To think Auriol Grey being jailed is not appropriate.

As I understand it the sentence can be reviewed but I think that's a separate process to an appeal.

If you lose an appeal your sentence can be reset though.

In certain cases I think that the home secretary can petition to have it increased but it's not for all crimes.

(I think)

It’s heartening to see one or two people, who were initially staunchly defending AG, change their mind.

The video really does appear to show a shove, but it isn’t clear enough to be inconclusive, so let’s assume for a moment that there wasn’t a push.

The video clearly shows AG (who had been acting aggressively) turn towards the cyclist as she passes and, at the moment the cyclist is passing her, extend her arm towards her, and we know that she made some degree of contact.

That, on its own, is assault and even if the actual contact was insufficient to cause the cyclist to wobble, the threat of violence in itself is sufficient.

The media reporting (from certain quarters) is very skewed, minimizing, and designed to stoke outrage and generate clicks.

I really hope she gets even longer. She certainly deserves it.

I blame the council for creating such a stupid compromised and ambiguous shared space instead of properly networked infrastructure.

It’s always the same in the UK, everything is always a really poor compromise somehow at great expense and somehow even that takes fucking ages.

Nobody should be dead here and nobody should be in jail. There should be proper safe spaces for non-motorised travellers prioritised massively over motor vehicles.

I think everyone can agree the paths, and whether they are shared or not, should be clearer.

But that doesn’t excuse assault resulting in death.

Yeap I'm sure many of us would prefer better signed shared spaces but the blame here lies with AG. Her actions directly caused the horrible death of another human being and huge trauma for the car driver.

She killed someone.

I'll leave it to the court to decide

I respectfully disagree. Her actions were heat of the moment angry and irresponsible. But she shouldn’t have been put in a situation of such conflict where such a reaction can have such severe consequences. She didn’t intend to kill, she lashed out and that was wrong, but we would have been nowhere near this point had the area for cycling and walking been properly designed. The only compromise we should be making in the 21st century is compromising the ability for cars to dominate our spaces.

Her lashing out caused the death of another person. Which is why she was convicted of manslaughter and not murder. Has she not lashed out, Celia would still be alive, so it wasn't the lack of clarity about the pathway that killed her.

But she shouldn’t have been put in a situation of such conflict where such a reaction can have such severe consequences

Oh I've heard it all now 🙄@brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr your comment is ridiculous. At best.

So if 'heat of the moment' is an excuse for killing someone, how many times can that be used and by how many people? AG faces no consequences, then has another 'run in with someone as she is reported to oft do, is she justified again in assaulting them/killing them? If you are saying its not her fault, she was put in that situation?

she shouldn’t have been put in a situation of such conflict where such a reaction can have such severe consequences

How can we prevent the situation whereby pushing someone into a road is likely to kill them?

Exactly! Are AG supporters advocating a buffer zone (is that the right term?!) around her so she can go about her day with absolute impunity, behaving as she wishes and anyone who displeases her rightly accepts her violence and aggression?

This is one of the limpest defences so far (save for the “everyone was doing this during lockdown” effort several pages back).

You concede that AG acted in an angry and irresponsible manner, and that she lashed out, and that this caused the cyclist’s death.

That is precisely why she was convicted of manslaughter. She purposefully assaulted someone, and it led to their death. She may not have attempted to kill the cyclist (if the intent to kill or cause GBH could be proven, this would be a murder charge).

Even if it had been a clearly designated pedestrian-only walkway, you can’t go around assaulting people.

And you cannot absolve someone of criminal responsibility because their aggressive and/or violent act was committed in the heat of the moment.

Bit Kim Jong-un is that not?

(Apologies, as am being flippant as still incredulous at her supporters!)

My above post should have been the end of my other one above it!

@brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr Her actions were heat of the moment angry and irresponsible…She didn’t intend to kill, she lashed out and that was wrong

Do you realise ‘heat of the moment’ and not intending to kill do not absolve you of responsibility?

It doesn’t matter if she didn’t intend to kill, her actions directly lead to the death of another person, which is exactly why she was charged with manslaughter.

Even if the cyclist was totally in the wrong, and it was just a normal pavement they were cycling on, it still wouldn't justify a pedestrian pushing them onto a busy road. Even if a motorcyclist was riding on the pavement it wouldn't justify pushing them onto a busy road.

she shouldn’t have been put in a situation of such conflict where such a reaction can have such severe consequences

But she wasn’t put in a situation of such conflict, because the situation didn’t have to result in a conflict.

She could have just kept to the other side of the pavement and passed on by. If she was feeling really aggrieved, she could taken a photograph and reported the cyclist.

Even if the pavement wasn’t a shared pavement, her reaction would still not have been justified. It is not okay to act aggressively towards someone else. Her actions caused someone’s death.

I think so many people don’t see anything wrong with her actions because they too feel entitled and justified to police others who they perceive as doing something “wrong”.

The cyclist died because of AG’s anger and entitlement issues, not because of some confusion over a shared pavement.

Let me ask, how many of you have done things you shouldn’t really have done as a motorist? Even if you won’t admit it, I bet there’s been a time that you’ve done a bit of ‘less than perfect’ driving. Does this mean somebody had the right to run you off the road?

I can understand people being outraged at the story if they’ve only been exposed to it through minimizing and click-baiting news articles.

I can understand people being instinctively worried about whether prison is the right place for someone with AG’s disabilities.

I can, to an extent, understand people wanting to attribute AG’s post-accident conduct and lack of remorse to her disabilities.

I can understand people not being convinced there was a push (in fact, while I strongly believe there was, there is obviously some doubt).

What I cannot understand is people’s willingness to excuse a physical assault, whether it’s because they don’t believe the cyclist should have been on the pavement, or because it was in the heat of the moment, or because ‘everyone was doing it’ in the pandemic.

If you think that it’s acceptable to assault a cyclist for being on the pavement, or to assault someone in the heat of the moment, or you found yourself assaulting people during lockdown, you’re probably a violent scumbag.

She pushed a woman into the road which resulted in her death. I don't get what the grounds for appeal are.

www.cps.gov.uk/legal-guidance/homicide-murder-and-manslaughter

CPS guidance on what qualifies as manslaughter, since a lot of posters seem to be struggling with the difference between manslaughter and an accident.

Grey's actions fall under;

Conduct taking the form of an unlawful act involving a danger of some harm that resulted in death ("gross negligence manslaughter"), and Conduct taking the form of an unlawful act involving a danger of some harm that resulted in death ("unlawful and dangerous act manslaughter").

She assaulted Celia, whether she actually touched her or not Celia clearly feared the risk of assault enough to swerve onto the road. Assault covers conduct taking the form of an unlawful act involving a danger of some harm that resulted in death.

It's also pretty fucking obvious to anyone with a brain that if you force someone onto the road and into oncoming traffic they may die which covers conduct that was grossly negligent given the risk of death and did kill.

Grey blocked the path and swung her arm at Celia as she tried to pass thus forcing her into the road.

Celia falling into the road without Grey's actions is an accident. Celia falling into the road as a result of Grey's actions is manslaughter.

I believe the appeal is over the sentence, rather than the conviction.

Its worth bearing in mind that there was insufficient evidence to convict her of the push, so the conviction was based solely on her other aggressive actions. Had it been possible to prove the push beyond all reasonable doubt, I’m sure she would have got a longer sentence.

The appeal is, presumably, focussed on obtaining a lesser sentence based on AG’s disabilities.

FWIW, if medical evidence supports that she belongs in a care home or similar, rather than prison, that’s fine. One place she should certainly not be is out on the street.

Guilty. That poor poor lady 🥺

The more I look at it, the more I don't see 'gesticulating' or 'waving arms' startling the cyclist and making her veer into the road of her own accord. What I do see in that split second frame is that AG rather deliberately pushes the shoulder of the cyclist away from her quite hard with her left hand as she passes, causing her to fall. There's just no other way it could be interpreted in my mind.

Bearing in mind the video we are seeing is not what was played in court. They had the full video of the entire exchange which was not edited and was not out of shot. I actually read a report by the police yesterday urging caution when commenting on the case because people are not in full possession of the facts which they themselves witnessed on CCTV. I'm quite satisfied now that the snippet we did see involved more than just a bit of light contact.

"Det Sgt Dollard, who interviewed Grey, told BBC Radio Cambridgeshire: "I'll always remember the morning after it occurred obtaining the CCTV and watching it in its entirety.

"In all honesty it's horrific and not appropriate for wider release to the public, but, if it were, then I think a lot of the arguments in relation to appropriate responses would be null and void."