A mother of four facing her tenth conviction for driving without insurance avoided a jail sentence for at least a week after the judge declared he was “not happy” with the way the prosecuting garda was reading out her previous convictions in the District Court this week (October 27 ).
Olivia O’Neill (32 ), from 23, Battery Heights, Athlone was in court for sentencing after being found guilty of driving without insurance on a previous date.
O’Neill had been stopped by Garda Joseph Hirst on May 20 at Deerpark, Athlone, and he told the court how she had no insurance, no licence, no tax, nor had she been able to produce any of these documents to a station of her choice within the allocated 10 days.
He told Judge Aeneas McCarthy that O’Neill had 82 previous convictions, 50 of which were for road traffic offences, 10 of which were specifically for driving without insurance.
Her most recent conviction was from Mullingar District Court on March 12, 2009, where she was handed down a six year driving ban for driving whilst disqualified, as well as being fined €300.
Garda Hirst continued reading O’Neill’s list of related convictions, but caught the judge’s attention when he mentioned a conviction for having no insurance from Athlone District Court on May 16, 2006 as “taken into consideration”.
“That’s impossible,” said the judge. “No insurance can only be taken into consideration with something else.”
The expression “taken into consideration” is used in court in a multi-charge case, where the defendant is convicted of one serious offence (eg driving without insurance, driving whilst drunk ), along with a number of lesser offences (eg not producing documents to a Garda station ). The court will sentence and/or fine the defendant specifically on the serious offence, and all additional convictions that won’t add to the sentence or fine will be deemed to be taken into consideration.
When Garda Hirst couldn’t immediately clarify O’Neill’s situation from the substantial sheaf of documents before him to the satisfaction of the judge, he adjourned sentencing until next Wednesday (November 3 ) because of “the serious consequences for this lady”.
“I’m not happy with those previous convictions. They must be taken into consideration with something else,” said the judge.
