OHTA.ca

i was charge with careless driving for hitting black ice in March. I turned away from oncoming traffic, ditched the car and it inevitably flipped on it's side. we were all okay but still taken to the hospital to make sure. the opp arrived at the hospital before my husband to go to speak to my 13 year old son without permission. Now I dont have anything to hide but is the officer supposed to have permission before asking him what speed we were going, what he thought was the cause of our situation??

oh also, how crucial is this to fighting my case. which i feel is alot steep of a charge for my circumstances. i know i haven't given any details of it. I also wonder about how well recieved is the notion of black ice in court? when we climbed out of our car all the witnesses said it was black ice and how slippery it was. therefore it's not someone I am faking or conjuring up...in case you were needing to know.

Black ice is usually not much help to people charged with careless driving because the prosecutor's position is usually, "If there was black ice on the road you should have been driving slower and more carefully; then there wouldn't have been a collision." But like everything, it depends on the totality of the circumstances.

With respect to talking to a minor, police can talk to whoever they want. The only time there is a requirement to consult a parent is if they are taking a formal statement from a minor who is under arrest and even then the parent doesn't get to veto it if they don't want the minor talking.

You may want to consider hiring a paralegal or a traffic lawyer for this particular case. They will get disclosure of all of the evidence against you, see if proper procedures were followed with respect to gathering evidence (such as talking to your son), and figure out if they can fight it, or plea-bargain it. As Simon Borys says, there's nothing that requires parental consent for police to talk to a minor (except in the circumstances he mentioned). However, there might be some technicality that the paralegal or lawyer could find. No guarantees, however.

In all likelihood, they'll plea-bargain it down to "Leave Roadway - Not in Safety" or something like that. It's 2 demerit points, no licence suspension, and a much smaller fine than you're looking at. However, that would depend on the evidence, the Prosecutor, and how they think they will do at trial. Your best bet, though, is to get some sort of professional legal representation. Careless driving is a very serious charge.

Radar Identified wrote:You may want to consider hiring a paralegal or a traffic lawyer for this particular case.

Agreed. Especially if there was a statement taken from a minor (I wasn't clear on that from your post) because there can be issues with the reliability and accuracy of such statements.