Speeding at 85 mph? Case dismissed!

[@lateralcast]

BOOK OUT NOW!: www.lateralcast.com/book FULL EPISODE: www.lateralcast.com/episodes/119 Link to a news article showing the photo discussed (SPOILER): www.motorcyclenews.com/news/2008/april/apr3008dutchbikerspeedingcrash-/

[@ChronoAegis]

Hey Team, thank you for the fun episode! A little hint though: The question graphic reads "licence plaCe" instead of "licence plaTe" ;D

[@syprague1889]

Thanks for the link! :D

[@CompletelyNormal]

Even if he wasn't charged under the laws of the Netherlands, something tells me he was probably adequately punished under the laws of physics.

[@tapio_m6861]

The laws of road rash.

[@lhpl]

The laws of physics also prove beyond any reasonable doubt that just moments before he _must_ have been riding the bike at excess speed. It not as if he had been running 137 km/h beside it.

[@codex4048]

If I were the prosecutor, I would have tried ro file suit for being on a highway without car or motorbike, and potentially for flying to low.

[@peperoni_pepino]

@codex4048 As far as I know, it is illegal to enter a highway without a suitable vehicle, but not illegal to be on a highway without a suitable vehicle. You cannot outlaw mishaps.

[@lhpl]

@@peperoni_pepino I suppose legislators could _try_ to outlaw mishaps, just like they could make laws that deny reality in other ways. It would be rather pointless, of course.

[@xanderveldmuisje]

On that road the speed limit at the time was 130kph. He was only going 7kph to fast. That is why they let it slide. After corrections (which is 3% above 100kph) you are left with 4kph above the speed limit. The cost of that ticket would be 26 euros on the highway. And 9 euros of administrative labour. Even without corrections the cost of the ticket would be under 50 euros.

[@PaulMutser]

120 certainly? This was before the increase to 130 was introduced

[@codex4048]

If it was indeed a 130km/h I would have liked the prosecutor to then try to pin "being a pedestrian on the highway" on him. That fine would be 35 euro, 44 with administrative costs

[@user-jn4sw3iw4h]

@codex4048 That would have been an awesome 'adding insult to injury'

[@andyu69]

They let it slide, because he already did.

[@undine120]

Talking about speed during lockdown, a similar thing happened in the US, a team went from NYC to LA in 25 hours, 39 minutes, meaning they averaged 110+ mph, including refueling, to break the cannonball run record.

[@kaelon9170]

big difference is that that team didn't get caught red-handed. This motorcyclist did. 😉

[@himagainstill]

I believe the guy that did this was the same guy who definitely didn't do it in the UK. Also, he didn't not-do it in the UK during lockdown, he didn't do it a couple of years before. He was just on trial in 2020.

[@Quintinohthree]

You say "a team" but matter of fact, there were several. Both the outright record and several sub-records like the solo record were all broken several times over during covid lockdowna

[@VonOzbourne]

Vinwiki posted a video recently about the trio that set the record for the fastest return trip. NYC-LA-NYC in a minute shy of 62hrs. Amazingly they did it in October 2024 and didn't benefit from the empty roads.

[@ScottishPirate87]

This is such a genius loophole. Outstanding, and most likely unrepeatable 😂

[@codex4048]

I'm not sure it is, by stating he wasn't on that bike he suddenly lost his right to be on an highway. Pedestrians are not allowed there. If they wanted to they probably could pin a few other things on him for making that statement.

[@ScottishPirate87]

@codex4048 That's a really good point actually, hadn't thought of that! 😂

[@user-du3pb2jg1n]

​@codex4048 if that case was made, most people would be doing illegal stuff after a crash just for being in a crash and being thrown off/out of their vehicle

[@JohnADoe-pg1qk]

He was lucky to be alive to be able to make that argument.

[@the_mcscientist]

Who is exited for Tom Scott being on the next season of Jet Lag'!!!

[@missitheachievementhuntres560]

Yes, so very much!!

[@IceMetalPunk]

"You have no proof I was driving that motorcycle so fast!" "There's nothing else in the photo, and it was moving that fast!" "Circumstantial, your honor! Perhaps my motorcycle and I were forced into a circus cannon and launched against our will shortly before the photo!"

[@fermitupoupon1754]

Technically under Dutch law this would not be a valid defence. The fine was sent to him based on the fact that the registration of the motorcycle came back to him. Even if you're not driving the vehicle you're still responsible for what is done with your vehicle.

[@Zelmel]

A great technicality, though I suspect it wouldn't fly in most countries.

[@LiveFreeOrDieDH]

The argument might not fly, but the rider still would! 😂

[@greensteve9307]

No pun intended?

[@JonBerry555]

I've read somewhere that a lawyer got out of repeated speeding violations by successfully arguing the sign was not displayed correctly: the type of post was wrong and then the foliage around it was not properly trimmed according to the regulations.

[@zunaidparker]

I knew this from the first instant. One of those famous trivia anecdotes.

[@t0bse]

omg that picture is gold

[@geoffreyporter6373]

For a second, I thought they found Max Verstappen thinking about MotoGP 😅

[@Becky_Cooling]

That was my first thought as well🤣

[@Chicken_o7]

My first thought was maybe they were racing to the hospital to see their dying mother or something, so the judge decided to let them off the hook

[@alexx12545]

Also thought it might be a medical emergency or something

[@panda4247]

@@alexx12545 well, it sort of was probably.... just a split second later...

[@gcewing]

"Where were you born?" "On the back of a bike going 137 km/h."

[@astjxs]

Perfect timing, just ran out of episodes to watch 😂

[@deathlessgamer]

Knew this one immediately as the question was read, they talked about it briefly on Top Gear.

[@loddude5706]

"Van Hammond !!!"

[@Becky_Cooling]

4:29 Wallace and Gromit up to their old tricks!

[@SegueGreene]

Yessss love the Julian cameos

[@almerindaromeira8352]

In Germany volunteer firefighters who are paged have Sonderrechte and are thus for the trip to the Fire Station exempt from the StVO (Traffic regulations). This basically gives them the right to drive over the speed limit so long as they don't endanger others. And they can do it with their own car (no lights or special sign needed).

[@__Ben]

I knew this one immediately, from an old Top Gear News segment, they even made the same suggestions of leaping out of your car to avoid tickets. (to be specific, S11E04 ~9:20)

[@rafaelmarkos4489]

That's where I remember it from!

[@gcewing]

My answer was that the camera was on the back of a truck being transported somewhere, and they forgot to turn it off, so it was snapping pictures of all the oncoming traffic at their speed plus the truck's speed.

[@Slikx666]

Well it wasn't due to the wind then. 🤣

[@widicamdotnet]

That was what I was thinking - just coasting through a storm in an attempt to outrun a flood or something.

[@SoapyWetDish]

My immediate thought was it was an organ donor bike, turns out it very nearly was.

[@little_valkyrie]

My first thought was that he was able to prove that his bike wasn't capable of that speed. I used to know someone who claimed to have gotten out of a speeding ticket by proving that there was no way she could have done that speed around that corner in her car. My dad also has a story of getting a ticket when he was working in the outback for a speed he knew his vehicle wasn't capable of. Unfortunately he wasn't able to fight that one as he had already left the state (he suspects that was intentional, that the police recognised the vehicle as one commonly driven by FIFO workers).

[@shadout]

I wouldn't be mad because it took him being thrown off his motorcycle at 130km/h to get this technicality. I'd rather the speeding ticket, myself.

[@DelphinusZero]

I was hoping it was something even more comical like he was in an advertisement on a truck

[@guard13007]

What a beautiful technicality.

[@TheHkluivert]

I don’t think the rider agrees 😢

[@mister-8658]

I was assuming a bird flew past the camera and caught a moped that was incapable of driving at 85 mph.

[@edwardlees4585]

I was convinced at the start that it would have been due to a pigeon flying next to him which set off the camera.

[@AuraDoesThings]

Pretty sure that I heard about this on an old episode of Top Gear, so I got this one pretty quickly.

[@rhyswilliams7884]

I remember seeing this on a program called 'Top Gear.'

[@stomponpie]

Don't many countries give the ticket to the registered owner of the vehicle unless they can show that someone else was the driver (e.g. someone else says they were driving and pays the fine)?

[@670839245]

my first instinct was the road was closed off temporarily for a racing course, like a rally race

[@lhpl]

I have not been able to find confirmation that he did not get fined, the two Dutch mention I could find both state explicitly that he will not escape being fined, although they were written just after the crash, so he could have been. It would not be difficult to prove that right before he fell off, he _was_ driving too fast.

[@kayleighlehrman9566]

my first guess was that, because it was explicitly mentioned that the bike, rider, and license tag number were all caught on camera, but they were all caught on different cameras?

[@donaldasayers]

"Mildly airborne." The Watford police waged a war via emplaced speed cameras against a local band of bikers. One GATSO camera had it's entire film used up with photos of a kid swinging a metal bucket around on a rope. Later the bikers covered the speed cameras on the bypass with bin liners. Only later in court was it revealed that the police had cut holes in the bin liners.

[@user-jn4sw3iw4h]

That exact speed sounds very familiar...... IIRC that was a manual bike record.... set on a closed off highway with a motorised vehicle in front of it to catch the wind. For a moment I thought it was going that way... way too many remarks were way too close

[@joe-skeen]

It didn't state the speed limit in the question, so my first thought was either that was the speed limit or there wasn't one.

[@Quintinohthree]

137 km/h is suspiciously close to the actual speed limit of the section of A28 in the north of Staphorst, and with 85 mph being such a round number it coul well be because it was rounded in translation. 85 mph could be as low as 82,5 mph which would only be 133 km/h, which might not even count as going over the speed limit.

[@LynnP]

I was thinking that perhaps an insect or something had zipped by the speed sensor at the same time the motorcycle passed.

[@hairyairey]

This also reminds me of something that happened in Australia (I might be ruining a future lateral here and this is better than the snooker speeding urban myth of recent days). They used an MD5 checksum to verify that images hadn't been tampered with. However when it was discovered that there can be "collisions" (ironic word in this context), ie that checksums were not unique all convictions on camera evidence were thrown out. I understand they have added SHA checksums now

[@michalpbielawski]

All checksums have collisions. By definition. There are (way) fewer available checksums than possible image files.

[@hairyairey]

​@@michalpbielawskiI meant a cryptographic hash that aren't supposed to have collisions. I note that people seem to use the same two terms interchangeably

[@syprague1889]

No. seriously. We need the picture for this kind of episodes.

[@lateralcast]

We don't have the copyright to do that, but I can add a link in the pinned comment. -- David (producer)

[@syprague1889]

@@lateralcast That would be awsome! Most of the time I don't have enough clue to find the picture of the location/invention/news story by myself.

[@Westing-er3fb]

My initial thought was that he was wearing a helmet and argued you couldn't tell who it was.

[@gcewing]

I think in that case they would just assume the registered owner of the bike was the rider. Otherwise it would be far too easy to get off.

[@willemm9356]

Iirc, That's how the law works in Germany. Which is why all speed cameras are from the front there.

[@gcewing]

@@willemm9356 So how do motorcyclists there ever get speed camera tickets?

[@Becky_Cooling]

Spoilers Falling off a motorbike at 85mph/137kph can't be fun, what level of injuries are expected at that speed? But anyways OUCH

[@57thorns]

On an empty highway, if he is lucky and just skids and has good proteective gear and don't tense up and panic? Bruises.

[@shortcat]

unless you hit anything other than flat road it's not much different from falling on the floor (if you wear the gear that protects from sliding your bare skin against the asphalt of course)

[@joshl4111]

Tom’s idea that the bike was on a trailer might sound ridiculous, but last year my friend and I were stopped for going slightly over the speed limit while towing a rally car on a trailer, in Tanzania (East Africa) and the cop gave us two tickets because both vehicles were traveling over the limit 😂

[@carl4964]

The question is wrote as traffic place...?

[@alanreader4815]

Because Matt Parker was Riding the Bike Instead lol.

[@hairyairey]

Reminds me of the time before speed limits in the UK. Think the record legal speed is 188mph

[@FiXato]

My first thought was also that the bike was on a trailer 😅 but then it wouldn't make sense for the cyclist to also be on the photo.

[@stephenwray4950]

First thought was that the bike on on the back of a recovery truck that was speeding

[@Pascaleiro]

Google "Dutch motorcyclist caught by speed camera skidding down the road", there's the photo!

[@Systox25]

I thought I had it, specially when he said switching place with a dog was kinda close. I thought an eagle diving from the sky triggered the cam

[@psilorder86]

Guess at start: The road was for 85 kilometers per hour?

[@kaelon9170]

About 5 years ago, I actually got a speeding ticket for doing 88km/h (54mph) in a 50km/h (31mph) road on a MOPED. Got a summons to court and all. What actually happened is that a car in the lane adjacent to me (I was doing ~25km/h in the bike lane) sped past at an absurd speed and was caught by a speeding cam. But the automated system actually read MY license plate rather than that of the speeding car. Both my moped and the car were clearly photographed in the same photo. After the police determined that my moped couldn't have been sped up to 88km/h as it would literally structurally fall apart before reaching that speed, the case was dismissed. But I was informed that they couldn't go after the car driver because the ticket either has to be made electronically by a speeding cam or the driver needs to be caught red-handed by a police officer.

[@paulnieuwkamp8067]

I was once ticketed for going 127 km/h (97mph) in a 50(31), in a van that could hardly reach that speed, let alone 400m (1/4mile) from a roundabout. This was before they had fancy things like websites to show you the photo, they didn't send it by default, and it didn't make it to court as I sent my objections through the mail (as the process here and back then required) and I got a letter back that the case was dismissed, so I don't know what had actually transpired though.

[@notthere83]

I mean... in Austria and Germany, that's often regular traveling speed?

[@brianakew3085]

So that one guy absolutely did not do the British equivalent of the cannonball run. What would you call that?

[@Hamzahasanlse]

Whats the name of the Bloke doing the lockdown speeding from john o groats to lands end

[@teh-maxh]

I think you mean the name of the bloke who definitely did not do that.

[@Maskawanian]

Must have been MKBHD

[@Jose.AFT.Saddul]

He didn’t get away with it because he was caught on video.

[@eastmeetswestpresents6923]

Hold on... Top Gear had the photo of the guy doing this, right? And they actually made fun of him? I remember Richard Hammond saying something to the effect of "I was washing my bike then it fell and then accelerated"

[@Cchogan]

Charge royalty? I remember princess Anne being done for speeding. £400 fine too.

[@gcewing]

I think it's only the king/queen who's immune from prosecution. The other royals are subject to the law just like anyone else.

[@jimday666]

For some reason I knew this one

[@olivier2553]

I just wonder if it was really a *CCTV* camera? It was a camera attache to a sort of radar, but that does not make them CCTV. I think it could be argues that a CCTV camera is not a calibrated piece of equipment valid to issue speeding tickets.

[@TheScarvig]

the speeding ticket is triggered by radar, the cam is taking evidence of which vehicle and who was the driver. not sure if CCTV is the right term for these cameras, but this is done so that you dont have to do the whole cop chase on the highway to hand you your ticket that seems to be done in the US

[@railcamrailfanner]

I was thinking he was in the movies

[@IVIaskerade]

This sounds a lot more impressive in kph. If you told people he was doing 85 they'd probably just say "eh, so was everyone else"

[@junipermeisje6300]

Nothing impressive in km/h either. Wasn’t really speeding was he?

[@alxk3995]

If that is the only reason, then this is one of the dumbest decisions ever,... Shouldn't he have to explain how else this picture was possible if he wasn't speeding?

[@IVIaskerade]

No, since the burden is on the prosecution to prove the offense happened.

[@UngodlyFreak]

One would think that the laws of physics should be sufficient evidence.

[@hanneken4026]

Was the speed camera triggered by a bird going that fast, and he was going slower? A colleague had a picture shot by a speed camera of a duck flying 60 km/hour along a 50 km/h stretch of road. I'd think there are much faster birds than that, for instance a falcon pulling out of a stoop I'd guess to be going quite fast.

[@rafaelmarkos4489]

Having just started the video - is this about the guy who was crashing and argued that he wasn't actually riding the bike when the image was taken? Edit: Yep, heard of this one before.

[@dylanzwering2255]

Top gear fans would get this immediately

[@ChrisWar666]

Maybe it was a diplomat?

[@bl4xxun]

137kph? Is that a lot? If the A stands for highway, it’s not that much above the limit

[@catbertsis]

Ahh the MKBHD gambit

[@NIKSEEN]

I thought the motorcyclist was pregnant and about to give birth or had a pregnant person on the back of the bike 😂

[@Gastogh]

I'm astounded it was not a thing with speedometers and km/miles conversion, and that no one even suggested it

[@harpoonlobotomy]

I mean, I would assume the issued ticket used the same metric as the local speed limit. If your country sets speed limits in km/h, you don't issue tickets in mph.

[@chair547]

I'm not sure how I feel about that identifies as a motorcyclist joke. It's not outright transphobic, but it does feel kind of weird.

[@lhpl]

You identify as a humourless person?

[@psikot]

It would have been better if it was the child of a diplomat and they can't be charged with any crime.

[@Dusto9]

Why would that be better? That happens all the time.

[@Speedster04_BRA]

Banking the answer: it's the guy that Top Gear riffed off because he jumped off the bike at the camera and argued in court that he couldn't be fined for crashing . EDIT: **smug face**

[@foobar3]

Tom Scott are you wearing eye liner...

[@SuspendedYT]

Dutch? Was he Max?

[@leumas75]

Exactly my thought as well!

[@T0MA2EN]

as an American i was confused by the thought of getting a speeding violation at 85

[@erictaylor5462]

I have been up to 75 MPH on a peddle bike, and I was caught doing 90 MPH in my pick-up truck and though the cop had me cold, he never pulled me over.

[@GrahamBunneh]

I skidded sideways through a red light camera once breaking in the rain - it turned out I'd got a puncture on my rear tire. Apparently wasn't good enough excuse 🙄

[@TregMediaHD]

Dutchies Unilever a thumbs up , let me hear you

[@faenethlorhalien]

Judge literally does not seem to understand the concept of causality. This shit is why people don't trust the justice system.

[@lewiskelly14]

What crap is this channel

[@ChristofferETJ]

Fun fact: 137km/h is equal to 13.7 miles per hour. That's not nautical miles, or any other archaic miles, of course.

[@IVIaskerade]

>137kph is 13.7mph Might want to check your maths there

[@lhpl]

​@@IVIaskeradecould be that he is Swedish or possibly Norwegian. Due to the size of these countries, the have a weird habit of expressing distances in "mil", by which they mean "metermil" or metric miles aka myriameter, 1 mym = 10000 m = 10 km.