Careless driving prosecution

[grateful]

I had a car accident a month ago. No-one else was involved. I slid on some mud on the road and hit a tree, I only received minor injuries and an ambulance was called. The police also arrived.
Without going into detail, I do not feel the accident was my fault. I have received a letter from a Driver Improvement Scheme saying the police believe they have sufficient evidence to prosecute me for careless driving, or i can go on a course. The letter says that if I do not feel I am to blame, not to 'choose' the option of the course. I don't know what to do. Has anyone else been through this?

[kags]

This is a difficult one without knowing all the details - however, i can tell you that 13 or so years ago a similar thing happened to me, I had an accident and was then prosecuted for careless driving although I felt strongly I had not been acting carelessly. I was advised by my solicitor at the time that these cases are very dificult to defend, and really the CPS do not bother to bring the case unless they are confident of winning. Defending it would be very costly, and unlikely to succeed unless you had a very strong case or one of these solicitors who get celebrities off scott free in return for a huge fee . (As it turned out, my solicitor knew the CPS prosecutor and persuaded him to drop the case). Do you have a solicitor who would look at this for a fixed - and hopefully small - fee, to advise you if it is worth going to court? The experience of going to court could be extremely stressful, with no guarantee of the outcome, so I would be tempted to take the course.

[seatrout]

I would think that it would be difficult to prove careless driving - the prosecution have to show that your driving fell below the standard of a careful driver. The fact that you had an accident is not proof of this on its own - but can you take the risk?
You are unlikely to get legal aid and if you get convicted you will have to pay your costs the prosecution costs the fine and have points on your licence. Unless you are really sure that you were not at fault it might be easier to go on the course. It might also impress your insurers

[Keeprockin]

I would think a lot depends on what your explanation of mud on the road is, if you'd been driving on it for a while,then the odds are with police,but if the road was otherwise clear and you drove into a small amount that wasn't plain to see,then argue. The general agreement is that skidding is caused by excess speed for road conditions

[Loosehead]

Very difficult to defend, the key point the prosecution will make is that you should be in control of the car, mud on the road is a common occurrence and they would argue that the fact you skidded on it indicates that commensurate care was not being taken. I'd take the course and go along with the process.

[Segilla]

Do you belong to the AA or other motoring organisation? They will help