Formula E driver Dan Ticktum has been fined and had his road vehicle licence endorsed following a ruling by a court in Staffordshire last month.
Cannock Magistrates Court found Ticktum failed to identify the driver of a car which was observed exceeding the 70mph (112kph) speed limit on the M6 Toll motorway on May 29th last year.Following the hearing last month, Ticktum was told to pay a fine of £440 plus additional costs of £90 and a surcharge to fund victim services of £176. He was also given six endorsement points on his driving licence. Drivers face a ban if they incur 12 points within a three-year period.
Ticktum, who is in his second season racing for NIO in Formula E, has courted controversy more than once during his career. While racing in MSA Formula in 2015 he was given a one-year ban for deliberately colliding with rival Ricky Collard in Safety Car period during a race at Silverstone.
He previously belonged to driver development programmes for two F1 teams. However his one-year ban compromised his chances of participating in an F1 test for Red Bull in 2018 during his time with the current world champions.
Ticktum later joined Williams’ junior driver programme but was released by the team mid-season in 2021. This was understood to have followed a complaint from a member of the public, and was not related to comments Ticktum made about Nicholas Latifi, one of the team’s F1 drivers at the time.
Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and
Formula E
- Canny Cassidy controls proceedings to win second Diriyah race
- Dennis dominates in Diriyah as Evans loses podium finish at final corner
- Formula E attracts backing from Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund
- While F1 is eager for more street tracks, Formula E is drifting away from them
- Wehrlein confirmed winner of season opener in Mexico after throttle map investigation
Browse all Formula E articles
SjaakFoo (@sjaakfoo)
17th February 2023, 14:54
It’s astonishing that teams want to associate themselves with what I imagine is just a PR nightmare.
petebaldwin (@)
17th February 2023, 15:04
True but when you’re talking about Formula E, I think the phrase “any publicity is good publicity” is more true than ever….
Alex Mc
17th February 2023, 15:06
“…found Ticktum failed to identify the driver of a car”
Ok, the Brits are going to have to translate that for us Americans! Like, he failed a picture quiz? I don’t understand.
Ben
18th February 2023, 9:41
I’m going to suggest:
His car was caught speeding but he claimed he wasn’t driving it. Then he couldn’t say who was driving or prove it wasnt him (failing to identify the driver, more than likely because it was actually him).
I don’t know if those are the exact details for sure, but its a fair assumption.
mrfill (@mrfill)
19th February 2023, 11:35
The car was caught by a speed camera and the driver is responsible. At first the police send a letter to the registered owner asking who was driving the vehicle and if this doesn’t get answered they assume the registered owner was driving. Most times the camera takes a picture from the front showing the driver and there have been cases where a wife has tried to take the rap for her husband’s speeding and been thwarted when it is shown that the driver had a luxurious beard.
Basically, if an owner fails to declare who was guilty of the offence, they are deemed to be guilty.
ajpennypacker (@ajpennypacker)
17th February 2023, 15:26
This kid is so dumb and clearly he will never learn. He is so lucky that someone gave him a chance in FE. Because there are easily 15 other drivers like him
Fer no.65 (@fer-no65)
17th February 2023, 15:42
I don’t understand. Was he involved with the driver speeding? this article isn’t clear…
SjaakFoo (@sjaakfoo)
17th February 2023, 15:55
He owns the car, was speeding, but he argued he wasn’t the one driving so he shouldn’t need to be fined. Then he had to prove it wasn’t him driving and speeding and he failed to produce the actual driver.
In other words, he was trying to get out of the fine he deservedly got.
gDog
17th February 2023, 16:02
Either he was driving himself, but tried to avoid the penalty by claiming someone else was driving but them didnt name them so gets the penalty anyway (should be a harsher penalty for trying to avoid it imo).
Or, someone else was driving his car and he doesn’t know their name…
Or, someone else was driving and he’s covering for them for whatever reason. But in that case surely you would just put your own name down as the driver of the vehicle?
I know which option sounds more likely to me.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
19th February 2023, 21:49
Alex Mc, @mrfill did a good job of summarising.
Further note: it’s also possible to get the “failed to identify driver” penalty for not answering a letter about a fine at all, if one has no good reason for ignoring it (for example, if Dan had been able to prove he was out of the UK for Formula E stuff the whole time the police was waiting, a “Not Guilty” verdict would have been the usual result). So failing to identify the driver will have almost certainly resulted in a worse fine than if he’d simply said, “It was me, I’ll pay” or “I haven’t a clue who was driving, but I’ll pay anyway since I’m the owner” (especially since the matter ended up in court). Points earned may not have been affected, depending on the circumstances – for example, if he was out of the country racing during a lot of the window for identification but not all of it, some mitigation is possible. As such, I’m not surprised this ended up in court.
Jere (@jerejj)
17th February 2023, 16:48
Firstly, an old matter & I wonder how much above the speed limit because marginal isn’t unsafe.
Most relevantly, though, I’m baffled that a person can seemingly get fined for failing to identify a speeding committer (in the UK), which is supposed to be law-enforcing people’s responsibility.
Yes, I noted the reference explanations just above before clicking, but I decided to post anyway as a general note.
Martin (@f1hornet)
17th February 2023, 17:02
Apparently it was 114mph, so way over the limit and unsafe https://www.expressandstar.com/news/crime/2023/02/16/racing-driver-fined-after-ferrari-photographed-travelling-at-m6-at-114mph/
MichaelN
17th February 2023, 17:11
A Ferrari at age 23? Let’s call it Clue #1 as to why this dude keeps getting drives despite a rap sheet longer any respectable racing team would want to be anywhere near.
grat
17th February 2023, 22:01
Ah, well, there’s the problem. Most Ferraris look very fast even when not moving, so the speed camera forgot to subtract 20 mph.
Oh. 114 mph? Never mind.
petebaldwin (@)
17th February 2023, 17:48
@jerejj – If the car is registered to you, you automatically get the fine. On the slip, you can either pay it or you can argue why you shouldn’t be fined – for example, if someone else was driving.
If you say someone else was driving, then you’ll be expected to say who you allowed to drive your car on that day. Driving someone else’s car without their permission is considered theft of a vehicle so if you don’t know who was driving your car then a bigger crime than speeding has been committed.
I assume this was pointed out to him and he suddenly remembered it was actually him in the driving seat.
Adrian
17th February 2023, 20:21
@petebaldwin They don’t know who was driving as he wouldn’t say, which is why he was fined for not revealing who was driving.
The speed the driver was going generally means an automatic ban which, under the new rules for UK registered racing drivers, also means the loss of the race license as well.
It’s daft state of affairs that the police withdrew the speeding offence as he wouldn’t say who was driving.
floodo1 (@floodo1)
18th February 2023, 16:33
thx
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
19th February 2023, 21:56
@jerejj At the speed Dan was driving, the police have the option (but not the obligation) to ask for immediate disqualification. It is possible that some form of mitigation was successfully argued to get the penalty down to where it is (the court has significant scope for this where it believes it to be warranted, and it can be granted on several grounds – including loss of ability to work – since the court is free to assume the defendent was driving for the purposes of determining mitigation).
Key man
17th February 2023, 18:14
Does any other country force its citizens, by law to incriminate others?
Proesterchen (@proesterchen)
18th February 2023, 9:43
Yes, of course. What do you think calling a witness constitutes?
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
19th February 2023, 21:58
As far as I know, every country that assumes owner-by-default and has the possibility of someone other than the owner getting a penalty (regardless of what grounds the country allows for that possibility) has a similar law regarding failure to identify who should in fact receive a penalty.