Struck car before hitting shop wall
The motorist came through the junction without stopping and crashed into a wall alongside SuperValu, Baltinglass
A DRIVER whose jeep careered down a hill, through a junction and across a main road without stopping and then hit a car was found guilty of careless driving when he appeared before a recent sitting of Carlow District Court.
Michael Vines (77) had pleaded not guilty to the charge and had claimed that the brakes of this jeep failed to work when the accident happened at Mill Street, Baltinglass on 7 November 2023.
Garda Declan Byrne told the court that he was called to the scene of an accident at SuperValu, Baltinglass, where he met the driver of a Peugeot car which had been damaged by Mr Vines’s jeep. The driver of the car told Garda Byrne that she’d been turning right into SuperValu carpark when Mr Vines’s jeep come from across the road, hitting the side of her car. Garda Byrne said that the jeep continued moving after hitting the Peugeot and only stopped when it hit the wall of the supermarket.
Garda Byrne also said that Mr Vines was in an ambulance by the time he got to the scene and that he said that his brakes failed as his jeep was coming down the hill at Belan Street before he reached the junction and went through the main road.
Garda Kieran Kennedy, a vehicle inspector for the gardaí, told Judge Geraldine Carthy that he inspected Mr Vines’s jeep and could not find anything wrong with the brakes and that the handbrake was also working properly.
CCTV footage of the incident was then shown in court, showing the jeep coming down the hill and not stopping at the junction as it should have. It continued across the main road, hitting the Peugeot and continuing on until it hit the supermarket wall.
Mr Vines, with an address at Red Bog, Blessington, Co Wicklow gave direct evident himself, telling the judge that he was returning home from a job and that his vehicle and the brakes were working fine before he reached the junction that he drove across. He said he had put his foot on the brake pedal several times to stop the jeep but that it didn’t work. He said that he “got a fright, it all happened in a flash”.
Inspector Conor Nolan put it to Mr Vines that he didn’t see the brake lights being activated on the CCTV footage, while Michael O’Brien BL submitted to Judge Carthy that there was no evidence of criminality.
However, Judge Carthy said that after hearing all of the evidence, she was satisfied that the state had made its case and found Mr Vines guilty of careless driving. She said it could have been a “misjudgement” by Mr Vines that he didn’t stop on time at the junction and, while fining him €500, she declined to impose a driving ban.
