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Woman outed after Twitter brag that she hit cyclist

Emma Way of Norfolk in the U.K. tweets that she hit a cyclist and that she had right of way. The police are informed. Her employer is none too pleased either.

Chris Matyszczyk
3 min read
Screenshot by Chris Matyszczyk/CNET

Road rage can mist the eyes. There is no reason, however, for that mist to travel to the brain.

Yet this may have happened in the case of Emma Way and her indomitable belief in the right of Way.

Way was allegedly driving her car through Norfolk, England last Sunday. Maneuvering wasn't, perhaps, so easy as she encountered a 100-mile cycle ride called the Boudicca Sportive.

It seems, though, that she channeled her inner combative Boudicca and asserted herself excessively.

Please don't take my word for it. Take hers on Twitter: "Definitely knocked a cyclist off his bike earlier. I have right of way -- he doesn't even pay road tax!"

Did she offer a hashtag in order to garner a little more support? Of course. It was #Bloodycyclists.

There are times, of course, when cyclists (especially those wearing tight shirts advertising Italian cheese) can themselves be arrogant or even belligerent.

In this case, however, the cyclist in question, Toby Hockley, told the BBC that Way didn't stop and couldn't have known whether he was alive or dead.

What is definitely alive, though, is a controversy and possible legal case.

Concerned human beings decided to alert the police to Way's rashtagged tweet. The police tweeted her: "@emmaway20 we have had tweets ref an RTC with a bike. We suggest you report it at a police station ASAP if not done already & then dm us."

One tweeter tried to help the police further by offering a photo that appeared to be from Way's Twitter feed. It was of a car speedometer, its needle at around 95 mph.

The police confirmed to the Independent that they have been in contact with both Way and Hockley and investigations are continuing. (Way has removed her Twitter account.)

Her employer, accountancy firm Larking Gowan, issued a very serious statement: "Please be assured that this is not a view held by the firm and we most certainly do not condone this behavior."

Because this is a world in which nothing exists unless it's on social media, Hockley took to the rival Facebook to offer his own account.

He wrote: "Oh hi! That was me you hit and FYI, you didn't knock me off, I'm too hard to be hurt by a pissy micra or whatever it was you were driving."

The "micra" would be a reference to the Nissan Micra, which is a small, but very useful car when taken to the narrow streets of England.

Oddly, though, he seemed to contradict himself when speaking to the BBC, offering that he had indeed been thrown from his bike: "She came on to my side of the road. I took the wing mirror off and I went flying off my bike into a hedge. She hit me hard, really hard. I am lucky to be alive. But I managed to get out of the hedge and stand up."

The lesson here is all too painfully clear: If you knock someone off their bike and feel a desperate need to boast about it on Twitter, try protecting your tweets.