'Disgust' voiced at sentence handed down over wild police chase whilst driver was high on heroin and cocaine
The father of a drunk-driving victim has said he is “totally disgusted” by the punishment handed down to a woman who led police on a 100mph pursuit while high on a cocktail of drugs.
Peter Dolan said that the woman’s behaviour was “disgraceful” and called out for a deterrent sentence.
Mr Dolan lost his student son Enda, 18, in 2014 when a van driven by a drunken and drugged-up man struck him while he walked in south Belfast.
The killer driver was given a sentence of three-and-a-half years in jail, which was later upper to four-and-a-half on appeal, and ever since then Mr Dolan has campaigned for stiffer sentences for serious motor offenders.
The News Letter has run a spate of stories in the last few months about low-level sentences being handed out in cases of extreme driving, and the latest one came at Newry Crown Court on Tuesday when Charlotte Spence – 35, of Railway Street in Strabane – was given a two-year probation order and banned from driving for a year.
She had admitted dangerous driving, driving while banned, possessing heroin, and using a car without insurance, all committed in April 2020.
It is not clear why her case took five years to be resolved.
In any case, it all began when police were called to a report of two people passed out in the front seats of a car in Keady, Co Armagh.
The court was told that Spence spotted them and reversed “at speed” to escape, showing “complete disregard for multiple pedestrians who were in the area”, according to the judge.
Police caught up with the vehicle and officers once more tried to speak to the occupants, but the vehicle made off at speed again, "forcing one of the officers back into a hedge”.
During the ensuing pursuit into Armagh city, the car was driving "into a one way street, mounting kerbs and pedestrian walkways” before the front nearside tyre came off. It continued to be driven at up to 100 mph, travelling on the rim of one wheel.
Spence then “carried out several dangerous manoeuvres including undertaking two HGV lorries at speed on the hard shoulder, travelling round a right hand bend on the opposing lane of traffic forcing an oncoming motorist to take evasive action to avoid a collision, performed an overtake manoeuvre narrowly missing a collision with another HGV lorry, driving the wrong way round a roundabout on the approach to Newry, and all the while exceeding the national speed limit... swerving onto the opposing lane of traffic and on the approach to a bridge, [then] travelled onto the wrong side of the road before turning into the driveway of a house under construction and coming to a halt against a pile of rubble”.
Spence, the court heard, “flung open the driver’s door” with such force that it damaged a police vehicle, then tried to run off.
She was unsteady on her feet, her speech was slurred and her eyes were glazed. She had heroin, cocaine, and cannabis in her system.
In mitigation, her defence lawyer argued that "there has been a change in lifestyle… she is a very different person now".
Commenting on the sentence, Mr Dolan said: “How do you respond to something like that?”
He said a custodial term would have been “more appropriate”, plus “a driving ban for a lot more than one year”.
"We’ve been campaigning for nearly 10 years in relation to careless and dangerous driving, and trying to get the law changed to try and promote a deterrent,” he said.
"And we feel like we’re up against a brick wall. We feel that our pleas have not been listened to by a lot of people, in particular the judiciary and justice department.
"We need to be putting out a deterrent here. We’ve had an individual here who had a complete disregard for pedestrians, other drivers, and to do what she did in the condition she was in was just totally disgraceful.
"What happens if there was a fatality here? Why are the judges not putting down a marker, putting down a deterrent, for other individuals? This is what I can’t get my head around.
"To walk away with a one-year driving ban, it’s not acceptable. It’s not on.”
When it was put to the Lady Chief Justice's office that some would consider the sentence too lenient, it responded: “It is not appropriate for the Lady Chief Justice (outside her role as an appellate judge when a particular sentencing disposal is appealed before her or referred to the Court of Appeal on which she sits) to comment or express any opinion on a sentence handed down in an individual case.
"In relation to sentencing in general, the sentence imposed will depend on the specific circumstances in each case and a wide range of different factors will be considered. In calculating the appropriate sentence for a particular offence, the judge will consider all of the evidence provided to the court as well as the relevant statute and case law (legal principles emerging from earlier decided cases) including the maximum sentence which the court can impose, any sentencing guideline judgments relevant to the offence committed, whether the offender pleaded guilty, the level of culpability, the offender’s previous convictions, and any other aggravating or mitigating factors presented to the court by the prosecution and defence.
"The court may also take into account other evidence such as a victim statement, expert medical reports and a pre-sentence report (prepared by the Probation Service about the offender and making a recommendation on possible sentencing disposals, although it is important to note that the court does not have to accept the recommendation).
"If the Director of Public Prosecutions considers the sentence to be too lenient, in certain circumstances, he has the power to refer it to the Court of Appeal for review.”