Driving high, then the crash

A methamphetamine-fuelled man who careened through an intersection as fast as 100kmh says a drink bottle is to blame for his driving.

But what flummoxed a judge more is how the 37-year-old man was still on a learner’s licence.

Corey Michael Rabbitts, 37, was sentenced in the Palmerston North District Court yesterday for causing injury while driving with drugs in his system.

The incident happened just before 9am on February 12, when he was driving an un-warranted car along Flygers Line towards State Highway 3, just outside of Palmerston North.

While Flygers Line is usually a 100kmh zone, there was a posted temporary speed limit of 30kmh.

Rabbitts was supposed to give way at the intersection, but eyewitnesses estimated he travelled through at between 80 and 100kmh.

He struck a car, which then crashed into another car. All three cars were extensively damaged.

A woman in one of the cars was seriously injured, suffering bruising and fractures to her sternum, ribs and collarbone.

In her victim impact statement, she said she and her husband had to cancel a trip to visit friends and family overseas they had not seen in more than 40 years.

There were costs in cancelling the trip and from the wrecked car.

Defence lawyer Marina Anderson submitted Rabbitts should get community detention, as it would enable him to continue his parttime self-employment as a tattoo artist. That would allow him to get money together to pay reparation, she said.

Rabbitts was sentenced to 41⁄2 months’ home detention and 200 hours’ community work, and was disqualified from driving for a year and ordered to pay $1500 emotional-harm reparation.