LIFE-BAN PENSIONER CAUGHT IN CAR BASH

Man had 119 convictions, court told

A PENSIONER banned from driving more than 30 times was back in court yesterday after causing a car crash.

Thomas Herron, who turns 74 at the end of the month, was disqualified from the road for life in 2008.

Despite this ban, he was back behind the wheel in 2018 when he caused a collision in Dundonald, on the outskirts of East Belfast, while driving to visit his partner in hospital. Judge Geoffrey Miller said Herron’s criminal record for driving while banned was “outrageously lengthy and relevant” and handed him an 18-month term suspended for three years. He was also banned from the road for life again.

Downpatrick Crown Court, sitting in Belfast, heard that despite initial denials he was the driver, the accused admitted three charges arising from the incident. Herron, from Well Road in Ballywalter, Co Down, pleaded guilty to driving while disqualified, no insurance and failing to report an accident.

The remote hearing was told a Suzuki driven by Herron scraped against a car at a junction on the Upper Newtownards Road on September 16, 2018. The accused gave a false name and address and claimed he didn’t have his driving licence and his vehicle was insured.

But he was caught when stopped by police in November that year and has already been sentenced for these crimes.

Judge Miller said Herron had 188 convictions, 119 for motoring offences.

He noted three further convictions for driving while disqualified since the 2008 ban, which Judge Miller said “brings the total for this offence to 41 – a figure unprecedented in this court”.