A coroner’s inquest has been told that no charges will be brought against a cyclist who was riding laps of London’s Regent’s Park when he crashed into a pensioner, causing her fatal injuries.
Hilda Griffiths, aged 81, died two months after the collision which happened shortly after 7am on a Saturday morning in June 2022, in which she sustained injuries including several broken bones and bleeding on the brain, reports Telegraph.co.uk.
Inner West London Coroner’s Court heard that the cyclist, Brian Fitzgerald, who works as a banker with Credit Suisse, was riding at a speed of between 25mph and 29mph as he undertook laps of the park, a popular destination with the capital’s cyclists, in a pace line with fellow members of the Muswell Hill Peloton club.
The speed limit in the park is 20mph, but the Metropolitan Police Service confirmed that it does not apply to people riding bicycles, and that the case had been closed because there was “insufficient evidence for a real prospect of conviction.”
Mr Fitzgerald told the inquest that he had been left with “zero reaction time” when Ms Griffiths, who had been walking her dog and was crossing the road to a pedestrian island, stepped out in front of the group from a pedestrian island, estimating that he only had 2 metres in which to brake to avoid crashing into her.
A jogger who witnessed the crash, which happened on the Outer Circle close to Hanover Terrace, confirmed that in their opinion, the cyclist was not at fault.
“I believe legally the speed limit doesn’t apply to cyclists [the same] as motorists,” Mr Fitzgerald said.
“I’ve never seen any police in the park having any objections to the speed cyclists travel at,” he continued.
Metropolitan Police Detective Sergeant Ropafadzo Bungo told the court that a review of the case determined that “there were no criminal acts which would allow prosecution” in instances where a cyclist is riding faster than the posted speed limit for motor vehicles and which do not apply to bicycles since they are not mechanically propelled and are not required to be fitted with speedometers.
The officer explained that “mechanically propelled vehicles have the ability to identify the speed one is actually moving at” while in most cases cyclists cannot.
The Royal Parks, which manages Regent’s Park as well as a number of other parks in London as well as Windsor Great Park, has previously confirmed that speed limits posted in the parks apply only to motor vehicles.
Mr Fitzgerald, who conveyed his “sympathies” to the victim’s family, added that he was not sure whether there were markings on the road telling cyclist to slow down, although a photograph shown to the inquest revealed that there was one on the approach to the location where the crash happened.
Ms Griffiths’ son, Gerard Griffiths, told the court that he believed the law needed reforming.
“With 35 or more cycling clubs with hundreds of members in the park, it was only a matter of time before tragic outcomes occurred,” he said.
“The laws are inadequate and need to change. If any other type of vehicles were travelling over the speed limit in that same formation – essentially tailgating – they would be committing an offence.”
Assistant coroner Jean Harkin recorded a conclusion of “accidental cycling collision death.”
While no charges are being brought against Mr Fitzgerald in connection with Ms Griffiths’ death, occasionally prosecutions are brought against bike riders involved in a crash in which a pedestrian is killed.
In August 2017, cyclist Charlie Alliston was sentenced to 18 months’ detention in a youth offenders facility after being convicted by a jury at the Old Bailey of “causing bodily harm by wanton and furious driving” in connection with the death of Kim Briggs, whom he struck as she crossed London’s Old Street.
Alliston, who was riding a fixed-wheel bike that had no front brake .and did not therefore comply with legal requirements for use on the road, was cleared of a separate charge of manslaughter.
The offence he was found guilty of falls under the Offences Against the Person Act 1861 and Mrs Briggs’ husband, Matthew Briggs, has campaigned since her death for the law to be updated with a new offence of causing death by dangerous cycling to be introduced, and has claimed that the government’s failure to do so is because ministers are scared of what he termed the “cycling lobby.”
> Husband of pedestrian killed by cyclist claims ministers are scared of “cycling lobby”
Because Ms Griffiths died more than 30 days after the crash, it will be recorded in official statistics compiled annually by the Department for Transport in its publication Reported Road Casualties Great Britain as one resulting in serious injury, rather than as a fatality.