The law against street racing does not have the expected deterrent effect

One year to the day after its adoption, the Ontario law against street racing has not had the deterrent effect that the authorities were expecting, and the number of daily seizures of vehicles does not decrease as much as expected.

The law gives police the power to confiscate immediately the vehicle of any driver has been driving 50 km / h above the speed limit and to relegate to the pound for a week, in addition to authorize fines reach $ 10,000. The authorities expected that a message passes quickly, but this is not really the case.

Immediately after the adoption of the law, the police proceeded to nearly 40 seizures per day, on average. The current trend is about 23 daily entries. At this rate, more than 10,000 motorists have been intercepted by the end of the year. Until the end of last week, 8,459 drivers had been accused under provincial law banning street racing, some two or three times.

Even if drivers have not yet grasped the message, the Commissioner of the OPP, Julian Fantino, always regarded the law as a success and intends to continue the momentum even.

Yet only about 41 percent of cases heard in court have given rise to a conviction under this legislation.

In August 31 last, the courts have treated 2,896 charges and 39 percent of them had been reduced to other charges, such as speeding. Twenty percent of the charges were concluded by a withdrawal, suspension, dismissal of charges, or an acquittal.