Busted driving while on mobile

A TOOWOOMBA man may have made the most expensive phone call of his life after he was busted by police talking on his mobile phone while driving to pick up the kids from school.

Police on patrol in Kleinton about 2.46pm on September 12 spotted Lindsay William Baartz talking on his mobile phone as he drove on Meringandan Shirley Road.

While Baartz initially denied talking on the phone, when police checked his phone record it showed an incoming call minutes before he was stopped by police, prosecutor Bettina Trenear told Toowoomba Magistrates Court on Tuesday.

A check of his driving record also showed the 37-yearold’s licence was demerit point suspended at the time, she said.

Baartz pleaded guilty to driving on a suspended licence and using a mobile phone when driving arising from the incident.

Ms Trenear said the ticketable fine for use of a mobile phone was $1078.

Baartz’s solicitor Joe McConnell, of McConnell Saldumbide Lawyers, told the court his client hadn’t intended on driving that day but had been asked to pick up the children from school by their mother who couldn’t do so.

Without any available public transport and no one else available to drive, Mr McConnell told the court his client had made the decision to drive and he had been talking on the phone to his wife about the children at the time, he said.

The licence disqualification would significantly affect Baartz’s business as a diesel fitter as he travelled up to 1000km a week, Mr McConnell said.

Magistrate Clare Kelly noted this was Baartz’s third mobile phone infringement and fined him a total $1528 and disqualified him from holding or obtaining a driver’s licence for six months.

The conviction was not recorded.