harryagain scribbled...
Had a Ford Anglia, the split pin holding the brake pedal pivot broke, the pivot fell out, so I was unable to brake with the pedal lying on the floor. Turning the engine off worked.
Certain mechanical failures on the Austin A35/A40 could be nasty, as there were not two independent braking systems. The handbrake and hydraulic brake shared many components (there was a single slave cylinder mounted on the chassis at the rear, which operated the same linkage as the handbrake).
Why would thet work? Another stupid half wit author. You had a spsrk producing device in every petrol tank. The sender for the petrol guage. Just a wiper on a bare resistor.
No air, no bang. The "empty" bit of the tank is filled with petrol vapour.
"Attempted murder". More half wits.
And just turn off the ignition. Or depress the clutch. Most people put a little gas on when starting so that would be apparent too before even setting off.
Well that would just be one wheel.
Still leaves the hand brake.
...
For a conviction, it is sufficient that the person carrying out the act did it with the intent to kill. It is irrelevant whether or not there was any chance of success.
Colin Bignell
I agree that's the law, but suppose I decide to try to kill a person just by wishing them dead? I might have the intent to kill, but mere bad thoughts have never been known to work in the past. You reckon I could be convicted, even though it ought to be laughed out of court?
So how do these new engine related serious crashes happen then where the electronics are tweaked to make it unable to stop?
Brian
A slight problem of proving the act in that case. However, if it could be proven that you did and that you genuinely believed it possible to kill in that way, you could probably be burned as a witch :-)
Colin Bignell
It's an interesting question though; if you genuinely believe you can kill someone just by thinking it, and you tried as hard as you could to "think them dead" in front of witnesses, what would be the legal position? You intended to kill them, regardless of the reality of your "skills".
My guess would be that you'd be sectioned instead of facing charges.
lol, someone that stupid would have accidentally killed themselves long ago by shaving or making a sandwich.
IIUC, these "bait cars" they use in the US telly programmes are tampered with so that they can be stopped by remote control when the thief drives off in them, I'm sure someone with the relevant skills could do something similar to make the car unstoppable. I know my car has various "drive by wire" stuff like the throttle and the semi-auto gear box which are electrical rather than mechanical. I had a hire car with a push-button ignition a while ago, so a simple over-ride of that part of the circuit means you wouldn't be able to turn the ignition off either.
Writing for a technically illiterate readership.
Some chav tried that on a car belonging to one of his neighbours , about 10 years ago ISTR.
The flexible hydraulic hose he cut was not for the braking system, but the suspension. He may have realised the difference in the short time between the Citroen settling gracefully onto him and his expiry from asphyxiation a short time later.
Easier way is to take an empty syringe with a needle and inject air into a suitable vein. Death by embolism, nothing to be detected and a tiny puncture wound unlikely to be noticed. Only theory at the moment.
mark
or insulin.
That's certainly been done in fiction - something by Dorothy L.Sayers? I'm sure it's happened accidentally as well.
Air is usually more readily available.
Under the Criminal Attempts Act 1981, Section 1
(1) If, with intent to commit an offence to which this section applies, a person does an act which is more than merely preparatory to the commission of the offence, he is guilty of attempting to commit the offence. ... (2) A person may be guilty of attempting to commit an offence to which this section applies even though the facts are such that the commission of the offence is impossible. ...
So, in theory, you would be guilty of attempted murder. However, I suspect that what would happen in practice is that the CPS would have a good laugh before deciding that prosecuting would serve no useful purpose.
Colin Bignell
See "Unnatural Death" by Dorothy L Sayers.
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