Join Wiseman Lawyers Traffic Lawyer Andrew Wiseman at Bundaberg Magistrates Court as he represents a client charged with multiple offences. Watch Andrew explain what happened in the courtroom, along with the outcome which he achieved and how he achieved it.
All right, today I’m at Bundaberg Magistrates Court. Pretty complex and serious matter today. Client was, initially when they engaged us back in January, was charged with repeat disqualified driving, repeat drink driving, and a number of other charges. In the nine months since then, he’s continued to offend and there’s been a total of 11 charges arising.
Initially when he engaged us, there was five, but he reoffended and on a number of occasions. Initially in Dolby, and then the remainder of the charges are arising in Bundaberg.
So over the course of nine months, since engaging us in January, he’s gone from, as I said, five charges to a total of nine. We had to get them all moved from the various courts into Bundaberg on the same date, so they could all be dealt with it once.
So what was dealt with today was two counts of disqualified driving, one of drink driving, one of drug driving, failure to properly control a vehicle, and then there was a number of other less serious charges, namely unregistered, uninsured, but there was two counts of possessed dangerous drug, utensils.
So again, 11 charges, a bit of a laundry list, but of equal concern was his history. He had multiple disqualified drivings, both in Queensland and New South Wales. Previous drink drivings, a lengthy criminal history.
So today wasn’t about his licence. It was all about trying to avoid jail. Somebody who’s got no criminal history and very little traffic history, who’s facing their third and fourth qualified driving faces a real risk of jail. Ordinarily, we keep them out, but we do see unrepresented persons or inadequately represented persons is actually going in or getting suspended sentences for third and fourth disqualified drivings. He’d previously been given a wholly suspended sentence for various offendings.
So obviously this was all about trying to avoid jail and, needless to say, it wasn’t an easy job. Basically, we asked him to complete the reformatory course we get everyone to do. We asked him to get some references. I got detailed instructions from him. I had to draught detailed summaries of case law in order to try to persuade the magistrate not to physically imprison my client. I flew up last night, met the client this morning, about an hour before court. We ran through my submissions, the procedure, what they can expect procedurally and what to be said, and you know where to sit here, stand there, et cetera.
I guided the magistrate through the difficulties he’d suffered since the incident, difficulties he’ll continue to suffer after penalty. We did negotiate with the police on certain charges to try and get mutually satisfactory charges, in lieu of more serious ones at the outset.
Long and short of it is, I was able to keep him out at jail. He did get a wholly suspended term of imprisonment, so six months imprisonment, wholly suspended for two years and a number of disqualifications. But again, the licence was the least of his concerns. It was all about avoiding jail, which he has. So he’s not going to jail. The six months suspended imprisonment will hang over his head for two years. If he can get through and not reoffend, that’ll be the end of it. But obviously if he does breach the two year suspension period, he’ll have to give me another call. But he avoided jail. He’s obviously very happy.
I’m Andrew Wiseman, Bundaberg Magistrates Court. Thanks for watching.