Need Statutory Declaration for unknown speeding/failure to ID driver **RESOLVED RESET TO SPEEDING**

[Man in the middle]

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The initial part of your hearing will be to decide whether the court excepts your story about not knowing about the missed hearing, if they do accept it, the next stage will be the hearing regarding the offence itself. In particular whether you were owner of the car or not .

 

No it won’t and this seems to have become unnecessarily complex.

 

The purpose of the SD (in your case) is to declare that you knew nothing of the proceedings against you which led to your conviction and fine. The court has nothing to question you about. In fact, the SD does not have to be made in court at all. It can be made before a solicitor or Commissioner for Oaths (who may charge a small fee of perhaps £5-£10)..If it is you then forward it to the convicting court for the conviction to be set aside.

 

On Wednesday there will be no obligation for you to prove anything to the court (though you should be aware of the penalties for perjury which may be applicable if you make a false declaration). The court must accept your declaration if it is made within 21 days of finding out about the conviction and it may, do so, subject to its discretion, fter that date.

 

If the only reason the SD could not be made in time was that the court could not provide an earlier appointment, the Declaration will be accepted. That is the only time limit on any of this. All other time limits are irrelevant. Acceptance of the SD depends only on how long previously you learned of your conviction and nothing else.

 

Once the SD has been made, if you make it in court it is standard practice in most areas now is for you to be asked how to plead to the original offences immediately afterwards. If so, you should offer to plead guilty to the speeding offence only on the condition that the “Fail to Supply Driver’s Details” (FtS) is dropped.

 

Under no circumstances should you plead guilty to speeding without this assurance.

They have no evidence that you were driving and you cannot be convicted of that offence unless you plead guilty.

Doing so is a possible route to nine points.

 

The prosecutor may not be in a position to accept this “deal” (though it is perfectly standard practice and is performed every day across the country). If he is not you should plead Not Guilty to both charges.

 

The matter will then not be progressed further on that day and instead it will be set down for trial at a later date.

If that happens, let us know and I will tell you how to deal with the matter on your trial day.

[Man in the middle]

 

 

15 hours ago, JenRuss said:

I will let you all know how I get on when I do a Stat Dec on wednesday morning.

I am hopeful that they will accept that I knew nothing of the earlier proceedings and original request for driver details - as this is the truth and should I need evidence I have got that.
 

My hope is that I will be asked to plead for the speeding offence and I will agree to plead guilty if the failure to provide details of driver offence is dropped.

 

However if this doesn’t happen, will I still have to answer to the charge of non disclosure of driver details? 

If I do have to answer to this charge I would plead not guilty -as I haven’t received the correspondence.

 

I just wonder what are the chances of the Magistrates deciding this requires a trial and accepting that I tried to update my new address details? Or is this very unlikely to occur?

 

I obviously don’t want another 6 points and a fine of £1k as I’d be worse off than if I’d paid the bailiffs!  

 

Can anyone shed any light on how likely I am to be charged with the offence of not updating my records or would this be something the DVLA would have to start?

 

I have since updated online so I think they are unlikely to initiate proceedings.  

 

You need to get you head round this, Jen.

 

First of all, you will make your Statutory Declaration (SD). The court's Legal Advisor will help you complete the paperwork before you come before the Magistrates. Then you will make your declaration (which is, roughly, to read what you've written on the form). Take no notice of the warnings that have appeared on here. Your SD will be accepted and you will not face a grilling.

 

You do not have to prove you knew nothing of the proceedings. You are simply stating, before the Magistrates, that you did not. All they are required to do is to confirm that you made your declaration.

That will set your original conviction aside.

 

Then, as is probably likely, you may be asked how you plead to the original offences. Hopefully both speeding and Fail to Supply Driver's Details (FtS) will be put. This is where you need to offer to do the "deal" that I mentioned. If you can, it might be useful to get to court early and ask to see the prosecutor. 

You can put your proposal to him (I'll use "him" but it may, of course, be "her"!) so that he can be prepared.

He may well then tell the Magistrates that he is dropping the FtS charge and that you are pleading guilty to speeding. If you are unable to see the prosecutor  beforehand, simply make your offer when you are asked how you plead. As I warned earlier, do not plead guilty to speeding until you have been assured that the FtS charge will be dropped. This "deal" is done every day in Magistrates' Courts. It is by no means unusual and the  prosecutor, Magistrates and Legal Advisor will all be well used to seeing it.

 

There are three potential pitfalls for which you should be prepared:

 

1. The original charges may not be put to you on Wednesday. This is unlikely as most areas adopt this practice now. If it happens you will simply leave the court and be told you will be advised in writing of a fresh date (when you can offer to do the deal again).

 

2. They may only put the FtS charge to you. This is also unlikely from what you have said. However, if it happens, you should plead Not Guilty to it and come back on here. We can then see if you have a reasonable defence to the charge.

 

3. The prosecutor may not accept your offer of the deal. This is a possibility though, provided both charges are put to you, it is very unlikely to happen. If it does, as I said earlier, plead Not Guilty to both charges and the matter will be adjourned for a trial. Once again, come back here and we can look at your options.

 

Things to remember for Wednesday:

 

A. You will not be "grilled" when making your SD.

 

B. You cannot be convicted of speeding unless you plead guilty. They have no evidence you were driving (that comes from you providing your details and you did not do). This is your leverage when offering to do the "deal".

 

C. Provided both charges are put to you, unless something very unusual happens, your deal is unlikely to be turned down. I heard of one case where it was. The defendant was, shall we say, less than polite to the prosecutor, so the prosecutor showed him where rudeness gets you. He ended up with nine points.

 

D. You will not face a trial for FtS on Wednesday. If you do have to plead NG to it (under (2) or (3) above) the matter will be adjourned to a later date. 

 

E. You will almost certainly face no action for failing to update your registration document when you changed address.

I'm not sure about the six month rule when it comes to this .

 

Most motoring offences cannot be prosecuted after six months.

However some can and in any case there is an argument that this offence did not only occur on the day you changed address but continued until you updated your details.

However, the offence is very rarely prosecuted and you have no need to worry about it.

 

Let me know if there is anything you are unsure of or if there is anything else I can help with.

Edited November 18, 2019 by Man in the middle

[Man in the middle]

Excellent result! Glad to have helped.