Skip driver banned for two years for dangerous driving
CCTV footage of the incident was screened in court
A LORRY driver who works for Ray Whelan’s Skip Hire in Carlow was last week put off the road for two years and fined when he appeared before the local district court on a dangerous driving charge. Aaron Paul Perse had pleaded not guilty to a charge of dangerous driving, which carries a mandatory driving ban, at Pollerton Little, Carlow on 10 September last year.
A motorist who made a complaint about Mr Perse’s driving, and who gave dashcam footage of the incident to gardaí, gave evidence in court last week. He said that he was driving into Carlow behind a skip lorry and that he saw the lorry driver overtaking several cars, with one of the cars having to take evasive action.
CCTV footage of the incident was screened in court, showing the lorry overtaking the cars near Boland’s garage in Pollerton Little, driving along meridian lines in the centre of the road.
Solicitor Kellie Manning told Judge Geraldine Carthy that Mr Perse (30) pulled out and overtook the cars because the car directly in front of him kept braking and he was afraid he was going to rear-end it. She continued that Mr Perse accepted that it was a careless manoeuvre but denied that it was dangerous.
Garda Francis Ryan, the investigating garda, said that if Mr Perse was concerned about the car in front of him constantly braking, then he should have slowed down himself to create a distance between them. He also said that the CCTV footage showed that there was ample space to do this.
Ms Manning submitted to Judge Carthy that it was a “momentary misjudgement” on Mr Perse’s behalf and that it was a careless and not a dangerous move.
Judge Carthy found Mr Perse of 21 Holland Park, Athy guilty of dangerous driving and put him off the road for two years while also fining him €1,000.
