Lucky : Live & Learn...

Consequences

Now so far I’ve told how my one split second stupid decision caused so much damage to me physically, mentally and emotionally. This only sums up about half of the entire incident though. The half that was in my hands.. The other part was not in my control. My doing led to it yes, but I couldn’t do much to change the consequences.

As I mentioned before I had been taken to the police station and put through an interview. I barely remember the interview, what they asked or said, what I said or what the charges were. I was too tired and I remember the pain being so crippling I couldn’t think straight. I did remember there was two charges though, my license was suspended pending my court date, the station they were from and that they said my car had been written off and seized. The paper they gave me apparently had it all documented on there, but this was lost in the hospital at some stage.

As much as it was tough dealing with all my rehabilitation, the not knowing of what had happened, what was needed or expected from me right then and what was coming up in the future was worse. So I did all I could do. I rung the station to get any details I could about my case. As is typical, only the officer who handled the specific case can give any details so we played a lot of phone chasey. I think he forgot I had been in the police so I was very aware of the rosters they worked. I roughly worked out his days/nights on and off and knew when he was avoiding me etc, but we got there in the end.

I found out my court date and he said he would get me a copy of my charge details; he never did. I did get a little information on my car though also; where it was and a rough guess of when I would get access to it to retrieve my belongings. This turned out to be bullshit though as because my accident happened just before Christmas instead of it taking the normal maximum week, it took 3. I did get all my things out though.. It was the first time I’d seen the car since the incident all smashed up and all by my doing.. I took a picture, cried a lot and retrieved the number plates to hand in.

The court date had been set for 6 weeks after the accident. The police never said about getting any legal advice, but for my own piece of mind I still looked into it. It was hard explaining a case without any legal documentation. The legal advisor even tried to get something from the court, but nothing was found out. We just decided we’d have to meet up on the court day, have a look through the statement of material facts and then decide what to do from there. That was nerve racking not knowing anything, but I was at least a little more settled knowing there would be legal advice available there with me.

So when the day came around, I cycled the 10 km to the court and nervously waited for the legal advisor to get there. When he finally did, we retrieved the Statement of Facts, read through them and discussed my options from there. From reading them there were a few discrepancies that could work in my favour. Firstly the main witness had said they were following me from a place I wasn’t even near; secondly whenever there is any traffic accident that possibly involves alcohol there is a 3 hour window in which the police have to get the offender officially breath tested on the recording machine. My accident had occurred at 12:15am and my breath test had been done at 3:20 am. They were technically 5 minutes out. Thirdly, both my charges were almost the same charge. A person can’t be charged for something more than once unless they actually committed that crime twice.

So I had 2 charges. One fell under the Traffic Act- Drive motor vehicle tram, train or vessel whilst over the middle alcohol limit, but not over the high alcohol limit. The other was more serious and fell under the Criminal Act – Dangerous operation of a motor vehicle and adversely affected by an intoxicating substance. To sum it up the traffic one represented the drink driving limit and the criminal one represented going through the red light before the incident.

We read through the statement and my legal adviser told me my options. Plead guilty to both charges now and cop a fine, suspension and criminal record, or have it adjourned. If it was successfully adjourned between now and the next court date we would work on trying to drop one or both of the charges if possible, and I could see about getting some character references to further back up how completely unlike me the behaviour had been. I had had my license 7.5 years and never lost a single demerit. I had had one speeding fine; and even then that had been 2 months prior. It was 100% out of my character! With these stats behind me and with having a few good cases to possibly get one of the charges dropped I decided adjournment could be the way to go. I also knew I had a few good people I could ask to write character references for me. Yes, reaching a final result would be put off yet again, but at least the severity of it could be somewhat reduced.

We entered the court room, and my case was seen to immediately. My legal advisor said what he needed to say and requested an adjournment. The judge granted it and I was given a next hearing date in exactly 6 weeks again. I was lucky enough to be the last person to squeeze in for that date which was good otherwise I would have had to wait another week. I was told to leave the courtroom and sign a bail undertaking yet again, stating I acknowledged my next court date and would appear or else face a fine or imprisonment.

My legal advisor and I discussed what would be done over the next 6 weeks before we parted ways. He would get in contact and converse with the Officer dealing with my case and see what could be done about either of the charges, and I would get in contact with some of my ex colleagues in order to get some character references. I won’t say I left the courts feeling happy, as it wasn’t sorted, but I did leave feeling slightly better knowing that something was going to be attempted to be done, and there could be better chances of a not so bad hearing next time.

I hit up a few of my ex colleagues, a Police Constable and a Prison Prosecutor and they agreed to write character references for me.