Prosecution against mobile crane operator dropped

Darren Finnegan, instructed by David Ollivere of Lyons Davidson solicitors, represented a company which operated mobile cranes at a first appearance before the Magistrates’.

Traffic police had stopped a five-axle mobile crane which, due to its size and weight required a Movement Notification. The police measured the vehicle and looked at one of the plating certificates on the side of the crane. The officer decided that the ‘Maximum Axle Weight’ meant the actual weight of the vehicle before him. This error led the police to believe that the vehicle was over 12 tonnes heavier than it was.

From this, the Movement Notification was deemed to have been invalid and the operator was prosecuted for operating a vehicle being in excess of Construction & Use width and length limits (they having deemed the vehicle to have fallen outside the STGO).

Darren pressed these observations on the court and the prosecution at the first appearance and briefly highlighted that no offence had been committed and that the prosecution was entirely based on the police’s misinterpretation of vehicle weights and that there was no evidence of the vehicle’s supposed dimensions.

The case was, after some delay and without further hearings, discontinued by the prosecution.

This case is added to a long list of inventive prosecutions brought against the operators of vehicles operating under STGO and, in particular, the operators of mobile cranes which fall into STGO.

Lincoln House Chambers, Darren and Richard in particular, have dealt with a number of such cases. Any case involving an interpretation of the Construction and Use Regulations and the STG Order is rather complex and benefits from expert representation. David Ollivere similarly is a specialist corporate and regulatory criminal solicitor.