Lorry owner pays €13,000 in green diesel fees and fines
A businessman has been fined €5,000 after green diesel was found in two of his lorry fleet which was on top of €8,000 he had to pay Revenue when the vehicles were seized arising out of the same incident.
Judge Kevin Kilrane told Jason Taylor that it was only right he was levied with such financial penalties.
“The pain must be more expensive for you to use the wrong fuel. You must realise it is more expensive for you now to use the illegal fuel than the legal one,” Judge Kilrane told the defendant.
Taylor, of Rathneeney, Laghy, County Donegal pleaded guilty to two counts of keeping green diesel in two articulated lorries at a depot he runs at Cleveragh Business Park on June 14 th 2016.
The court heard that Customs carried out a dipping of the fuel tanks of the defendant’s fleet of lorries and two were found to contain marked diesel, one having a concentration of 62% and the other 30%.
State Solicitor Mr Hugh Sheridan (prosecuting) said the defendant co-operated with the sampling but he had no explanation as to why the marked diesel was in the tanks.
He has two previous convictions for the same offence, one in Letterkenny in 2011 for which he was fined €2,500 and another in 2013 in Sligo when another €2,500 fine was imposed.
Mr Sheridan explained that the two lorries were seized but were released back to the defendant after he paid fees of €8,000. The trucks were seized because the defendant’s previous offences.
Taylor told the court he now had a fleet of 50 vehicles and employed 60 drivers. At the time of the offence he had 12 lorries. He has had random checks by customs since and everything was fine, he said.
The defendant told Mr Tom MacSharry, solicitor (defending) that he had been in hospital at the time of the offence. His brother managed to get the €8,000 together to get the lorries back.
Taylor said he believed it had been a genuine accident but that he did not know who had filled the lorry tanks. It was one of three people.
Since the incident, the green tanks have been moved away from the white ones at both his depots.
“The fuels are 150 yards apart now,” he said. He said his business had grown well and was working with several ‘ blue chip’ companies.
In reply to Mr Sheridan, Taylor said the two lorries which had the marked diesel were in long haul use. The tanks in those lorries were 1,000 litres and he agreed with Mr Sheridan that the concentrations of 62% and 30% were high.
Judge Kevin Kilrane said it was difficult to avoid the suspicion that green diesel wasn’t in systemic use. This was the defendant’s third conviction.
“You have suffered quite a bit and rightly so. The pain must be more expensive for you to use the wrong fuel,” Judge Kilrane told the defendant.
On two counts of keeping green diesel in two of lorries, Taylor was fined a total of €5,000.