OHTA.ca

On sunday morning 31st January 2016 and OPP officer came to my house and asked me questions about where I was on 19th december 2015.

After asking these questions he told me that I was involved in an accident where I struck a pedestrian and ran over his dog. Though both are fine now, but witnesses gave description of a dark SUV and as per the officer someone also chased my vehicle and noted my number.

I was shocked by this as I was not involved in any such accident and I said the same thing to the officer. The officer said that he is just doing his job and he is conveying what the witnesses told the police. He gave me 3 charges (no points yet)1.careless driving; 2. Failing to remain at the scene and 3. Failing to report. My court date is 23rd March for further proceedings.

I m a Uber driver and I did tell the officer that I might have been in toronto downtown that day. I am not aware of any such accident whatsoever.

I am too stressed, what are my options. Please help.!!!

These are very serious charges which will have a catastrophic effect on your driving ability. I would be doing everything possible to determine where I was on the date and time in question and also where my vehicle was. Is it possible someone else was driving it ?

There has to be some evidence pointing towards you hitting them (i.e damage on your vehicle). Let's just pretend that I wanted insurance money, so I claimed argyll hit me and drove off, and gave his plates, the police shouldn't charge him without some burden of proof.

On your summons date, just state you would like to review disclosure before you make a plea,and they'll reschedule you another date where you should plead not guilty, or take a deal if they give you one.

This one is a little out of my personal range, so I'd probably hire a professional.

Based on the severity of the collision the police could also get a warrant/production order for the uber records to prove you were or were not in the area. However if it's not a serious injury collision I doubt they would go through the trouble

The officer did mention that there were only minor injuries and dog is also fine and there are no criminal charges as of now.

He also said it's not necessary that the witnesses will be there to testify against me.

"He also said it's not necessary that the witnesses will be there to testify against me".

The witness may not be there on the first court date, but if this goes to trial, the witness is most definitely required to testify against you.

Unless there is video evidence so you're going to want to get disclosure to see what the crown has available too them.

Get the time of the incident and contact Uber. They track their vehicles should be able to tell you exactly where you were at that time.

UnluckyDuck wrote:There has to be some evidence pointing towards you hitting them (i.e damage on your vehicle).

The witnesses are part of the evidence. There doesn't need to be a "bloody glove". Anyone is capable of clipping a pedestrian without having any visible damage on the vehicle. The "no damage" defense is not a theory i'd put all my marbles into.

Did you actually answer the questions that officer asked you? You realize that you did not have to answer any questions and that anything you said can be used against you!

Did you get a SUMMONS for all three of these offences, all with the March 23rd date? Or do any of the tickets say NOTICE OF OFFENCE on them instead of SUMMONS? The date on the summons is not your trial date so the officer and the witnesses do not have to be there.

At the summons date you can:

(i) say that you want to plead guilty (not adviseable), or

(ii) say that you are not sure how you want to plead yet and would like disclosure before you decide, or

(iii) say that you want to plead not guilty, and want to request disclosure, and want to request a trial date.

For option (ii) above (not sure how you want to plead), they will set another date like the first summons date where you will again be asked how you plan to plead (the officer and witnesses do not need to be at this one either).

For option (iii) above (pleading not guilty), they will set another date as the actual trial date where the officer and witnesses must attend.

In order for any of these charges to stick, there MUST be a witness that can identify you as the driver. You have nothing to lose and everything to gain by pleading NOT GUILTY to all these charges and requesting a trial date and requesting disclosure (officers notes, witness statements and will-says, audio/video recordings if any). You must get a copy of all the disclosure before you can decide how to fight these tickets. You can also plead guilty to all the charges at anytime up until the trial date and you would not be any worse off than simply pleading guilty today, however it is totally to your advantage to look at the disclosure before you decide what to do.

"In order for any of these charges to stick, there MUST be a witness that can identify you as the driver".

That's not quite right...A fail to remain charge can go to the registered owner, unless the owner can prove that the car was stolen at the time of the incident. The careless and fail to report are driver charges.

Ah yes... there is a disctinction as to whether they are charging you as the OWNER of the vehicle or the DRIVER of the vehicle.

If they are charging you as the OWNER then (if convicted) the charge does NOT show on your driving record and does NOT affect your insurance. But I think they would still need a witness at the trial to identify the vehicle.