them affect our reactions to them. The worse the consequences the more likely that the penalties will be higher. The worse opinion we have of a person’s character the more we are likely to seek vengeance rather than understanding.
While, in many instances, stiffer penalties and jail time may be a deterrent at other times they can lead to something quite different. A driver who makes a mistake and receives a stiff penalty and possible jail time is likely to be affected by this consequence for the rest of their life. Once that penalty is completed its consequences are not. A stiff monetary penalty that cannot be afforded may lead to the loss of a house, a car or other essentials that might have kept that person in a stable environment, seek help, and allow that person to move on. Without that house, car, etc. a domino effect may occur. A job might be lost. A marriage may fail. The person’s mental state may change. These consequences may seem of little importance if we do not understand when a possible deterrent can change to a possible enhancement for that penalized person’s next bad interaction with society.
At the same time, there in no freedom without responsibility. There comes a point when an individual is past the point of help and must have their freedom removed, sometimes permanently, for the sake of public safety. This must mean continued and costly monitoring because early intervention did not occur or was unsuccessful. Once we help create such monsters there are times when you can’t break the branch and stick it on another part of the tree.
Vengeance, like candy and alcohol, may be a quick, satisfying indulgence. But if our ultimate goal is our health and the overall well-being of our society we need to take it in moderation. And we need to understand its consequences. Penalizing a driver causes a disruption that may result in a downward spiral. A driver with a drinking problem may resort to more drinking. Perhaps a turn to more powerful drugs, or a turn to more dangerous crimes. The need to consider this is not because we are “bleeding heart liberals” or unfeeling for the loss of the victim. This need is because it affects our own pocket book, our own future safety and how effectively our society will function in the future. Because, unless we are willing to keep troubled persons away from society for their life-time, they will eventually return and not necessarily in a better state. The fallacy of believing that a quick return to prison will surely occur is that, in fact, a troubled person performing disruptive or criminal acts, does not get caught on a 100% basis. If our goal is vengeance without rehabilitation that driver may return to society with a fresh, sharper and more mean-spirited axe to grind. Impaired drivers will continue driving impaired but they will become more educated on how not to get caught. Speeders will continue speeding. Distracted drivers will continue driving distracted. Many of these acts will go on for a substantial time and over many incidents before those responsible are snared, and the process could repeat itself.
Furthermore, imprisonment does not mean that there is no cost to our society. It means that we pay for meals, housing, guarding and other costs that occur during imprisonment. Recent statistics from Correctional Service Canada (CSC) indicates that it costs taxpayers $116,000 per year to keep a prisoner in jail. In the fiscal year 2015-16 there was an average of 14,639 persons in Canadian jails which resulted in costs of about 1.7 billion dollars. So why not become tougher on crime? Why not increase the prison population to 30,000? That is OK, but now the costs rise to 3.5 billion dollars. The solution exported by many who blow this horn sounds great.
What occurs during imprisonment has consequences for what occurs after imprisonment. Involving the penalized driver in a reason to change may be a greater deterrent that the penalty itself.
Drowning at Ethel Ontario – Accountability Might As Well Be Rocket Science?
Under normal circumstances accountability is not a difficult concept to understand: If someone’s actions have caused someone’s death they should be accountable for it. Why is that principle so hard to follow in motor vehicle deaths? Let us look at the following example.
From articles posted by CTV News London and the London Free Press it was reported that at around 2300 hours on Friday, March 18, 2022 the OPP responded to information that a vehicle had left “the roadway” and entered the Maitland River south of Ethel, Ontario. Both news articles reported that a body was subsequently recovered from a submerged pick-up truck at 1800 hours on Saturday, March 19th. Neither article provided any information as to where the vehicle entered the water. In their defense these were the only news agencies to bother with providing any information to the public about the drowning. Many prominent news agencies provided no mention of the drowning.
The London Free Press article reported that the submerged pick-up truck was found south of Ethel. At best, CTV news reported that police responded to Ethel Line and that the pick-up truck was recovered south of Ethel, Ontario. But there are two sites where a vehicle could possibly enter the water of the Maitland River south of Ethel, as shown in the map below.
The area near Ethel, Ontario where a drowning occurred in the Maitland River on Friday, March 18, 2022.
A Google Maps view of the Ethel Bridge site is shown below. It shows well-constructed guard (guide) rails on both sides of the bridge abutments and these rails are properly secured to the ends of the concrete abutments. At first glance it seemed unlikely that a vehicle would pass through this location and into the water. So the roadway maintenance personnel and County officials seemed to have done their proper job here.
View, looking south, along Ethel Line at the Ethel Bridge located just south of Ethel, Ontario. This bridge crossing the Maitland River looks to be in good condition and contains properly anchored guard (guide) rails positioned on both ends of the bridge.
The second site is shown in another Google Maps view shown below. This is a view looking south and the Maitland River is hidden in the trees along the right side of this view. Here the situation is of more concern. There is no barrier here between the roadway and the Maitland River. There is a downslope from the roadway to river leading to a further concern.
View, looking south, along Ethel Line. The Maitland River is hidden in the trees on the right side of this road. Note there is no barrier here and there appears to be a substantial grassy slope leading from the roadside down toward the Maitland River.
So is the site of the plunge into the water relevant? Well it depends of whether you understand the concept of accountability.
Let us deviate from this example for a moment and consider the successful launch of a rocket toward a moon landing. NASA is an organization with many employees with incredible skills. Each employee’s actions are responsible for getting a rocket to the moon. The guy who supplies the rocket fuel is just one employee. If the rocket-fuel guy does not supply the fuel the mission fails. Thus he has an important responsibility as he is accountable toward making sure the rocket fuel is available. If the rocket fuel is not available the actions of hundreds of other employees do not matter, the rocket will not reach the moon. Surely it is understandable that the successful implementation of a difficult task is reliant on all persons in the plan being accountable for each of their tasks. Is this so difficult to understand?
Well the successful implementation of a road safety plan is no different than that rocket launch to the moon. The successful implementation of a road safety plan also requires that the actions of many persons, and agencies, act in an accountable manner in order to reach that safety goal. We often refer to the three foundations of road safety: The human, the vehicle and the environment, or HVE for short.
Those accountable for the human factors may be those that drive a vehicle. In order for the road safety strategy to work the driver must drive at a proper speed, must not be distracted, must not be impaired and so on. The driver is accountable for these things.
Those accountable for the vehicle may be the vehicle manufacturers who must build a reasonably safety vehicle. Air bags must deploy at an appropriate timing and severity. Wheels must not break off. Steering wheels must change the direction of the vehicle reliably. Those persons who work at federal institutions such as NHTSA or Transport Canada must also have a regulatory role to play. Vehicle technicians must be accountable for providing correct maintenance procedures to a vehicle. And so on.
And there are those accountable for the environment in which the vehicle travels. This refers to the roadway system and how it is designed, maintained and signed. It refers to those roadside objects constructed to lessen the likelihood of a significant injury should the driver or vehicle fail in their obligations.
The concept of accountability applies to each and every individual in this chain of responsibilities because, if one fails, we all fail. No rocket fuel, no successful launch. It is that simple.
When a rocket fails to launch NASA does not just simply and hurriedly build another rocket. That would be stupid would it not? NASA would investigate why the launch failed. It would look at all the actions that were taken or not taken. If the rocket fuel guy failed to supply the fuel NASA would not simply blame the guy who supplies the oxygen, or the guy who is responsible for the rocket’s structure, or whatever. Recognizing that the fuel was not supplied NASA would make sure this was corrected for the next launch. And no need to build a new rocket.
So what investigation should be carried out when a fatal collision occurs? Should the same sort of investigation be carried out? Should investigators follow along and note where the failures occurred? Should investigators look at the Human, the Vehicle and the Environmental factors in totality? If the guy responsible for the Environmental factors has failed to ensure a safe site should that be ignored? It should be ridiculous to ask that question but the reality is just that: Environmental factors that fail are not investigated and documented in fatal motor vehicle crashes. And fatal motor vehicle crashes continue, and missions to improve road safety fail, on a regular basis.
Let us return to our example of the fatally drowned driver in the Maitland River. The fact that the vehicle entered the water is a failure of the environment where the entrance occurred. But has this failure been acknowledged? No. Not only has it not been acknowledged it has not even been mentioned or identified where the failure occurred. Why did police not identify the specific location where the pick-up truck entered the water? And when the news reporters filed their articles for the public why did they not comprehend that the location where the vehicle entered the water was relevant? Are you not accountable for informing the public when the lack of installation of a roadside barrier, or the improper installation of a barrier, has led to a drowning death?
In fact this evening, March 21, 2022 CTV News provided a video segment where they included some video footage of the location where the pick-up truck was either found or entered the water. Indeed the location shown in the video footage was at the Ethel Bridge, and it seemed to show an area on the west and on the south side of the bridge. Subsequently I returned to Google Maps and examined the guard (guide) rail on the south side of Ethel Bridge and the two images below show what I uncovered.
View, looking north, along Ethel Line toward Ethel Bridge. CTV news video seemed to show the area to the left (west) of the bridge where the pick-up truck may have entered the water. But note how the rail on the right (east) is much longer than the rail on the left (west). Why was the rail so short on the west side of the bridge?
View, looking north at the guard (guide) rail on the west side and south of the Ethel Bridge. The rail is very short and much shorter than the length of rail on the east side. Why was this short rail installed instead of the longer length on the east?
Why have police not commented on how the vehicle entered the water, supposedly at the bridge, and somehow bypassed the protections of the guard (guide) rail? It should have been obvious to any untrained eye that the shortness of the rail would be a factor in whether or not a vehicle could enter the river. These are the ways in which road safety hazards are bypassed and allowed to exist, undetected, because those responsible for the public’s safety fail to protect the public’s safety.
As I have said before, Vision Zero is a marvelous propaganda campaign. Many experts quote how we must focus on reducing a vast number of deaths by the year 2030. But Vision Zero is doomed to failure when politics and corruption prevents the identification of those factors that continue to cause fatalities because those accountable for those factors are sacred cows, untouchable in the field and unidentifiable to the public. Indeed, road safety is rocket science: the rocket will never get off the ground because the rocket fuel guy continually fails to fill the tank.
Appalling Secrecy Prevents Mother From Knowing How Her Daughter Died
Checking internet sources such as Google has produced no information about circumstances in which 17-year-old Francesca Savoie died in a reported motor vehicle collision in Bas-Caraquet, New Brunswick. The only knowledge I can gain is from the single news article posted on March 20, 2022, by the CBC’s Catharine Tunney.
Tunney’s deeply disturbing article described how Savoie was killed in a motor vehicle collision in Bas-Caraquet, New Brunswick, sometime in the year 2007. Francesca’s mother, Liette, “has been on a quest ever since to learn more about what happened that night – a quest driven in part by rumours on the Acadian Peninsula about a high-speed chase and a second vehicle“, as stated in Tunney’s article.
In 2012 Liette Savoie requested all information from the RCMP on the crash. Unidentified individuals at the RCMP responded by saying “…only a small portion of their files would be released”. These RCMP individuals cited the portion of the Access to Information Act “…that shields from disclosure information obtained in the course of a police investigation less than 20 years old”.
Savoie’s complaint to the Information Commissioner led the Commissioner to ask the RCMP to explain why the files were not released. The unidentified RCMP individuals “…argued that the personal information of the deceased is protected by law for 20 years after the death and the public interest in disclosure ‘did not outweigh the invasion of privacy that would result from the disclosure'”.
Let me repeat that phrase again. The unidentified RCMP individuals decided that the deceased’s death was personal information owned by the deceased. No one had the right to know how the deceased had died, especially not the deceased’s mother. And this is what strikes to the heart of the bazaar reasonings of the Canadian justice system.
If, by some chance, Francesca had been murdered, her mother would have no right to know. If the RCMP had covered up the murder for some undisclosed reason, Liette Savoie also did not have the right to know.
As a totally independent observer with decades of experience in uncovering the details of police collision reconstructions I am in a unique position to review the case and evaluate, for myself, whether there is any reason to be concerned about Francesca’s death. But the internet has been wiped clean of any mention of Francesca and her untimely death. And, unless you were a local of the Bas-Caraquet region in 2007, you also would have no information about the tragic incident.
Liette Savoie’s dilemma is not unique. Every year thousands of persons perish on Canadian roads. Police come to investigate and close the area where a fatality occurs. Not only is the actual site closed off, but several kilometres are closed off such that any independent reporter can only use a high-powered, telephoto lens to photograph a distorted view of the collision scene, though in many instances such a photo is impossible. Even news media become complicit in this secrecy by claiming that their photos are copyright and cannot be used in any discussion of a collision. For many thousands of persons like Liette suffering is in silence as no one knows that they are given no information about how their loved one passed away. By some fluke of chance a reporter, such as the CBC’s Catharine Tunney, decides to post a single article and suddenly that lonely silence is made known – about that single individual. But many thousands of persons are not afforded that luxury of being made known to the public. They move on in silence, requesting information that is denied, and no one is able to make those deniers accountable for their decisions.
Tunney indicated that recently the Information Commissioner sided with the RCMP. When Liette Savoie when to the Federal Court it also sided with the RCMP. An absolute dead end for a mother who simply wanted some answers.
The federal court’s comment on the matter is also revealing. The justice was quoted as saying, if the information commissioner’s recommended amendments to the Access to Information Act don’t materialize “the eventual expiration of the twenty-year moratorium offers some hope”. How uplifting. We just have to guarantee that Liette Savoie lives long enough to make her request at that future date.
Unreasonable secrecy is a deplorable matter in an otherwise democratic society. It is the method by which many evil deeds are allowed to slither through the weak crevices of a good society. It is more deplorable when many good men and women observe its slither but are more interested in chewing the popcorn on their comfy couch amidst the viewing of their latest soap opera or sports program on their high definition TV.
Springtime Cycling – The Challenges Continue
There are many examples in London, Ontario, like in many cities, where springtime cycling can become challenging due to cycling path maintenance issues. Here a sand-filled pot has been knocked over spilling sand onto the cycling track on Dundas near Wellington Road in downtown London.
Much like general roadway maintenance, the maintenance of cycling paths, trails and tracks is needed on a constant basis. Many cities like London have reduced their roadway inspections over the years, especially with the advent of the Municipal Act and the so called Minimum Maintenance Standards. With no accountability municipalities are free to chose their level of acceptable vigilance while relying on their Risk Management departments to handle claims in an aggressive manner.
When cyclists collide with obstructions within a cycling path Risk Management departments in Ontario municipalities find creative ways of blaming the cyclist for failing to be sufficiently vigilant. With large resources at their disposal municipalities use tax payer money to fight the individual taxpayer rather than to improve safety for the taxpayer.
The creation of obstructions within a cycling track is often explained as necessary because various segments of the road and cycling track need rehabilitation from time to time. Never is it possible for individual taxpayers, including cyclists, to question if the obstructions were reasonable for the circumstances.
A large traffic cone is seen here placed in the eastbound cycling track of Dundas Street at Colborne Street in downtown London. In the background, across the street, is another obstruction as City maintenance vehicles have parked within the cycling track preventing it from being used.
Some obstructions are so prominent that cyclists are completely expelled from a cycling facility and must find alternate ways to bypass the area.
This view shows maintenance vehicles parked within the cycling track of Dundas Street at Colborne Street, completely blocking the track. Cyclists must find alternate ways of avoiding the obstruction, sometimes resulting in unexpectedly dangerous results.
Your cycling track is blocked Mr. Cyclist? Well that’s your problem, we have the right to conduct maintenance activities as we please. And you don’t have the right to question if it could be done in a better way.
So, cyclists beware. You have the right to cycle but not the right to complain. Try fighting City Hall….ha ha ha!
Bicycling in Winter Conditions – How Can We Make It Happen?
This view of the Thames Valley Parkway in Springbank Park in London, Ontario, is taken on a beautiful fall day. Numerous cyclists share the path with pedestrians and pets. While crowded it can be a pleasant experience for all. But these pleasant conditions do not last. winter conditions are a starkly different story.
When the days are warm and sunny, cycling can be a beautiful experience for all ages. And climate change requires a vast number of Canadians to take up this pastime. But that pleasant weather is not always there. In fact, even in the southern parts of Canada like south-western and south-central Ontario the weather can be challenging for most cyclists almost half the year.
In London, Ontario, multi-use trails such as the Thames Valley Trail (TVP) are in constant use. But when snow falls, and is not cleared, the TVP becomes impassable for many cyclists.
This view of the Thames Valley Parkway in Springbank Park in London, presents a starkly different scenario to the pleasantries of a warn fall day. The path has not been cleared of snow and there is absolutely no cyclist or pedestrian in sight.
How do we make cycling in winter conditions happen?
A look at past history and other regions of the world tells us that great societal and political changes have occurred by brutal force. In other words, autocratic regimes can make things change quickly and efficiently. As was the case of Joseph Stalin and his changes to the Soviet agrarian system in the 1930s, collectivization was simply imposed. Literally millions of Russian and Ukrainian citizens were staved to death to achieve Stalin’s success. So change can be achieved, but at what cost?
Some Stalinist thinkers can easily be convinced that cycling can be imposed by brutal attacks on the driving public. Reduce the efficiency of driving, penalize drivers of cars at every corner, until they have no choice but to ride bicycles. Others like myself believe that you can gain more with sugar than you can with vinegar. Rather than making it a difficult world for car drivers, we can make it more comfortable, convenient and safer for cyclists. We can achieve this in many positive ways.
The cost of e-bikes could be made cheaper through government incentives. A much greater emphasis could be placed, not just on building new cycling paths, trails and tracks, but on improving their maintenance so that they are truly usable throughout the Canadian year. Safe ways of securing cycles from theft can be introduced so that a rider can be assured that, at the halfway point of their excursion, their cycle will still be there to take them back home. More cycle designs are needed to protect riders from the elements such as rain through development of water-resistant, light-weight cages. No one can feel comfortable travelling to a workplace in soaked clothing when the alternative of a warm and dry, gas-guzzling automobile is present. And we need to improve the design of those paths, trails and tracks to separate pedestrians of cyclists, and cyclists from motor vehicles.
Cycling can be achieved in winter conditions. It is possible to make this happen without autocratic, dictatorial punishments. It just needs a few positive persons to create positive change.
A cycling we will go, through the cold and winter snow…
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