Woman tells court she was forced to drive against her will

A WEXFORD woman who pleaded guilty to road traffic offences, but claimed she had forced to drive against her will, saw her case adjourned at Arklow District Court last Wednesday.

Natalie Byrne (30), 7 Riverchapel Downs, Riverchapel, Gorey, Co Wexford, was charged with the misuse of a vehicle registration plate, no insurance, driving without a licence, non-display of disc, non-display of insurance disc user, and provisional licence unaccompanied by a qualifed driver, at Killinskyduff, Arklow on February 1, 2019. The non-display of disc user charge and failure to produce charges were withdrawn by the prosecution.

The court heard that at 2.28 p.m. on the date in question, a vehicle driven by the defendant was stopped by gardaí at a checkpoint. There were two different registration plates on the vehicle. Gardai spoke to the driver and discovered that the insurance was in someone else’s name. The NCT disc had a date of March 2018 and the tax disc had expired on August 2018. It was claimed that the registration had been mixed up by the garage but this was not explained.

The second registration plate belonged to an occupant of the vehicle. Tickets were issued but not paid.

The court heard Ms Byrne had eleven previous convictions for road traffic offences.

Solicitor Padraig Hyland said the defendant had been in difficult circumstances and had been forced into the driving seat before the checkpoint. She had not been the party driving without insurance, he said.

Giving evidence, Ms Byrne said she was in the car with her ex-partner. They spotted the checkpoint due to the traffic and she got into the driver’s seat. She did not say anything to the gardaí at the time and had been unaware that there were different registration plates on the vehicle.

Ms Byrne said the car had been put in her name by her ex-partner and she had never driven this car.

Mr Hyland said the defendant had two children and her father was ill. She was travelling by bus to visit him. She admitted she had not had insurance.

Judge David Kennedy asked who had been operating the checkpoint. He said that, if events happened as Ms Byrne described, this was a serious allegation and it was not fair for Ms Byrne to take the penalty if another had committed the offence.

The prosecution requested time to investigate these allegations.

Judge David Kennedy adjourned the case to March 11. He said he did not want to convict the defendant if she had carried out the actions against her will.

Ms Byrne said she would prefer to deal with the charges and take the consequences. However, Judge Kennedy said he was not going to do this and adjourned the case.