Cutting another driver off in a fit of temper may bring criminal charges

Anyone who drives regularly will have been angered by other drivers who ignore the traffic rules. On 7 October this year in Songyuan, Jilin, a dispute over changing lanes produced a very dangerous incident. It need never have happened at all: it arose only because neither driver would give way, and it ended with the two vehicles in collision.

That day a bus travelling from west to east and a taxi travelling from south to north and turning right reached an intersection at the same time. The taxi wanted to pass in front of the bus and the bus did not give way. The two vehicles then began to jostle on the road, until the taxi stopped across the front of the bus and its driver got out to argue with the bus driver. During the argument some passengers in the bus urged the bus driver to hit the taxi. One was bold enough to say it and the other bold enough to do it: the bus driver drove into the taxi, and passengers on the bus were injured. The bus driver then called the police, saying that the taxi had changed lanes and caused the crash, and saying nothing else.

The officers recovered the surveillance footage and found that the incident involved suspected criminal conduct. On 18 October both drivers were criminally detained.

The law

Why were the two drivers detained?

Both were driving vehicles used for carriage: the bus in particular is public transport. Each driver bore a duty to ensure the safety of passengers and to safeguard public safety. They disregarded public safety, knowing that what they were doing would endanger it and would carry a serious risk to the life and health of an indeterminate number of people or to public and private property, and they were indifferent to that outcome. That brings them within the Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China on the offence of endangering public safety by dangerous means.

The offence of endangering public safety by dangerous means is a distinct charge, covering the use of unusual dangerous methods other than arson, breaching a dike, explosion or poisoning to endanger public safety. The interest it protects is public safety, and it requires intent. It is an offence of conduct: whether or not serious consequences result, the act of endangering public safety is enough to constitute it.

Passengers who egged the driver on should bear responsibility

One further point in this case deserves attention: the encouragement given by passengers. The criminal law recognises the instigator, meaning a person who deliberately incites another to commit an offence by persuasion, inducement, instruction, encouragement or bribery, whether or not the other person then commits it. The video shows several passengers calling out, "Go on, hit him".

It should not be assumed that a shouted remark is of no consequence. A single heated sentence from a passenger may be what pushes a bus driver into taking further, dangerous and excessive action.

A wider pattern

Incidents of this kind, of drivers cutting each other off in a temper, occur from time to time in daily life. They carry a serious safety risk and are highly dangerous, very easily causing traffic accidents and casualties. Many people have a weak sense of the law and do not realise that such conduct not only breaches the traffic rules but may amount to a criminal offence.

Under the relevant provisions, driving a motor vehicle without overtaking or giving way as required, or driving against the flow of traffic, attracts penalty points and a fine. Under the Criminal Law, racing on the road in egregious circumstances constitutes the offence of dangerous driving, punishable by up to six months' criminal detention and a fine.

In recent years many serious traffic accidents have arisen from driving in a temper, and not a few families have been destroyed by them. Drivers are therefore reminded: never drive in anger, keep a steady frame of mind, give way courteously, and put safety first.