Our 33-year-old client who due to committing a number of traffic offences, had accumulated more than 13 demerit points in one year.
Instead of accepting a driver licence suspension period, he elected to be on a good behaviour licence for a period of 12 months.
This means that if our client committed a further traffic offence carrying 2 or more demerit points, he would lose his licence for double the initial suspension period.
Approximately one month into his good behaviour licence, and on a double demerit weekend, our client was caught by police driving with a 4 year old child in his motor vehicle who was not properly restrained.
He was stopped by police who issued him an on-the-spot fine of $337. This offence ordinarily carries 3 demerit points, however due to being the long weekend, our client was faced with 6 demerit points.
Our client contacted our Parramatta traffic law firm office. He spoke to our traffic lawyer Tayla Regan. On our advice, our client elected to go to take the matter to court. Our traffic law team immediately commenced work on his case.
Tayla Regan assisted our client to gather the appropriate materials that maximised his chances at getting the best possible outcome. If our client were to be convicted with the demerit points, he would be unable to drive for a long time which would impact his life in many ways.
On the day of court, numerous subjective materials were tendered to court including a letter of apology, good character reference letter, photographs of a newly purchased child restraint, a GP mental health plan, Narcotics Anonymous tokens and an employment document stipulating his need for a driver licence.
Ms. Regan made compelling submissions with respect to our clients need for a licence in two particular ways. The first was that he needed to drive for work – supported by documents stating his employment was contingent on a driver license. The second consideration was that he needed to drive himself to drug rehabilitation to prevent relapse.
Whilst our client’s traffic history was lengthy and he was on a good behaviour licence at the time, the Magistrate in court was convinced enough to not convict our client, which allowed him to continue driving.
He was sentenced to enter into a Conditional Release Order without conviction for a period of 9 months.
Given there was no conviction recorded, this meant that our client received no fine or demerit points, and therefore was not in breach of his good behaviour licence. Our client was able to keep his driver licence.